Timon of Athens, IV.iii, 1999, Royal Shakespeare Company.

Timon launches Alcibiades and his whores against the Athens which rejected him. Michael Pennington, Timon of Athens; Rupert Penry-Jones, Alcibiades; Nadine Marshall, Timandra; Kemi Baruwa as Phrynia; Director, Gregory Doran; Designer, Stephen Brimson Lewis.

"After the interval there is nothing but the bare boards of the huge oval floor, a wasteland under a mourning sun. The refuge of the vagabond Timon is a pit at the very front of the stage in which he's digging for the roots of reality and is patently his expected grave." Patrick Carnegy, Spectator 5.9.99


John Day's play Humour Out of Breath (1608) refers to "the lord that gave all to his followers, and begged more for himself" - a possible allusion to Timon supporting a date before 1608. Shakespeare may have played the Poet. In 1678 Thomas Shadwell produced an adaptation, The History of Timon of Athens, the Man-Hater, to which Henry Purcell composed music. Shadwell added Melissa, Timon's faithless fiancée, and Evandre, his loyal and discarded mistress. Other adaptations include James Dance's in 1768, followed by Richard Cumberland's at Drury Lane in 1771, in which the dying Timon gives Evadne to Alcibiades; Thomas Hull's at Covent Garden in 1786; George Lamb's at Drury Lane in 1816; and an 1851 production reinstating Shakespeare's original text by Samuel Phelps at Sadler's Wells. On Broadway, in 1993, Brian Bedford played the title role. Donald Cooper: photographer. Rights: Donald Cooper This image may be used for educational purposes only: picture courtesy of AHDS.ac.uk. Performing Arts Collection. Data partly from Wikipedia, by Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License.