GETTING kids into Shakespeare can be a challenge, but there’s one theatre company with it’s sights firmly set on engaging youngsters in the work of the Bard.

Shakespeare 4 Kidz is the brainchild of director Julian Chenery and he’s bringing one of it’s most successful productions, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, on tour to the Cliffs Pavilion, Westcliff, at the end of the month.

The tale of Duke Theseus and his Amazonian Queen Hippolyta, two sets of lovers who get lost in a forest patrolled by a feuding fairy King and Queen, the mischevious sprite Puck and the hapless workman Bottom, has enough of its own magic to capture most imaginations.

But the company gives it a child-friendly makeover, working in music, song and modern language, while keeping in classic lines from the original text.

“We felt the reason people often turned off Shakespeare, for whatever reason, was that studying it at school was so dull, like learning Greek or Latin,” explains Julian.

“The language created a barrier, some people engaged with it and some didn’t. We felt if you could tell the story to a much younger age group the fear would disappear.” It’s recieved high praise and celebrity endorsement, with Southend’s own Helen Mirren dubbing it “the Avatar of Shakespeare, with something to be enjoyed by all age groups, a great message and lots of fun and fantasy”.

“It’s a musical theatre production,” says Julian. “It blends understandable language with the original Shakespeare text and songs and dance and music.

“It’s very funny, it lasts a couple of hours and it keeps very faithful to the plot and the charaters.”

Julian was inspired to set up the company after he realised that despite Shakespeare’s iconic status, many people knew nothing about some of his most famous plays.

He explains: “That’s what triggered it for me. If Shakespeare was such a big part of English culture then why is it so many people couldn’t tell you the plot of Hamlet or Macbeth?

“The problems as far as dealing with Shakespeare as pieces of entertainment or something you learn at school is the language. It isn’t easy to understand for most young people of the 21st century.”

A Midsummer Night’s Dream was the first production the company turned its hand to, back in 1996.

Since then their version of the classic play has been performed by schools up and down the country.

The company’s repertoire now includes Macbeth, Hamlet, Twelfth Night, the Tempest and Romeo and Juliet, as well as A Midsummer Night’s Dream and three of the shows are due to be transfered onto the silver screen this year.

“We’re working with Elsinore Productions on film versions of Hamlet, Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet,” says Julian.

“We should start shooting them in May or June.

“We’re doing Hamlet and Macbeth together and hopefully by the end of the year we’ll have three of them ready to be released whenever the distributer wants to do them.”