Though it's about an early real British king and Roman invaders, Shakespeare's Cymbeline isn't really a history, and -- since every plot complication is explained and worked out in the end -- it's no tragedy. The director, David Latham, writes that it is a romance, but he also says it's such a wonderful play, he can't understand why it is so rarely performed. Latham's new version is interestingly staged and superbly performed, but it's no wonderful play.
The plots all seem to relate to King Cymbeline of Britain. He wants his daughter Imogen to marry his stepson, a mean-spirited, vicious bully. So Imogen infuriates him by marrying the handsome, noble Posthumus, whom Cymbeline banishes to Rome. Posthumus wagers that an Italian, Iachimo, can't seduce Imogen, so Iachimo gets phony evidence that he had her, and the loving Posthumus sends his servant Pisanio to murder Imogen. Pisanio has her run away, disguised as a boy, to a hunter and his two noble rustic sons who suddenly love Imogen, and she loves them. But no incest, because they're really her lost brothers whom she never heard about.
Anyway, her stepmother, the evil queen, gave Pisanio a "healing" potion, which is poison, so Imogen takes it and falls into a deep sleep, and the seven dwarfs -- I mean, the two young men -- bury her. Eventually, King Cymbeline's life is saved from the Romans by his sons whom he doesn't know about, and he is united with them. And he's reunited with Imogen (who only appears dead and eventually wakes up, like Juliet and three other badly treated wives in Shakespeare). Posthumus is sorry he had his wife killed and sorry he fought along with the Romans, and when Imogen, disguised as a boy, comes to tell him she's okay, he decks her and almost really kills her. So it's a happy ending for those two to be reunited, I guess.
The Britons vs. Romans plot is more complicated and involves Imogen being found by the Romans, whom she faithfully serves and later saves from death. There's also the Roman god Jupiter, who keeps showing up and making pronouncements.
The production is very striking and includes great actors like Martha Henry as the evil queen, James Blendick as Cymbeline, and Bernard Hopkins as Pisanio. It's probably as good a Cymbeline as you're likely to see.
