The Boys from Syracuse

The Boys from Syracuse is a musical by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, based on William Shakespeare’s play, The Comedy of Errors. The score includes swing and other contemporary rhythms of the 1930s and wasthe first musical to use Shakespeare as a source.

The plot centres around identical twins Antipholus of Ephesus and Antipholus of Syracuse, who were separated from each other in a shipwreck as young children. Their servants, both named Dromio, are also long-separated identical twins. When the pair from Syracuse come to Ephesus, a comedy of errors and mistaken identies ensues when the wives of the Ephesians, Adriana and her servant Luce, mistake the two strangers for their husbands. Adriana’s sister Luciana and the Syracuse Antipholus fall in love and all ends happily.