Eileen Atkins as Ellen Terry, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

Have you ever thought, how much we all, and women especially, owe to Shakespeare for his vindication of woman in his fearless, high-spirited, resolute and intelligent heroines?

-Ellen Terry

As the French have Sarah Bernhardt, the Italians Eleonora Duse; the English have their own legendary actress and it is Dame Ellen Terry. A mythologised muse and chief Shakespearean actress over 7 decades, Terry will be celebrated in a one-woman show, written by and starring grande dame Eileen Atkins.  

Born in 1847 into a family of actors, there was something special about Ellen Terry. Modern, intelligent and celestially beautiful, she struck and beguiled the imagination of a generation. Having played most of the prominent Shakespearian roles, she started touring the world giving lectures about Shakespearian heroines. She used to introduce her lectures by quoting the great actor Henry Irving: 'Shakespeare must be kept up or we shall become a third-rate nation'.

Sharing a love of Shakespeare with her Terry, Atkins has taken two lectures – The Triumphant Women In Shakespeare and The Pathetic Women In Shakespeare – and compressed them into one, weaving in biographical details about their author.

At nearly eighty years old, Dame Eileen Atkins (Cranford, Upstairs Downstairs, Gosford Park) has worked extensively in theatre, television and cinema since 1953. She's also an exceptional screenwriter, as anyone who saw her adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, starring Vanessa Redgrave, can attest.

Atkins as Terry sounds pretty remarkable - and all this in the most exciting new venue in London: the Globe's indoor Sam Wannamaker Playhouse

Don't miss this: it won't come round again. 

Ticket price: £25-45