Why Dungeons and Shakespeare is the Edinburgh Fringe’s most charmingly chaotic RPG experience

Actual play shows featuring tabletop roleplaying games have steadily established a presence at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe over recent years. While streams like Critical Role popularised live-streamed gaming into an art form, traditional actual plays on stage do not always hold an audience’s attention during a live theatrical run. Dungeons and Shakespeare, created and performed by Shelby Bond for Best Medicine Productions, takes a fundamentally different operational approach.

Shelby Bond, a trained actor from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, leverages theatrical principles to structure a fast-paced interactive one-shot. Rather than watching a cast play a campaign on stage, audience members step directly into the roles of Shakespearean heroes, villains, and classic Dungeons & Dragons monsters. Simplified mechanics and rolls of a giant D20 drive the story, keeping rules light while ensuring narrative momentum never flags.

During a recent Edinburgh Fringe performance, the mechanics yielded a chaotic climax. An audience member playing a Zombie Juliet took part in a total party wipe during the final moments of the game. Juliet, 21 in this play, fell to a misplaced fireball from Prospero, the wizard from The Tempest played by another audience member, who missed a dryad and struck the tragedy’s heroine. Elsewhere in the room, an audience member embraced playing a smothering carpet, while younger members assembled to form a Gelatinous Cube for the final battle.

The show balances the freedom of live improv with the structure of a tabletop roleplaying game. Having performed the show nearly 900 times across North America, Shelby operates like an experienced games master: forcing meaningful choices, steering the plot forward, and introducing dice rolls that capture the excitement of a natural 20 for non-gamers and tabletop veterans alike.

Prior knowledge of Dungeons & Dragons is not required to enjoy Dungeons and Shakespeare, though a passing familiarity with Shakespearean tropes and a willingness to participate enhance the experience. Speaking previously with Geek Native ahead of his Fringe debut, Shelby Bond highlighted how timeless classical tropes interact with live play:

Shakespeare’s characters are timeless because they represent the human condition and its strongest drives- love, jealousy, vengeance – and that’s what drives any story.

Dungeons and Shakespeare is currently touring following its Edinburgh Festival Fringe run. Full venue details and ticket information are available via the Edinburgh Fringe Box Office.