We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. 

Richard Roxburgh will return after a seven-year absence to the Sydney Theatre Company stage to play Prospero in The Tempest, the exiled duke who will come to seek forgiveness for his sins and plead for his freedom. It will be Roxburgh’s first Shakespearean role since playing the grief-stricken prince Hamlet in 1995.

Richard Roxburgh returns to the STC as Prospero in The Tempest. Image © Andrew Cowen.

The Tempest is the final play credited to the Bard, and grapples with peace and reconciliation, though has been subject to contemporary, critical post-colonial readings, particularly of the depiction of the colonised half-human, half-beast Caliban who lives on the island where Prospero and his daughter Miranda are marooned.

Artistic Director Kip Williams, who will direct the ensemble production at the Ros Packer Theatre from mid-November, tells Limelight he is thrilled to have coaxed Roxburgh, 60, into the magician’s role, the actor having last played at the company opposite Cate Blanchett in...