SHAKESPEARE lovers will be seeing double at Ludlow's extended arts festival this year. With two plays on the programme, many actors will be seen in a second role.

Philip Madoc returns to the Ludlow Festival as Shylock in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice.

Highlights

Madoc's warm-hearted portrayal of Sir John Falstaff was one of the highlights of last year's production of Merry Wives of Windsor.

His CV includes a wealth of theatrical, TV, film and radio work. This time, in the role of the Jewish money lender, he is tackling one of the most difficult parts ever written.

To add to the challenge, this year's Festival is spread over three weeks and takes in two plays. Madoc is also appearing in The Winter's Tale as the Old Shepherd, a role that is crucial in the unravelling of a complex plot.

A native of South Wales, Madoc is a leading member of a company that will give a Welsh lilt to this year's Shakespeare.

Bill Bellamy, a founder member of the National Youth Theatre of Wales, has a memorable encounter as Antigonus in The Winter's Tale when he exits the stage 'pursued by a bear'.

He has a more stately part in The Merchant of Venice as the Duke of Venice.

One of Theatr Clwyd's most promising actresses Siwan Morris won impressive reviews in the West End last year when she played opposite David Warner.

In Ludlow, she is cast as Shylock's runaway daughter Jessica.

She also plays Perdita, who is brought up by Philip Madoc's Old Shepherd after being abandoned by her father, the King of Sicily.

Literature

Heledd Baskerville recently worked with this year's director Michael Bogdanov on a BBC programme about Shakespeare in Wales.

She teams up with him again in The Merchant of Venice as Portia, whose speech about mercy contains some of the best known lines in all literature.

Her other role is as the shepherdess Mopsa in The Winter's Tale.