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Cymbeline may have been a king of Britain in Roman times �� or maybe not: the evidence for his existence as an historical figure is scanty at best. But whether his status is more historic or legendary, more factual or mythological, he is the title character of an intriguing and unusual play by William Shakespeare.

Within Shakespeare’s oeuvre, the play Cymbeline, King of Britain is customarily categorized among Shakespeare’s “romances��, alongside plays like The Tempest and The Winter’s Tale. These plays, composed late in Shakespeare’s career, combine elements of the comic and the tragic, often within a strange and otherworldly setting.

Shakespeare may have been writing romances at this time in part because his theatrical company, enjoying at that time the patronage of King James I, was able to perform indoors, at the Blackfriars theatre; there, elaborate productions that were heavy on pageantry and special effects could be staged more easily than in the outdoor setting of the Globe theatre. Additionally, Shakespeare’s composition of “romances�� may reflect changes in the theatrical fashion of his time �� audiences may have gotten tired of plays being tidily categorized into tragedies like Hamlet, comedies like A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and histories like Henry V.

As movies from the “Bollywood�� cinematic tradition of India often offer their viewers a little bit of everything �� a mix of music and drama and comedy and suspense and romance, constituting a sort of cinematic masala �� so Shakespeare’s romances typically have something for everyone; and Cymbeline is no exception in that regard.

The play Cymbeline is set in the time of the first Roman emperor, Augustus Caesar -- or, to put it another way, sometime between 27 B.C. and 14 A.D. And as the play begins, Cymbeline, King of Britain, is angry with Imogen, his daughter from his first marriage to a wife who has since died. The reason? Like many another Shakespearean father, Cymbeline has tried and failed to control the marital destiny of his daughter; having remarried, Cymbeline would have liked for Imogen to marry his new Queen’s son, Cloten. But Imogen secretly married the noble but poor Posthumus, thus incurring her father’s wrath.

Cymbeline’s Queen is meanwhile pursuing her own hidden agenda; she has been encouraging Cymbeline to refuse Rome the tribute that the Britons have paid since the time of Julius Caesar �� an act that makes war between Rome and Britain all but certain. This is all part of the Queen’s plan to do away with Cymbeline and make her son Cloten the king of Britain. The Queen is confident in the success of her foul scheme; seeking to persuade Posthumus�� servant Pisanio to join her conspiracy, she declares that Cymbeline’s “fortunes all lie speechless, and his name/Is at last gasp.�� Fortunately, Pisanio is one of a number of characters who reject treachery.

Cloten, the Queen’s son, is a good example of the apple not falling far from the tree. He loves to indulge in vain boasts regarding his quarrelsome nature �� “Every jack-slave hath his bellyful of fighting, and I must go up and down like a cock that nobody can match.�� And Cloten wants to possess Imogen, bringing musicians to serenade her with songs about how “the lark at heaven’s gate sings,/And Phoebus gins arise,�� and he is frustrated that she rejects him. Mind you, Cloten does not love Imogen; Cloten loves no one but Cloten.

And as if Imogen did not have enough troubles already, further troubles await. For Posthumus, sent away from Britain by the king’s order, has taken refuge in Italy; and while in Italy, staying at the home of his friend Philario, he has made the acquaintance of one Iachimo, a “player�� who boasts that he can seduce any woman, including Posthumus�� beloved Imogen. Posthumus impulsively, and foolishly, agrees to a wager with Iachimo, to the effect that Imogen will be true. I can’t help wondering how Imogen would feel about this wager, if she only knew.

Iachimo travels to Britain, meets Imogen, and (after a brief and notably unsuccessful seduction attempt) persuades Imogen to let him store some of his valuables in her locked bedroom. Bad idea, that �� for one of the larger boxes turns out to contain Iachimo himself, who lets himself out in Imogen’s room after Imogen has fallen asleep. Noting that the household has fallen asleep �� “The crickets sing, and man’s o’erlaboured sense/Repairs itself by rest�� �� Iachimo beholds Imogen’s beauty: “‘Tis her breathing that/Perfumes the chamber thus.�� While he’s about it, Iachimo takes careful note of the paintings and decorations in the room, steals off Imogen’s arm a bracelet that Posthumus gave her, and notes a mole-shaped birthmark near Imogen’s exposed breast �� all so that he can pretend to have accomplished Imogen’s seduction, and so that he can win his bet.

Posthumus, like a long line of jealous and frankly misogynistic men in Shakespeare’s plays �� Claudio in Much Ado About Nothing, for example, or both Iago and Othello in Othello �� believes Iachimo’s claims to have seduced Imogen, and bitterly denounces the manner in which, as he believes, Imogen pretended to be “As chaste as unsunned snow.�� Posthumus�� rage extends so far as ordering his servant Pisanio to take Imogen to Milford Haven in Wales, and to kill her on the way.

Fortunately, Pisanio is an ethical man who is resistant to treacherous plans, whether those plans come from his master or from Cymbeline’s Queen. Pisanio, a choral figure in the play, tells Imogen of Posthumus�� order, blaming his master’s misplaced jealousy on “slander,/Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue/Outvenoms all the worms of Nile.�� Imogen is initially in despair at learning that her beloved husband believes in her infidelity and has called for her murder; but eventually, she learns that “Some griefs are med’cinable.�� At Pisanio’s urging, Imogen (like Rosalind in As You Like It and Viola in Twelfth Night) disguises herself as a boy, and her journey to Milford Haven continues on that basis.

So, is this play plot-heavy enough for you yet? But wait, I prithee; for verily, there is yet more. It turns out that, twenty years before the main action of Cymbeline, King of Britain, the kingly title character (whose royal judgement is often questionable) unjustly suspected Belarius, one of his noblemen, of treason. Belarius fled the court, and took with him Cymbeline’s sons Arviragus and Guiderius. Unaware of their true identity, and long thought to be dead by everyone at court, Guiderius and Arviragus have been brought up as sons by Belarius, and the three live humbly, as hunters, in the area around �� wait for it, wait for it �� Milford Haven, in Wales!

Coincidence, that force that ne’er stands still,
Resolveth many a play by Master Will.

Imogen, now disguised as a boy named “Fidele,�� finds a welcome home with Belarius, Arviragus, and Guiderius, all of whom are charmed by her “boyish�� good looks. Belarius describes Imogen/”Fidele�� as “By Jupiter, an angel! Or, if not,/An earthly paragon. Behold divineness/No elder than a boy.��

There is still, seemingly, a potential danger for Imogen. Cymbeline’s treacherous queen, like Claudius in Hamlet, had sought to prepare poison as a backup plan; she gave to Pisanio the potion that she had prepared, claiming that it was a tonic. Fortunately, the court physician, one Cornelius, had suspected the Queen of treachery, and had made the “poison�� into a harmless potion that induces nothing more than a deep sleep. Yet when a headache-stricken Imogen asks Pisanio for the potion, takes it, and falls asleep, everyone assumes that she has died, and a sorrowful Arviragus offers moving words of mourning:

With fairest flowers,
Whilst summer lasts and I live here, Fidele,
I’ll sweeten thy sad grave. Thou shalt not lack
The flower that’s like thy face, pale primrose, nor
The azured harebell, like thy veins.

Posthumus, meanwhile, has made his own way to Milford Haven, and has been captured in the context of a Roman-British war that has broken out over the nonpayment-of-tribute issue. Sentenced to hang, Posthumus must endure not only the fears of impending death but also the company of an unnecessarily jolly jailer who is given to dime-store philosophizing like this prosaic little tribute to the hangman’s rope: “O, the charity of a penny cord! It sums up thousands in a trice.��

Yet “Fear no more the heat o�� the sun,/Nor the furious winter’s rages��; for Cymbeline, King of Britain is a romance, not a tragedy. Cloten, plotting a particularly grotesque revenge against both Imogen and Posthumus, will get his comeuppance; so will the treacherous and conniving Queen. And, as if to draw attention to how hard he is working to give the audience a happy ending, Shakespeare has Jupiter �� the king of the Roman gods himself �� put in an appearance toward play’s end, in a deliberate and quite literal example of deus ex machina that may remind readers of the moment when Hymen, the Greek god of marriage, appears to bless the happy couples at the end of As You Like It.

Cymbeline, King of Britain holds an unusual place among Shakespeare's plays. It is, with King Lear, one of only two Shakespeare plays set in ancient, pre-Norman Conquest Britain -- in contrast with nine plays about English history (Richard II, the two parts of Henry IV, Henry V, the three parts of Henry VI, Richard III, and Henry VIII). Moreover, as you may already have gathered, Shakespeare’s romances can be something of an acquired taste.

If you prefer the generic purity of the Bard’s comedies, histories, and tragedies, then a play like Cymbeline, King of Britain may not be for you. But the play continues to make itself part of the Shakespearean conversation �� as when filmmaker Michael Almereyda adapted Cymbeline for the screen in 2014, with a contemporary setting (the Britons are a Sons of Anarchy-style motorcycle gang, the Romans are corrupt police officers) and a talented cast that includes Ethan Hawke, Ed Harris, Milla Jovovich, John Leguizamo, Dakota Johnson, Bill Pullman, and Delroy Lindo. Cymbeline unquestionably gives the reader the chance to experience something different in a Shakespeare play.