'A rollicking pageant' The Queen has commanded Will Shakespeare to write a play about her favourite character, Sir John Falstaff, in love. The catch is that it is to be performed in two weeks time at the great feast of the garter ceremony - which happens to coincide with Will’s 34th birthday. As Will panics, trying to escape from the bailiffs, Ben Jonson arrives to lend a hand, but when every boy actor in the company go down with the measles, all seems lost. A lost bear, a stage-struck wife, a jealous husband, a hen-pecked friend, singing mistresses and many more add to the chaos. “If you were commissioning a play about the Man of the Millennium, you would hope for something like Reg Mitchell’s ‘By Royal Command’ ... So the Shakespeare Millennium Birthday Celebrations Committee have every reason to feel delighted with the outcome of their commission.... Reg Mitchell has woven every known fact and most of the unknown facts about the life of the town’s most famous son, sprinkled in allusions to many of his works adding a range of pointers as to their possible inspiration, selected a galaxy of famous names from the time and produced a rollicking pageant for the town.” (Stratford Standard.)