Going to the theatre has always been an important part of any trip to London. Not only does the city boast some of the great theatres but ticket prices are usually reasonable. It is also home to the world’s longest-running play, The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie. The story has been at St Martin’s Theatre for over seventy years. London also hosts the world’s two longest-running musicals. Les Miserables and The Phantom of the Opera have been running on the London stage for nearly forty years. Les Mis, as it is commonly known, celebrates its fortieth birthday in October 2025, and Phantom passes the forty-year mark a year later.

To put it mildly, attitudes towards witches and sorcerers in the Elizabethan period were confusing and often contradictory. While Bloody Mary (reigned 1553 - 1558) was vicious in her treatment of witches, Elizabeth I (1558 - 1603) had a more ambivalent relationship to this subject. After all her mother, Anne Boleyn had been accused of being a witch because of a malformation of her left hand, which appeared in the form of an extra finger. Elizabeth, as a strong female ruler, may not have been happy about hunting down the fair sex, therefore, and accusing those who might be innocent of any crime.