William Shakespeare
The Comedy of Errors
The full script in Final Draft, Word & PDF
Two sets of identical twins separated at birth arrive in the same city, and a day of mistaken identity turns Ephesus upside down.
PDFs Only
$4.99
- ✓ Stageplay PDF (72 pp.)
- ✓ Screenplay PDF (63 pp.)
- ✓ Instant download
Full Package
$12.99
- ✓ Final Draft (.fdx)
- ✓ Microsoft Word + RTF
- ✓ Screenplay + Stageplay PDFs
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All 37 plays in every format cost $99, less than 8 single Full Packages. PDFs only: $55 for all 37.
- Genre
- Comedy
- Written
- c. 1594
- Setting
- Ephesus
- Scenes
- 11
- Speaking roles
- 20
- Uncut running time
- ~1h 45m
What happens in The Comedy of Errors
Aegeon, a merchant from Syracuse, is arrested in Ephesus, a city hostile to his own, and given one day to raise a ransom or be executed. He tells the Duke how a shipwreck separated him from his wife and one of each pair of his twin sons and their twin servants, all of whom are named Antipholus and Dromio.
By chance the Syracusan Antipholus and his Dromio have just arrived in Ephesus, where the other pair have lived for years. Servants, wives, a goldsmith, a courtesan and a doctor take one twin for the other, and the confusion builds through beatings, a missing gold chain and a lock-out from a house. The Abbess finally resolves everything.
See the formatting
The first page of Act I, exactly as it appears in the files you download.
The biggest roles
Share of the play's spoken words, counted from the script. 20 characters speak; 7 of them have under 1% of the text — natural candidates for doubling.
| Role | Share of the text | Speeches |
|---|---|---|
| Adriana | | 81 |
| Dromio Of Syracuse | | 98 |
| Antipholus Of Syracuse | | 106 |
| Antipholus Of Ephesus | | 76 |
| Dromio Of Ephesus | | 63 |
| Aegeon | | 18 |
| Luciana | | 43 |
| Duke Solinus | | 22 |
For directors
The text is spread unusually evenly: Adriana (14.6%), Dromio of Syracuse (14.4%), Antipholus of Syracuse (14.3%) and Antipholus of Ephesus (12.0%) each carry a large share, with Dromio of Ephesus at 9.5%. Casting four convincing twins, or the right pairs, is the main challenge. With 20 speaking roles over 11 scenes and about 1 hour 45 minutes uncut, this is a compact evening that rarely needs trimming.
Cutting notes
- Aegeon's long opening account in 1.1 is sometimes shortened because it is pure exposition.
- Topical wordplay, such as Dromio's description of the kitchen-maid in 3.2, is often cut or updated for a modern audience.
- The Dr Pinch exorcism sequence is occasionally shortened, though it is one of the play's comic set pieces.
For teachers
Typical topics include mistaken identity, the farce structure, marriage and the role of the wife, and the play's debt to the Roman dramatist Plautus. Students often study the opening exposition by Aegeon, the Dromio scenes with their wordplay and beatings, and the final recognition scene in 5.1. It is among the shortest of the plays, which makes it popular for classroom reading.
Questions
Is this the complete, uncut text of The Comedy of Errors?
Yes. Every file contains the full play — 11 scenes and about 14,400 spoken words. Cut it yourself in Word or Final Draft to fit your running time.
What is the difference between the stageplay and screenplay layouts?
The stageplay layout indents stage directions and sets dialogue full-width, like a theatre script. The screenplay layout follows film conventions: scene headings and action flush left, character names centred, dialogue in a narrower column. Both tiers include both layouts as PDFs; the Full Package adds editable Final Draft and Word files of each.
Can I use this The Comedy of Errors script for a production or a class?
Yes. Shakespeare's plays are in the public domain, so there are no royalties to pay for staging them. Edit, stage, film or teach with these files.
How do I receive the files?
Right after checkout you land on a private download page, and the link is also emailed to you. It keeps working, so you can re-download any time.
