The Elizabethans were big believers in Astrology, and Shakespeare often has characters stop and bemoan the influence of celestial bodies on their lives. John Lyly, thought to have been a big influence on Shakespeare, had gone one step further in
The Woman in the Moon, in which they take a very hands-on interest in the plot. It's a sort of alternative creation myth, where four shepherds (Joel Davey, Rhys Bevan, James Askill and Robert Heard) have seen the sorts of things their sheep get up to and complain to Nature (Julia Sandiford) about the lack of any human females so they can join in the fun. So Nature creates the first woman, Pandora (Bella Heesom.) She may have done a bit too good a job though, as the stars and planets resent the appearance of something as luminous as themselves on Earth. They resolve to use their very different influences on her, taking turns to affect her moods until both Pandora and her various suitors have been driven to distraction.
