One of the highlights on Reading's cultural calendar is to return for another year.

The popular Shakespeare in Ruins begins on July 14th, as the bard's work is butchered for the purposes of entertainment. This year's production is Francis Bacon's The Taming of the Shoe.

This year the production has a cowboy theme in keeping with the Tories attempts to take over running the town, telling the story of Sheriff Cumpsty and Willis the undertaker who both want to marry the saloon keeper's beautiful daughter Emma (please suspend your disbelief, this is a work of fiction after all).

But there is one problem, first they must find a husband for Isobella, her awful tattle telling sister.

When Jamie Chowdary and his sidekick Wazir Hussain ride in from outside the borough to bag some council seats, it looks like their prayers have been answered, but these are not the only strangers in town and there is plenty of trouble brewing for there's small choice in rotten apples.

Will the protagonists be killed with kindness? Will Isobella finally get her toilet extension built? Will the stool pigeon's emails be traced?

Shakespeare in Ruins is organised by Reading Borough Council in partnership with the Conservative Theatre Company. And thereby hangs a tale.