Coincidence gives us Shakespeare's obscure romance, "Cymbeline," in a Pitt student Studio Theater production, just as PICT stages his magisterial "King Lear" next door at the Stephen Foster Memorial -- and with his 444th birthday coming Tuesday.

Along with "Cymbeline" being a gift to those ticking off their lifetime Shakespeare lists, its conjunction with "Lear" is notable in that these are the Bard's only plays set in legendary ancient Britain -- although "Lear" goes back to the time of Solomon and "Cymbeline" just to that of Christ. (Leave "Macbeth" out of it: that's in historic time.)

The story is one of an evil stepmother, a conniving Italian, parental interference, misprised virtue and the varying wages of war, set against the backdrop of possible Roman invasion. In keeping with the setting in magical Wales, there is a long final scene where each revelation is topped by the next; the truths about those thought dead or fled (including a headless body) are revealed and the long separated are reunited.

That's the pleasing payoff. But there's some tough slogging, thanks mainly to some weak acting, including a tendency to over-act and let generalized emotion bury the words.

This is director Chaya Gordon's final MFA project, a huge undertaking. She has done some intelligent cutting and makes do with a cast of a baker's dozen, thanks to canny doubling in which women frequently play men -- a fitting reversal of the practice of Shakespeare's theater.

Gordon also encourages direct address to the audience, which I admire, and speedy recitation, although that can sometimes sound like a clickety-clack "Beyond the Fringe" parody.

Iachimo, which means "little Iago" (his villainy is obvious from the start), is capably played by Aaron Jefferson Tindall. He has a fine, creepy scene, poised over the heroine Imogen's body, taking notes so he can convince her exiled husband Posthumus that he slept with her.

Joseph Jackson's stalwart Posthumus, when emoting or shouting, can be hard to understand, and Cory Tamler's Imogen can be shrill. The clodpole Cloten is played by Ryan Ben with raw comic energy. I admired the speaking of Ana Carolina Noriega as both the First Gentleman and the veteran Belarius.

"Cymbeline" has the odd distinction of having provided words for "Cats" via T.S. Eliot, who turned Shakespeare's aching double entendre, "Golden lads and girls all must, / As chimney-sweepers, come to dust," into the lyric, "Pollicle dogs and cats all must / Jellicle dogs and cats must / Like undertakers, come to dust."

Shakespeare, however, lives on.