Brooke and his fellow students were reacting against Victorian theatre and decided to revive the presentation of Shakespeare in Cambridge, not performed there since 1886.
[3] The Society came to specialise in Elizabethan and Jacobean revivals in uncut texts performed with their original economy and rapidity, and (in the early years) with the female roles played by men.
The first successful modern production of The White Devil, for example, was that of the Marlowe Society (ADC Theatre, Cambridge, March 1920), directed by J. T. Sheppard, with music by C. Armstrong Gibbs and with Eric Maschwitz as Vittoria.
The Festival was launched by Michael Oakley's production of Dido, Queen of Carthage at Emmanuel College Chapel, followed by a gala performance at the Senate House.
In 2020, the Marlowe Society presented Othello at the Cambridge Arts Theatre, directed by John Haidar.