Tom Hanks - Tom Hanks Leads Star-studded Cast In Shakespeare Play

Tom Hanks and his actress wife Rita Wilson teamed up with Martin Short to form an all-star cast in Shakespearean classic A Midsummer Night's Dream for a charity performance on Thursday (27Sep12).

Billy Crystal, Eddie Redmayne, William Shatner and Topher Grace also stepped onstage to act out The Bard's play at the Freud Playhouse at the University of California, Los Angeles.

The stars put a 1960s twist on the event, which was billed as "an evening filled with peace, love and psychedelic Shakespeare" starring "groovy love children Rita 'Daisy' Wilson and Tom 'Far Out' Hanks and a tie-dyed cast of hilarious hippies".

The 22nd Annual Simply Shakespeare Celebrity Reading raised money for the Shakespeare Centre Los Angeles, an organisation which creates literary programs to help impoverished students.