Philostrate
Philostrate manages the ceremonial world of Theseus's court and serves as the formal gatekeeper of entertainment — a role that exists to be overruled by the Duke's generous pragmatism. He is the play's representative of official taste, and the play is gently at his expense throughout Act V.
Appears In
Biography
Philostrate is Theseus's master of the revels — the court official responsible for arranging entertainment for the Duke's wedding celebration. He appears briefly in the play's opening scene, dispatched by Theseus to stir the Athenian youth to merriments and prepare festivities for the four-day wait until the wedding. His function in Act I is purely ceremonial, establishing the festive frame into which the evening's chaos will eventually resolve.
His more substantial moment comes in Act V, when Theseus calls on him to present the evening's entertainment options. Philostrate has already seen the mechanicals' Pyramus and Thisbe in rehearsal, and his recommendation against it is earnest and alarmed: he found it 'nothing, nothing in the world' — the most lamentable comedy he has witnessed, performed by men whose theatrical capacities are entirely unequal to the occasion. He urges Theseus not to subject himself to it.
Theseus overrules him, and Philostrate is left to watch a performance he tried to prevent receive a reception far warmer than he anticipated. His function in the play is that of the courtly standard-bearer who underestimates what sincere effort, however incompetent, can achieve — and whose aesthetic judgement is technically correct and humanly insufficient at the same time.
Motivation
Philostrate is motivated by professional conscientiousness and a genuine concern for the Duke's dignity. His opposition to the mechanicals' performance is an act of loyal taste-management rather than snobbery, and the play treats it as both understandable and slightly beside the point.
Personality
Philostrate is a man entirely at home in the world of courtly decorum and entirely discomfited by anything that falls outside it. His alarm at the mechanicals' rehearsal is the response of a professional whose standards are real, and his failure to anticipate the charm of their sincerity is the play's gentlest joke at the expense of official taste.