I love your thesis. Love it. I'm not sure if you already know this, but you're actually echoing an extremely prevalent idea through theater theory which is that the unreal is real or that the real can only be divulged through examining the unreal. So some suggestions...
1. Try looking at your thesis through the lens of theater history/ look at different performance histories of The Winter's Tale.
2. When I was talking with some of the cast members of BYU's production of The Winter's Tale they talked about the element of magic in it. I can probably give you some contact information so that you can e-mail one of the cast members if you want.
3. http://metalib.lib.byu.edu/V/PR25DA99MGXLGGAE74A2Q8A9GY22L379VL9TRVDGLQVEGQK72B-65344?func=meta-3&short-format=002&set_number=002313&set_entry=000005&format=999 this is an article I found online and it's actually about a man who was the lighting director for a production of As You Like It and The Tempest. It's pretty short, but relevant to your topic - he talks about how it's difficult to work the logistics of creating the "magic" of Shakespeare's plays. For anyone involved in putting on a production, magic is a very real. If you want to present magic on the stage you have to have a firm connection with reality - how are the lights going to work? what about the stage crew? costum changes?
I know that this wasn't an angle you were taking, but I think it's one worth considering :) Good luck!
Yours truly,
Mikaela
