diff -r cf70f030a744 Lib/HTMLParser.py
--- a/Lib/HTMLParser.py	Wed Jun 18 23:07:46 2014 -0400
+++ b/Lib/HTMLParser.py	Mon Jun 23 21:53:39 2014 +0300
@@ -11,6 +11,11 @@
 import markupbase
 import re
 
+try:
+    _unichr = unichr
+except NameError:
+    _unichr = chr
+
 # Regular expressions used for parsing
 
 interesting_normal = re.compile('[&<]')
@@ -456,8 +461,8 @@
                         c = int(s[1:], 16)
                     else:
                         c = int(s)
-                    return unichr(c)
-            except ValueError:
+                    return _unichr(c)
+            except ValueError as e:
                 return '&#'+s+';'
             else:
                 # Cannot use name2codepoint directly, because HTMLParser supports apos,
@@ -466,10 +471,13 @@
                 if HTMLParser.entitydefs is None:
                     entitydefs = HTMLParser.entitydefs = {'apos':u"'"}
                     for k, v in htmlentitydefs.name2codepoint.iteritems():
-                        entitydefs[k] = unichr(v)
+                        try:
+                            entitydefs[k] = _unichr(v)
+                        except ValueError:
+                            pass
                 try:
                     return self.entitydefs[s]
-                except KeyError:
+                except KeyError as e:
                     return '&'+s+';'
 
         return re.sub(r"&(#?[xX]?(?:[0-9a-fA-F]+|\w{1,8}));", replaceEntities, s)
diff -r cf70f030a744 Lib/test/test_htmlparser.py
--- a/Lib/test/test_htmlparser.py	Wed Jun 18 23:07:46 2014 -0400
+++ b/Lib/test/test_htmlparser.py	Mon Jun 23 21:53:39 2014 +0300
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@
 import pprint
 import unittest
 from test import test_support
+from test.test_support import have_unicode, requires_unicode, u
 
 
 class EventCollector(HTMLParser.HTMLParser):
@@ -351,12 +352,13 @@
              'Date().getTime()+\'"><\\/s\'+\'cript>\');\n//]]>'),
             '\n<!-- //\nvar foo = 3.14;\n// -->\n',
             'foo = "</sty" + "le>";',
-            u'<!-- \u2603 -->',
             # these two should be invalid according to the HTML 5 spec,
             # section 8.1.2.2
             #'foo = </\nscript>',
             #'foo = </ script>',
         ]
+        if have_unicode:
+            contents.append(u(r'<!-- \x2603 -->'))
         elements = ['script', 'style', 'SCRIPT', 'STYLE', 'Script', 'Style']
         for content in contents:
             for element in elements:
@@ -434,20 +436,21 @@
             "<a href=mailto:xyz@example.com>",
             [("starttag", "a", [("href", "mailto:xyz@example.com")])])
 
+    @requires_unicode
     def test_attr_nonascii(self):
         # see issue 7311
         self._run_check(
-            u"<img src=/foo/bar.png alt=\u4e2d\u6587>",
+            u(r"<img src=/foo/bar.png alt=\u4e2d\u6587>"),
             [("starttag", "img", [("src", "/foo/bar.png"),
-                                  ("alt", u"\u4e2d\u6587")])])
+                                  ("alt", u(r"\u4e2d\u6587"))])])
         self._run_check(
-            u"<a title='\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8' href='\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html'>",
-            [("starttag", "a", [("title", u"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8"),
-                                ("href", u"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html")])])
+            u(r"<a title='\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8' href='\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html'>"),
+            [("starttag", "a", [("title", u(r"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8")),
+                                ("href", u(r"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html"))])])
         self._run_check(
-            u'<a title="\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8" href="\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html">',
-            [("starttag", "a", [("title", u"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8"),
-                                ("href", u"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html")])])
+            u(r'<a title="\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8" href="\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html">'),
+            [("starttag", "a", [("title", u(r"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8")),
+                                ("href", u(r"\u30c6\u30b9\u30c8.html"))])])
 
     def test_attr_entity_replacement(self):
         self._run_check(
@@ -465,9 +468,10 @@
              ("starttag", "c", [("\\", "/")])])
 
     def test_entityrefs_in_attributes(self):
+        euro = unichr(0x20AC) if have_unicode else '&euro;'
         self._run_check(
             "<html foo='&euro;&amp;&#97;&#x61;&unsupported;'>",
-            [("starttag", "html", [("foo", u"\u20AC&aa&unsupported;")])])
+            [("starttag", "html", [("foo", u"%s&aa&unsupported;" % euro)])])
 
     def test_entities_in_attribute_value(self):
         # see #1200313