my engagement with the Shakespeare meme is fairly desultory, I'm afraid

[kaberett]

In that I have studied Merchant of Venice and Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth at secondary school (including being shown Macbeth on the Estate; our teacher attempted to fast forward through the dubious stairwell sex scene In Accordance With Edict and actually just got the VHS stuck on it); Twelfth Night in a variety of set-ups, largely at the Edinburgh Fringe, where I very much enjoyed it (it was SO GAY); and I have furthermore seen All's Well That Ends Well and A Midsummer Night's Dream as parts of the Cambridge Shakespeare Festival (John's, I think, and Girton, respectively, and in fact almost certainly More Plays I just don't remember... which).

The thing I've seen unambiguously the most variants of is Much Ado About Nothing, which is My Fave. My cousins introduced me to the 1993 Branagh/Thompson film; the Joss Whedon travesty, once only, so that I had; the Tate/Tennant production; an incredibly American Shakespeare-in-the-park production in LA back in 2011; and a version in the Globe, a few years ago, which I thought I had written up but cannot immediately find and will attempt to dig up in the morning, but right now I am going to bed.

... please ask me about my feelings about Much Ado and the variations in staging I have seen. I HAVE FEELINGS.

Comments

[alexseanchai]

I'm curious your feelings about Much Ado

[fyreharper]

I do not have specific questions about Much Ado, but I would love to hear about it! ::props chin on hands and makes wide-eyed curiousface at::

(when you saw Midsummer did it have bdsm-flavored fairies though; I am curious whether that’s a Why Is This A Thing or a Why Is This A Thing *Here*... thing :p )

[naath]

It's certainly not always a thing... my experience of MND is as Shakespear For Children... as if it's 'appropriate' or maybe as if one can assume 10 year olds don't get 16th century dick jokes if you play them with a straight face. Um.

[batrachian]

I mean, last I saw MND was as a middle school production but it was very obvious that the kids DEFINITELY saw the dick jokes...so...

(Actually it was quite well done, and my not!phew was the Best Puck, so maybe I'm biased.)

[naath]

I think Shakespeare is all the much more fun for being rude. Maybe if the grownups pretend it isn't then it's *even better*...

[batrachian]

Oh, so do I. And it's definitely amusing to watch the furious denials and THIS IS SERIOUS LITERATURE.

[sporky_rat]

The Tate/Tennant production and the chemistry.

The staging for the chemistry.

[naath]

I have feels.

[stultiloquentia]

Oh yes please, I would like to read about all your Much Ado feels.

[azurelunatic]

My teacher attempted to fast forward through the sex scene in a production of R&J; unfortunately she did not stop the video before pressing the fast-forward button, so we got to see Romeo's bum in fast-forward while she slapped her hands over the screen in a futile attempt at figleafing. It was great.

[all_strange_wonders]

Yes please. There's so much interesting scope in Much Ado for variation, and yet somehow it is always still essentially an amazing Othello-meets-romcom mashup.

[passingbuzzards]

ooh, tell about the LA production!

[skygiants]

the thing IS that the Branagh/Thompson is undoubtedly my most formative and most-beloved Much Ado (the whole bit with the folding chair! THE WORLD MUST BE PEOPLED!) but also I have become regrettably aware that it cuts out most of Hero's funniest bits and I'm upset about that. Which productions that you've seen do best by which characters, do you think?

[aella_irene]

Much Ado! The Haymarket did an amazing production a few years ago, pairing it with Love's Labours Lost, LLL at the start of WW1, and Much Ado at the end, in a community wracked with PTSD (and also managed to make me feel for Don John, never a thing I thought would happen.)