# Brushing up on my Shakespeare **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 20, 2016, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375 "2016-08-20T03:11:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/41 "2016-08-20T21:49:31Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > _ **The Tempest** _ … with Leslie Nielsen as Captain James T … sorry, Commander J.J. Adams. :o Shirley you can’t be serious. And another vote for both Henry V’s, Branaugh’s and Olivier’s. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/42 "2016-08-20T22:11:30Z")
> [@TonySinclair](#): > > Shirley you can’t be serious. Yes, I’m serious. And don’t call me Shirley! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/43 "2016-08-20T22:25:47Z")
> [@NAF1138](#): > > Side bar question: are these modern performances that were shown on the BBC or PBS available on any of the popular streaming services? I’m noticing several recommended that were made after 2006 that I never saw. I just did a search on Netflix and none of the movies mentioned was available for streaming. Several were available on dvd. I found a few on Amazon, some streaming free with Prime, some for rent. The Patrick Stewart _Macbeth_ is a PBS Great Performances offering, but I haven’t looked on the PBS Roku channel yet to see if it’s available. Haven’t searched Hulu Plus yet. TV watching is so complicated now. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/44 "2016-08-20T22:32:50Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > Judi Dench’s costume consisted of green paint and a few strategically placed fig leaves, which prompted **Evil Captor** to start a thread titled “Nice rack, M!” She was really hot back in the day, wasn’t she? :o ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/45 "2016-08-20T22:55:49Z")
Def Ralph Fiennes’ Coriolanus - a really modern, mad, scary production. It’s worth just googling the imagery. Fwiw, I quite liked Dr Who’s/David Tennant’s Hamlet though obv. any of the usual suspects do a decent turn. > [@NAF1138](#): > > I haven’t seen [The Hollow Crown](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hollow_Crown_(TV_series)) series, which does Henry IV, so that might be pretty good. They do a version of Richard II also, which no one does and I have been meaning to see, because I haven’t seen any good productions of that play ever. I trust the people who made it, but won’t recommend it without actually having watched it. Proceed with caution. These are all recent and solid BBC productions with amazing casts who earn huge money elsewhere. If I picked one it might be Richard II because it’s not produced that often and it’s a subtle, nuanced portrayal of RII by the mighty Ben Whishaw. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/46 "2016-08-20T22:59:25Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > The BBC project to put out all the Shakespeare plays in the 1980s was hit-and-miss, but I loved their _Midsummer Night’s Dream_ with Helen Mirren as Titania. … > [@terentii](#): > > Has anyone seen John Cleese in the BBC production of _ **Taming of the Shrew** _ (1980)?.. I loved these productions (and some of them are available on DVD). John Cleese directed that _Taming of the Shrew_ and instead of casting a glamour-puss as Kate (a la Elizabeth Taylor), made Kate a plain woman who’d always been overshadowed by her more-attractive younger sister Bianca. The result was very touching. NAF1138 mentioned _Richard II_: the BBC version starred Derek Jacobi. His “let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings” will rip your heart out. Just a masterful performance. The Othello was distinctive, too. Anthony Hopkins would never be given the title role today, of course. (His makeup made him look sort of North-African, rather than sub-Saharan, I guess.) It’s Bob Hoskins’ Iago that was amazing–it certainly shaped my view of the character. Hoskins played him not as a mustache-twirling villain, but as a “plain, bluff soldier”…and it worked beautifully. Highly recommended, all of them. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/47 "2016-08-20T23:01:19Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Haven’t searched Hulu Plus yet. > > TV watching is so complicated now. :rolleyes: It IS! HULU has criterion so it should have many of the older films. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/48 "2016-08-20T23:47:32Z")
No love for the 1999 _Midsummer Night’s Dream_ with Kevin Kline? ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2016, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/49 "2016-08-20T23:47:44Z")
And, just for fun, check out the Reduced Shakespeare Company. They put on an abridged version of all the plays in a single hour. (The twelve history plays are a football game, with a crown as the football.) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/50 "2016-08-21T00:26:57Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > She was really hot back in the day, wasn’t she? :o As an aside, her scream is the ringtone I have tied to my mother’s phone number. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/51 "2016-08-21T00:41:34Z")
The best version of Twelfth Night is the BBC version starring Felicity Kendall. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/52 "2016-08-21T00:45:27Z")
[Playing Shakespeare](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086780/) (available from Netflix and on YouTube, it seems) is a 9 part series where John Barton from the RSC gives a master class on how to perform Shakespeare, with actors you know well. A highlight is Patrick Stewart and David Suchet giving alternate versions of Shylock’s speeches from the Merchant of Venice. It will make you think about the plays in ways you never did before. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/53 "2016-08-21T01:40:17Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > The best version of Twelfth Night is the BBC version starring Felicity Kendall. Felicity Kendall, mmmmmmmmmmmmmm! :o ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/54 "2016-08-21T01:44:17Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > The Othello was distinctive, too. Anthony Hopkins would never be given the title role today, of course. (His makeup made him look sort of North-African, rather than sub-Saharan, I guess.) … Which is where the Moors were from. > **[Moors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moors)** > > The term Moor is an exonym first used by Christian Europeans to designate the Muslim populations of the Maghreb, al-Andalus (Iberian Peninsula), Sicily and Malta during the Middle Ages. Moors are not a single, distinct or self-defined people. The 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica observed that the term had "no real ethnological value." Europeans of the Middle Ages and the early modern period variously applied the name to Arabs, Berbers, and Muslim Europeans. > The term has also been used in Europe in... ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/55 "2016-08-21T03:29:57Z")
If you haven’t seen it something really brilliant about Ian McKellen’s _[Richard III](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_III_(1995_film))_ is that it’s not set in modern times, but rather in an alternate-history 1930s Britain where England has embraced European fascism (very Nazi-esque). Although it isn’t the traditional setting it fits the tone and drama of the play perfectly (and they stick to the Elizabethan dialog). ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMensch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@MonkeyMensch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMensch)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/56 "2016-08-21T07:49:00Z")
I just wanted to give a shout out for the thread title. I’m sure most folks got it, but I opened the thread up because of it. And I come out with a load of great ideas and productions to watch. Thanks all. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/57 "2016-08-21T13:16:00Z")
> [@MonkeyMensch](#): > > I just wanted to give a shout out for the thread title. I’m sure most folks got it, but I opened the thread up because of it. And I come out with a load of great ideas and productions to watch. Thanks all. Glad you dropped in! Love your screen name, BTW. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/58 "2016-08-21T13:44:58Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > John Cleese directed that _Taming of the Shrew_ and instead of casting a glamour-puss as Kate (a la Elizabeth Taylor), made Kate a plain woman who’d always been overshadowed by her more-attractive younger sister Bianca. The result was very touching. I also recommend this one. In addition to the casting of Kate, Cleese as Petruchio was extremely good, including one soliloquy where he says what he’s planning to do to change Kate. That text could be read as male dominance-asserting control over the woman, but Cleese’s delivery made it clear that he saw Kate as having been harmed by her father’s treatment of her compared to Bianca, and Cleese by putting her under strain was trying to bring her out of that and re-discover herself. It too was very touching, because far from being the male dominant (that Petruchio can be), he came across as very insightful and caring. Unorthodox methods, perhaps, but with the goal of helping Kate, not dominating her. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/59 "2016-08-21T18:53:13Z")
One more to add: [**The Merchant of Venice**](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0379889/?ref_=nv_sr_1), starring Al Pacino as Shylock and Jeremy Irons as Antonio. Pacino does a good job as a man driven to madness by anti-Semitism. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2016, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375/60 "2016-08-21T20:58:43Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > … Which is where the Moors were from. > [Moors - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moors) Certainly, but for several years now no respectable production has cast an Othello who looked anything other than sub-Saharan, or at least of partial sub-Saharan heritage. It’s just the societal consensus (though no doubt that will change as the decades go by). > [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > And, just for fun, check out the Reduced Shakespeare Company. They put on an abridged version of all the plays in a single hour. (The twelve history plays are a football game, with a crown as the football.) That’s a great show! I saw a production in Orlando some years back and laughed my arse off. > [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > I also recommend this one. In addition to the casting of Kate, Cleese as Petruchio was extremely good, including one soliloquy where he says what he’s planning to do to change Kate. > > That text could be read as male dominance-asserting control over the woman, but Cleese’s delivery made it clear that he saw Kate as having been harmed by her father’s treatment of her compared to Bianca, and Cleese by putting her under strain was trying to bring her out of that and re-discover herself. > > It too was very touching, because far from being the male dominant (that Petruchio can be), he came across as very insightful and caring. Unorthodox methods, perhaps, but with the goal of helping Kate, not dominating her. I agree. It was a great reading of the play. (In general, those 80s BBC productions didn’t play it ‘stodgy and safe,’ but instead employed the top people of the day to come up with some very fresh, though canonical, versions of the plays.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brushing-up-on-my-shakespeare/763375.md?page=4)