Shakespeare Redux

[truemane]

All this talk of Shakespeare has gotten me all excited about the Bard. What does the playground think about modernized Shakespeare? Clever update or soulless sacrilege?

Personally, I'm a big fan. I think that Shakespeare, by all accounts, was about ten parts popular entertainer to one part tortured artist and were he alive today he'd be in Hollywood doing lunch and making deals. I think that modernized Shakespeare is probably closer to his vision than actors in tights speaking his every syllable in devoted admiration on stage.

So what's your favourite modernized/updated/adapted Shakespeare? I'll take strict re-stagings (Romeo + Juliet) as well as re-inventions (10 Things I Hate About You).

My favourites, in no particular order:

1. Titus. 1999. Directed by Julie Taymor (of Across the Universe and the Lion King on Broadway fame). Starring Anthony Hopkins and Jessica Lange. A gorgeous, almost timeless reinvention of Shakespeare's earliest and bloodiest popular success. Harrowing and fascinating and horrifying all at once. And everything is draped in Taymor's sumptuous visuals.

2. "O". 2001. Directed by Tim Blake Neslon (the stupid guy from 'O Brother Where Art Thou'). Not in the original language, but making Othello into a High School Basketball star adds an entirely different layer to Shakespeare's story of greed and envy and lust. Excellent, understated performances by Mekhi Phifer and Josh Harnett.

3. Richard III. 1995. Directed by Richard Loncraine. Starring Ian McKellan and Annette Bening. Moved Shakespeare's story of the evil plotting king to a fictional fascist WWII England. Riveting and powerful, the actors really bring the language to vibrant and visceral life.

4. Ran. 1990. Directed by 'The Master' Akira Kurosawa. A re-imagining of King Lear as an aging Japanese Warlord splitting his realm between his sons, Ran is Kurosawa's late-life apocalyptic masterpiece. Dark and brooding and filled with pathos and pageantry, Ran was Kurosawa's final word on the samurai epic.

The best revisionist Shakespeare I've ever seen on stage was a production of Romeo and Juliet written as two warring families in 1930's Sicily. An interesting take on the whole thing, but the reason it as so special was the actress who played Juliet was SO good that it felt throughout the play that she was the star-crossed lover who knew what she was doing and Romeo was just along for the ride. I've never heard the words spoken that way before and it gave the whole play an interesting slant.

Anyway, tl;dr...

Anyone else got favourites? Film? Stage? Interpretive dance?

[Occasional Sage]

Ran certainly, and Throne of Blood as well. Both stories translate very well into Japanese culture.

[Killer Angel]

Much ado for nothing (Branagh).
It's not a new adaptation, but it has a fresh feeling, if you know what I mean...
It seems a brand new work.

[Cristo Meyers]

Much ado for nothing (Branagh).
It's not a new adaptation, but it has a fresh feeling, if you know what I mean...
It seems a brand new work.

I was going to say that one too. LadyMeyers bought it on a whim and we spent the entire night laughing, if only at Keanu Reeves' acting.

I always thought Lurman's Romeo and Juliet (DiCaprio/Danes) was interesting.

[snoopy13a]

My Own Private Idaho :smalltongue:

[Archpaladin Zousha]

A friend of mine is actually writing a young-adult novel version of "Much Ado About Nothing" for her senior thesis.

Personally, I think there's a difference between "revisionist Shakespeare" that takes the premise and character types and makes its own version of it and the kind that just uses Shakespeare's actual words with different costuming and scenery. The former can work if it's treated well and they aren't just doing it for the sake of it being a modernized version of Shakespeare. The latter I don't think really counts since despite the alterations, it's STILL Shakespeare.

I actually haven't seen any official reinterpretations of Shakespeare. I've seen Branagh's movies, Mel Gibson's Hamlet and even starred as the Captain my high school's production of Twelfth Night, but no matter what it was, it was always Shakespeare's words, and that's what's really important I think.

[Platinum_Mongoose]

Men of Respect, starring John Turturro, is a fascinating Mafia-based remake of Macbeth. Worth a look.

And I'm admittedly a fan of Ten Things I Hate About You, though in tone these two films could not be on more opposite ends of the spectrum.

[Lord Seth]

I actually haven't seen any official reinterpretations of Shakespeare. I've seen Branagh's movies, Mel Gibson's Hamlet and even starred as the Captain my high school's production of Twelfth Night, but no matter what it was, it was always Shakespeare's words, and that's what's really important I think.Try Throne of Blood or West Side Story. Those are very good reinterpretations. Of course, most of Shakespeare's plays were reinterpretations themselves!

[Archpaladin Zousha]

Okay, I've heard of West Side Story, haven't heard of Throne of Blood.

[bosssmiley]

All this talk of Shakespeare has gotten me all excited about the Bard. What does the playground think about modernized Shakespeare? Clever update or soulless sacrilege?

Updating the costumes: fine, if you're on a budget.

Just don't touch the language. It takes one hell of an ego to think you can out-write Will. :smallcool:

@Dervag & Phoekun: Fair enough. Stories inspired by the greatest plot thief of all time are ok (two of my favourite adaptations are "10 Things I Hate About You" and "Scarface"); as are weird costumes w. Shakespeare's language ("Richard III", "Romeo & Juliet"); but outright bowdlerization and then claiming it is still Shakespeare is a no-no IMB.

[JonestheSpy]

When I was in college my school produced a very well-designed Midsummer Night's Dream. It was set in 19th Century colonial India. Theseus was a governor in the classic white-suit-and-pith-helmet array, Hippolyta was native royalty, the lovers upper class in kids in suits and huge hoop skirts that got destroyed during the trip through the jungle, the mechanicals were Kiplingesque hobo rascals, and the fairies Hinduesque jungle spirits. One of the better re-imagiings I've seen.

[Dervag]

Updating the costumes: fine, if you're on a budget.

Just don't touch the language. It takes one hell of an ego to think you can out-write Will. :smallcool:There's a problem with that, though: if you take the play and transfer it into, say, 1980s Miami, you wind up with people dressed like moderns, driving cars, and so forth... but speaking in Elizabethan English. It ends up making them look dumb.

I think it's fine to update the language to match the costumes, but if you do both, you should not advertise your work as a "remake of Shakespeare." The notion of anyone (except the greatest of geniuses) being able to "remake" Shakespeare is a farce, but it's perfectly all right to create modern-setting stories that are influenced, even heavily influenced, by the Bard.

[PhoeKun]

Updating the costumes: fine, if you're on a budget.

Just don't touch the language. It takes one hell of an ego to think you can out-write Will. :smallcool:

I... I dunno. Shakespeare is Shakespeare, and he really stands in his own category. And speaking as someone who adores the language of the plays, I don't think touching the script is really a taboo art. Well... it is if you're trying to do a stage performance of a Shakespeare play, but in other forms of theater, and in movies, I'm less certain.

I don't think it's really about thinking that this or that is "better" than the play, but in modernizing it you can tell a story that's worlds apart from what went on at The Globe, without it needing to compete with the original for our love. Kurosawa's adaptations are legitimately brilliant. As mentioned before, "O" made me think about Othello in ways I hadn't before. There's real artistic value to putting new spins on old stories - that is, after all, what Shakespeare did.

Having said that, my favorite movie version of a Shakespeare play is Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing. The cinematography is wonderful, and the cast list is very well put together, Keanu Reeves or no Keanu Reeves (and incidentally, his remains the most perfect delivery of the "I am not of many words, but I thank you" line I have ever seen. Minor thing, but still. He was an hilarious and unintentionally brillaint Don Jon).

On the stranger side of things, I've seen a version of Hamlet where they made absolutely no attempt to put anyone in costume of any sort, and judging from the scenery, it's almost as if one of them happened to have a camera on hand, and someone said, "Hey, who feels like performing Hamlet right now?" It's passably read, but the visuals are so casual that it's extremely throwing.

[Platinum_Mongoose]

There's a problem with that, though: if you take the play and transfer it into, say, 1980s Miami, you wind up with people dressed like moderns, driving cars, and so forth... but speaking in Elizabethan English. It ends up making them look dumb.

I refer you to Romeo+Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. Set in what I believe is modern day Brazil, stays true to the language, and is one of the best adaptations of that particular text out there.

[warty goblin]

I refer you to Romeo+Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. Set in what I believe is modern day Brazil, stays true to the language, and is one of the best adaptations of that particular text out there.

It made me want to be nearly anywhere but the theatre when I went to see it.

[Platinum_Mongoose]

It made me want to be nearly anywhere but the theatre when I went to see it.

Well, that's simply a matter of opinion, clearly. I enjoyed the movie quite a lot. Guy-who-played-that-one-annoying-guy on Lost was a great Mercutio.

Also, isn't Forbidden Planet a Tempest retelling? I haven't actually seen it (and I'm a sci-fi nerd cinema major--fail at life) but that's what I hear.