It is important to remember with the approaching Valentine’s Day that love can appear in many forms: “Some Cupids kill with arrows, some with traps.” This line from William Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing reminds everyone that sometimes they are stricken with love, and at other times they walk into it like a trap. However, like much of this show, this phrase has another meaning. In the story, it refers to just how characters are easily tricked into falling in love with each other.
The show’s title itself also expresses the double meaning presented in this work as explained in the playbill by Director Dr. Bethany Reeves: “What is the ‘nothing’ causing so much ado? Far from being a throw away title, Much Ado About Nothing is a triumph of wordplay and suggestion. In Elizabethan England, “nothing” and “noting” (i.e. observing, overhearing, spying, etc.) were pronounced the same way, and much of what is “noted” in Ado is, indeed, based on “nothing.”
Good and malevolent characters alike turn to trickery to achieve their ends, and a great deal of both comic and serious upheaval arises from the noting of nothing. The cleverness of the title has one more twist: “no thing” was once a cruel reference to a women’s vagina. And there is no doubt that, Ado, like several other plays by Shakespeare (notably Othello, The Winter’s Tale, and Cymbeline), is a wrestling ring for Elizabethan cultural tensions around gender, marriage, and the sexual purity of women.
The show is set in Messina, Italy where visiting gentlemen have returned from battle: Prince Don Pedro, his bastard brother Don John, and Pedro’s friends Count Claudio and Sir Benedick. Claudio immediately falls in love with Hero, the daughter of the governor Leonato. Claudio reports of his love to Benedick who laughs at the thought of marriage and believes that a women must be as perfect as himself for him to know love. Meanwhile, he and Leonato’s niece Beatrice mocks and jabs Benedick who follows in suit with his own scornful jests. With help from Don Pedro, Claudio and Hero are arranged to get married, then with help from Leonato and the people, they develop a plan to trick Beatrice and Benedick to fall in love. When the prince’s brother hears of this wedding, he devises a plan with his accomplice Borachio to cast infidelity on Hero’s good name.
The plot takes a turn leading with a trail of deception and rumors. In the end, the spying and rumors cause trouble, but in return make amends as the Constable Dogberry and his men discover Don John’s plot against Hero.
This production was extremely well put together from fantastic costumes to great portrayals of the characters. The sometimes hard to follow Elizabethan language was made clear by the pronounced actions of the actors. Where many Shakespeare productions may come across as slow and sleepy, this show was bright and full of constant laughs from the audience.
During the performance, each actor carried a small scroll with him or her. These scrolls were cue scripts, which contained the actors lines as well as the cues for their next speech, entrance, or exit. This was common practice back in the days of Shakespeare where actors were only given portions of the scripts so that if they were lost or stolen, rival playwrights could not perform the play.
The set itself was very simple with two chairs set on each side of the stage and a small and tall ladder draped in leaves like a garden. The set became comical as actors used these small obstacles to try and conceal themselves from other characters. The costumes were great as well, resembling the spirit of the characters and the attire of the era the play was set in.
When the play had ended and the characters had been united with their significant others, the celebrations began again as the scene played on while The Proclaimers’ “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)” played as the actors took their bows and the audience left the theater.
Be First to Comment