3.27 Measure for Measure (1603) in Full

Film Adaptation

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Director Desmond Davis based the brothel in the play on a traditional Western saloon and the prison on a typical horror film dungeon.  The role of the Duke was originally offered to Alec Guinness. When he turned it down, the role was offered to a further thirty-one actors, before Kenneth Colley finally accepted the part.  The set for the episode was a 360-degree set backed by a cyclorama, which allowed actors to move from location to location without cutting - actors could walk through the streets of Vienna by circumnavigating the studio eight times.  For the interview scenes, Davis decided to link them aesthetically and shot both in the same manner; Angelo was shot upwards from waist level to make him look large, Isabella was shot from further away so more background was visible in her shots, making her appear smaller. Gradually, the shots then move towards each other's style so that, by the end of the scene, they are both shot in the same framing.

Reference:  Measure for Measure, Behind-the-scenes.

Kate Nelligan, as Isabella 

I was enamored with actress Kate Nelligan, who suffused my view of Isabella in the play with a longing and a romance.  Drawn so, I was glad for the Duke's machinations.  He deftly turned the amorous, ill-intentioned Angelo from having forbidden sex with Isabella, to having sex with his estranged but lawful wife.  It is this seedy scheming that makes "Measure for Measure" a dark comedy.    

Full Theatrical Reading

Complete Text

Measure for Measure

Note. The numbers in the title refer to the play number (3.27) and publication year (1603), which Wikipedia noted based on the Oxford chronology.

3.23 As You Like It (1599) in Full

"As You Like It" is a 1936 film, directed by Paul Czinner and starring Laurence Olivier as Orlando and Elisabeth Bergner as Rosalind. It is based on William Shakespeare's play of the same name. It was Laurence Olivier's first performance of Shakespeare on screen.

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"As You Like It" is one I have pegged for a Shakespeare Talks! on gender and identity.  Consider this:  In Shakespeare's time, young men played the role of women.  In this case, it's Rosalind.  Who pretends she's a man, in an effort to get close to, and woo, Orlando.  Once they've built up a friendship, she persuades him to do a role play, with her (secretly disguised as man) as lady (which of course she is already).  You get the picture.

Full Theatrical Reading

Complete Text

As You Like It

Note. The numbers in the title refer to the play number (3.23) and publication year (1599), which Wikipedia noted based on the Oxford chronology.

3.16 The Merchant of Venice (1596) in Full

Film Adaptation

The 2004 adaptation follows the text very closely, only missing occasional lines. The director, Michael Radford, believed that Shylock was Shakespeare's first tragic hero, who reaches a catastrophe due to his own flaws:  Thus the film does not show Shylock purely as a villain, but partly also as a victim. It begins with text and a montage of how the Jewish community is abused by the Christian population of Venice. One of the last shots of the film also brings attention to the fact that, as a convert, Shylock would have been cast out of the Jewish community in Venice, no longer allowed to live in the ghetto.

Reference:  The Merchant of Venice (2004 film).

Full Theatrical Reading

Complete Text

The Merchant of Venice

Note. The numbers in the title refer to the play number (3.16) and publication year (1596), which Wikipedia noted based on the Oxford chronology.

3.7 Richard III (1592) in Full

Director Jane Howell also saw the unedited nature of the tetralogy as important for Richard himself, arguing that without the three Henry VI plays "it is impossible to appreciate Richard except as some sort of diabolical megalomaniac," whereas in the full context of the tetralogy "you've seen why he is created, you know how such a man can be created: he was brought up in war, he saw and knew nothing else from his father but the struggle for the crown, and if you've been brought up to fight, if you've got a great deal of energy, and physical handicaps, what do you do? You take to intrigue and plotting."

Richard III falls under my umbrella of Shakespearean villain extraordinaire, alongside Iago and Lady Macbeth.  But this production from the BBC Television Shakespeare suggests I ought to read those Henry VI plays to get a better grip on him and perhaps recast his character.  Alas, these plays are among the few I haven't read, yet.

Full Theatrical Reading

Complete Text

Richard III

Note. The numbers in the title refer to the play number (3.7) and publication year (1592), which Wikipedia noted based on the Oxford chronology.

"Where the Bee Sucks," There Sucks Ariel

Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip’s bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat’s back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

Where the Bee Sucks, There Suck I is a poem by William Shakespeare, sung by Ariel in Act V, scene i  of "The Tempest."

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A very lovely performance by Amy Koop and Michael Mikulin, wonderfully arranged by Mikulin, in this audio recording:  Where the Bee Sucks (There Suck I):

This song from The Tempest is sung by Ariel, a sprite who is in the service of the sorcerer Prospero. Prospero decides to renounce his magical powers (“I’ll drown my book”). Ariel sings this song while helping to attire Prospero, as the sorcerer removes his wizarding robes and dresses in his city clothes, in preparation for leaving his magical powers behind. The song lyrics reflect Ariel’s anticipation of gaining freedom from service and being returned to the natural world.

"O Mistress Mine" of Feste the Clown

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"O Mistress Mine," by mezzo-soprano Pamela Dellal with the Ensemble Chaconne

O Mistress mine, where are you roaming?
O, stay and hear; your true love’s coming,
That can sing both high and low:
Trip no further, pretty sweeting;
Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man’s son doth know. 

What is love? ’Tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What’s to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies not plenty;
Then, come kiss me, sweet and twenty,
Youth’s a stuff will not endure.

"O Mistress Mine" is a poem by William Shakespeare, from his play "Twelfth Night" (Act II, scene iii):

These lines are sung by Feste, one of the more complex comic foils to appear in a Shakespearean work. He is something of a jester, of course, but he has an unmistakably philosophical underside (“Better a witty fool than a foolish wit”), pressing characters to abandon their self-pity, to recognize that life always brings its burdens — but pressing them also to seize the moment of love, which brings life’s rewards. All of this is very much the message of this sweet, simple, and yet poignant song, which attained celebrity in its own right in Shakespeare’s lifetime. Part of that celebrity was owed not to Shakespeare, however, but to the man who composed the music by which the words came to be known. 

Listen to the setting of “O Mistress Mine,” one of the last works composed by Thomas Morley, a student of William Byrd’s who died shortly after the play opened, in the fall of 1602. Although he was an organist at St Paul’s Cathedral and he attempted to write some serious church music, Morley is best known for his perfection of the consort style (the introduction of the “broken consort,” in which wind instruments are added to the conventional strings) and of the English madrigal.

Reference:  Shakespeare/Morley — “O Mistress Mine.”

A lovely instrumental performance, by the Stockholms Barockensemble.  

An accomplished performance, by Alfred Deller with the Deller Consort.  

Forlorn "Willow Song" of Desdemona

The poor soul sat sighing
By a sycamore tree,
Sing willow, willow, willow,
Wth his hand in his bosom
And his head upon his knee,
Oh, willow, willow, willow,
Shall be my garland.
Sing all a green willow,
Aye me, the green willow
Must be my garland. 

He sighed in his singing
And made a great moan,
Sing...
I am dead to all pleasure,
My true love he is gone, etc.
The mute bird sat by him
Was made tame by his moans, etc.
The true tears fell from him
Would have melted the stones.
Sing... 

Come all you forsaken
And mourn you wth me.
Who speaks of a false love?
Mine's falser than she.
Sing...
Let Love no more boast her
In palace nor bower;
It buds but it blasteth
Ere it be a flower.
Sing... 

Thou fair and more false,
I die with thy wound.
Thou hast lost thy truest lover
That goes upon the ground.
Sing...
Let nobody chide her,
Her scorns I approve.
She was born to be false
And I to die for love.
Sing... 

Take this for my farewell
And latest adieu;
Write this on my tomb
That in love I was true.
Sing...

"The Willow Song" is a song William Shakespeare wove into his play "Othello" (Act IV, scene iii).

As Desdemona [wife of Othello] is preparing for bed the night she will be murdered, she starts singing a song about willow trees. This song, supposedly sung originally by one of Desdemona's mother's servants who loved a crazy guy, reflects Desdemona's own situation. She herself is worried that the man she married has gone crazy and will desert her. Willows at the edge of water are a traditional symbol of women deserted by their lovers.

Reference:  The Willow Song.

Desdemona describes her source of the song to Emilia while dressing:

My mother had a maid call’d Barbary;
She was in love, and he she lov’d prov’d mad,
And did forsake her. She had a song of “Willow,”
And old thing ’twas, but it express’d her fortune,
And she died singing it. That song tonight
Will not go from my mind, I have much to do
But to go hang my head all at one side
And sing it like poor Barbary.

Reference:  The Willow Song.

Othello smothered Desdemona to death - not merely deserted - out of a horribly, but wrongfully, implanted belief by Iago that she was unfaithful to him.