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| Courtesy of Karen Whimsey |
I have been catching up on my reading this past weekend, finishing plays that I didn't have time to complete earlier in the semester. Can I just say that the History Plays are duller than a dead cat licking peanut butter off of a moldy pickle? Ya, they're just not very exciting. What was exciting, however, was finishing The Taming of the Shrew. That's a good play. It's the one that I've been the most drawn to all semester. I've watched several film versions/adaptations of this movie, some of which I blogged about in previous posts. It is interesting to see what modern directors do to make this play less femininely upsetting. This usually involves taking out the part where Kate is dominated completely by the man. The modern chick-flick 10 Things I Hate About You doesn't have Kate being literally broken from being a shrew, it has her having the ability to love and be loved. Different. Kiss Me, Kate has the actors playing Kate and Petruchio be a divorced couple learning to fall in love and be happy together again. Different. McClintock!, one of my favorite John Wayne movies, has Kate as the wife who left, and then came back again. She gets her sass tamed down more (through methods like spanking with an iron shovel), and falls in love with her husband when she realizes he's up to her challenge. Not as different, in my point of view. I see Kate as someone who is extremely intelligent, and wanting someone to be intelligent with her. (See my previous post for more on this topic.) The other plays are nearly there. I won't go into as much depth with the others (Othello and King Henry V), but I'll let you know when I finish them tonight. |
