Shakespeare Retold (2005)

Average rating

(76%)

Starring:	Sarah Parish \| Damian Lewis \| Billie Piper \| James McAvoy \| Keeley Hawes \| Richard Armitage \| Shirley Henderson \| Rufus Sewell \| Stephen Tompkinson \| Twiggy Lawson \| Imelda Staunton \| Estelle Harris \| Bill Paterson \| Lennie James \| Sharon Small \| Johnny V
Director:	Brian Percival, Mark Brozel, David Richards
Studio:	ACORN MEDIA
Run time:	320 mins
Genres:	Drama
Languages:	English
Released:	December 26, 2005
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Four features. These adaptations inspired from the original plays bring Shakespeare's stories to the modern day audience. In 'Much Ado About Nothing', Beatrice and Benedick are two news presenters and ex-lovers who are reunited to present the same regional news programme. The friction in their relationship is almost palpable. Also includes 'Macbeth', 'The Taming Of The Shrew' and 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'.

Highest rated reviews

6 out of 6 people found the following review helpful:

shakespeare set in modern day

Rick from London, 4th December, 2006

Translating Shakespeare's comedies and tragedies to the modern day is a tricky task. The BBC has done an excellent job transforming Much Ado About Nothing to the set of a local TV magazine show, with Benedick and Beatrice as bickering anchors. In this case the transformation works neatly, as the TV studio offers numerous oppurtunities for conversations to be overheard. Also, the adaptation strays from the original story resolution, putting a modern spin on the sequence of events. Macbeth doesn't work quite so well in its respective modern setting. Not only do the producers have the task of shifting Macbeth to a restaurant, they have to be conscious that this was done just a few years back in the Christopher Walken film Scotland, PA. The biggest problem with this location shift is that one has to wonder why murder, which might seem like a realistic approach for a medeival lord, would even be considered by a chef in a restaurant. If Joe Macbeth feels that his boss Duncan Docherty is exploiting his work, why doesn't he just do what Gordon Ramsay did, namely move to another restaurant? I never quite believed that a chef would spontaneously start such a bloodbath for that kind of reason, and the insertion of a backstory motivation involving a miscarriage didn't really help things. (IIRC, Scotland, PA avoided many of these difficulties simply by cutting down on the body count.)

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2 out of 2 people found the following review helpful:

Very hit and miss

Cath from Coventry, UK, 21st February, 2006

This series transposes 4 Shakespeare plays to modern day settings, with very mixed results. By far the most successful was Much Ado About Nothing, set in a local TV news station. The script was witty, performances excellent, and the melodrama at least MAINLY believable. Damien Lewis and Sarah Parish made a good team, Billie Piper also popped up. Macbeth featured a Scottish chef and his conniving wife. The play itself is not exactly realistic, and this was just a yawn. Taming of the Shrew was just horrible! Go ahead young female politician marries a cross dressing wastrel for public acceptance. Terrible over acting all round. Didn't see the Midsummer Night's Dream.. This was a decent idea, trying to expand the interest, but Shakespeare has survived all these years because of the beautiful language, which this Retold series totally loses. Besides, Shakespeare nicked most of his plots!

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1 out of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Excellent - almost

A Customer from Wareham, England, 22nd February, 2007

Much Ado - beautifully and cleverly done. Damian Lewis's almost reptilian attractions used to perfection. I shall forever remember his 'vicious little dinosaurs.' Macbeth was almost perfect - just not quite. The characters and their relationships were not clearly enough defined, which led to some little confusion at times. Richard Armitage was wasted - we were not allowed to be sufficiently emotionally involved with him before his final act to appreciate the extent of his suspicions . It was, however, tremendously well acted and still worth while.

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Most recent reviews

shakespeare in the 21st centuary

A Customer from Luton, 10th January, 2008

I have only watched the first disc with much ado about nothing and macbeth and cant wait to watch the next one as these modern day tales of shakespeares original classics are brilliant. Some great casting and you will still understand what is going on even if you haven't seen the originals. The stories are true to the originals in that they are still both tradgedies but with great 21st centuary twists im sure shakespeare would be proud of. These films could have fallen flat on their face but i am delighted to say they bowled me over with how true to life they really are.

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