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Shakespeare Retold Details

2005 Certificate 12
  • Rated:
  • 80
  • from 1408 members

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. .. Read more

Starring Sarah Parish, Damian Lewis, Billie Piper, James McAvoy
Director Brian Percival, Mark Brozel, David Richards
Genres Drama

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Shakespeare Retold cover art

Shakespeare Retold

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'.

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 DVD: 5 hrs 20 mins
Certificate Certificate 12
Genres Drama
Language DVD: English
Released DVD: 26 Dec 2005
Production year: 2005
Format DVD

Shakespeare Retold (2 discs) (2005)

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  • Sign up Shakespeare Retold - Disc 1

    Features Much Ado About Nothing and Macbeth...

  • Sign up Shakespeare Retold - Disc 2

    Features The Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night's Dream...

  • Most helpful member's review of Shakespeare Retold

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  • 10 out of 10 people found this review helpful

    Rated - 4 stars

    shakespeare set in modern day

    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.)

      • Rick from London
      • Posted 04 Dec 2006 18:44

  • Most recent members' review of Shakespeare Retold

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  • 2 out of 2 people found this review helpful

    Rated - 4 stars

    Excellent - almost

    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.

      • A customer from Wareham, England
      • Posted 22 Feb 2007 09:20

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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 ...