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There are four episodes included in this Box Set including Macbeth (which is retold within a competitive top London restaurant), Much Ado About Nothing (which is quite cleverly transformed to the world of daytime TV presenters), Taming of the Shrew
(re-imagined in the environment of modern media savvy politics), and
what would a Shakespeare collection be without the most bizarre of his
writings A Midsummer Night's Dream (which takes the triangular love story amidst the backdrop of a summer holiday camp).
Since Baz Lurhman showed that
Shakespeare can be modernized – and 10 Things I Hate About You
proved you can make
Shakespeare relatable to anyone younger than 200 years old, the
possibilities of exploiting the writers works have been endless. So,
it's great to see it done well (because there have been more than a few
terrible adaptions - most notably O and Mel Gibsons Macbeth).
The
strength of all the BBC re-tellings is the relatability each has to
modern times. It's a great way of teaching younger kids the basics of
Shakespeare (without them actually realising they are learning at
all!). Heck,
theres even references to David Brent and Little Britain.
For mine, Midsummer
has always been an odd story to follow, however the ‘Retelling’
makes for some light and fun viewing - and for the first time ever -
you can actually understand what the hell is going on!
A
fantastic cast has been assembled throughout the series – the most
impressive being Damien Lewis (who I've been a big fan of since his turn as Sgt Winters in Band of Brothers and most recently from the TV series Life). There are a few other stand out performances including James McAvoy and Harry Potter's Imelda Staunton, who really give some cred to each episode.
If series
like these were shown in schools – perhaps I might have paid a bit more
attention…or at least finally understood what Bill Shakespeare was on
about!
EXTRAS
Nothing
on offer which is quite strange, especially considering it's a Box Set
and the individual episode releases don't include extras either. But,
considering it’s a ABC
series – chances are that there wasn’t much effort put into behind the
scenes featurettes. Conclusion:
Movie 70% Extras: N/A
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