[FANFARE]
KYLE: "I learn in this letter that Don"--
Ah.
[EXHALE] Second episode.
I want to do something light, something recent,
something made by one of the most successful directors working in Hollywood today.
Eh. He'll do.
Joss Whedon. "Buffy", "Firefly", couple episodes of "Roseanne", you all know him.
Glib, bleak, has a thing for genre fiction and assertive women.
Anyway, while he was off making a billion dollars,
Joss Whedon ditzed around adapting Shakespeare in his spare time.
Because there's nothing so refreshing after a long day of rendering flying robot suits shooting lasers at aliens than...
adapting Shakespeare.
Apparently.
THOR: You have no idea what you're dealing with.
TONY: Uh...Shakespeare in the Park?
KYLE: His pet project, "Much Ado About Nothing", adapts a play that's not quite a masterpiece,
but still popular enough to be quoted by everyone.
BENEDICK: I do love nothing in the world so well as you.
[SOFT LAUGH TRACK]
Is not that strange? [LAUGH TRACK]
Everyone.
[MUMFORD AND SONS "SIGH NO MORE" PLAYS]
Every--
We couldn't find a third?
TOBIAS: For you, are my Beatrice.
STEVE HOLT: Beatrice!
KYLE: This isn't one of Shakespeare's most quotable plays, ultimately.
Or necessarily one of his masterpieces. It's a...
["SIGH NO MORE" BY JOSS WHEDON PLAYS]
Man, this music sucks.
It is a light bit of comedy. The plot's a proto-romcom.
There's an argument that's easily solved by telling the truth,
there's a Will-They-Won't-They that inevitably resolves itself into an Obviously-They-Will,
and everything is solved with the power of "mawwiage".
And to get to that point, true to the title,
no one means what they say, no one who matters really hates anyone, no one who matters really loves anyone,
and all else is fanciful wordplay around their true desires.
BENEDICK: A miracle! Here's our own hands against our hearts.
KYLE: The play is one of the most joyous, fruitful, engaging meditations on nihilism ever written.
Basically, it's...Whedon-esque.
Whedon's nodded to Shakespeare before.
GILES: We few. We happy few.
SPIKE: We band of buggered.
KYLE: But this is the first time he's filmed it.
This version of "Much Ado" grew out of parties he threw at his house involving group readings of Shakespeare.
Just gather up a bunch of his actor friends and toss out a play before the night ended.
Shakespeare in the Parlor.
So he put up the Whedon Signal and nabbed his acting buddies
and went about making Joss's Home Movies.
In black and white, mostly because that's easy to light.
So he shot in his own house, with his best friends, working with a play that he liked but not loved.
We're basically watching his vacation footage.
Look. At. How. Awesome. My. House. Is.
I've already talked about Kenneth Branagh's popular version of "Much Ado".
That was all rustic Italian comic romanticism, with a heavy dose of bombast.
Whedon's version, on the other hand, doesn't really have a concept behind it.
Other than "set in the modern day".
DON PEDRO: Come, shall we hear this music? CLAUDIO: Yea, my good lord.
[SOFT ELECTRIC GUITAR]
Set in the modern day and about, um...generically rich people.
Just, rich. Richie Richersons.
We're working in a low-to-no-concept idea.
Unless that concept is...Shakespeare in the Cups.
# DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK HEY
KYLE: Count the glasses. Count them!
Maybe it's just an excuse for the incredibly stupid plots of the characters.
DON PERDO: I will assume thy part, in some disguise, and tell fair Hero I'm Claudio,
And in her bosom I'll unclasp my heat, and the conclusion is, she shall be thine.
KYLE: [SLURRING] So I'm going to pretend to be you and hit on your girlfriend,
and then she'll want your D and then, wedding!
Yay! [GLASS CLINK] [GULP]
DON PEDRO: For we, are the only love gods!
KYLE: [SLURRING] No, you're drunk!
It all kind of feeds back into a casual, three martini lunch feel.
It...
This shot makes no sense.
What possible sequence of events could have led him into the pool,
with the...snorkel, with an...unspilled martini?
How did they get underwat--how---
Or maybe that's the joke and I'm just dissecting a proverbial frog and I'll talk about other stuff now!
Cast! After putting out the Whedon Signal, he got a cast of very familiar faces
including Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, Fred Burkel, Simon Tam, Agent Phil Coulson,
Captain Hammer, Andrew Wells, BriTANicK, half of Garfunkel and Oates,
and the only good character on "Dollhouse".
They're all good actors, and they all do fine with dialogue that has become known in certain circles as "Buffy Speak."
Whedon's voice is so distinct that Buffy Speak has become a mode of language unto its own.
One codified by jumbling of nouny-ness and adjectiviage into languagey bits,
that sound like your brain forgot words before spontaneously re-remembering them.
DR. HORRIBLE: The status...is not quo.
MAL: Morbid and creepifying, I got no problem with. Long as she does it quiet-like.
XANDER: Can I just say, "Gyeh!"
BUFFY: I see your "Gyeh!" and raise you a "Nyaugh!"
KYLE: And so here we have a stable of excellent performers who work fine with a very distinct language mode...
and you're going to have them do Shakespeare?
Measured, precise, cadenced Shakespeare?
Hell, you're going to have Whedon do something that he didn't write himself?
He's defined by the language he speaks, and you're constraining him with someone else's?
FIRST WATCHMEN: We charge you, let us obey you to go with us.
KYLE: Well, let's go ahead and be really nasty to everyone in the cast!
Alexis Denisof barks his lines like a cartoon version of Clark Gable,
Reed Diamond has all the charm of a guy about to sell you an extended warranty,
Sean Maher has about the same, only he's selling you cocaine instead,
Jillian Morgese was apparently hired because she was an extra in "The Avengers", and it shows,
who the hell let this eighth-grader on set?,
and Fran Kranz has a voice less suited for iambic pentameter, and more suited for bong jokes.
LEONATO: Hath no man's dagger here a point for me?
KYLE: Eh, I don't know.
What do you think, more accomplished Shakespearean actor Tom Hiddleston?
[STABBING SOUND, CRY OF PAIN]
KYLE: That's a bit harsh!
But here's the thing: it all kind of works.
I think the performances intially felt dull because I was so used to this mode of acting.
It's not Royal Shakespeare Company, it's just American TV.
Crisp visuals, gruff voices, and shot on cheap locations to keep costs down.
It's Stratford-Upon-Avon 90210.
It's almost as if the director has over two decades worth of television experience.
Or something.
And it's not like Whedon doesn't understand the language, or the characters.
Cough Decaprio and Danes cough.
The movie's full of little grace notes that show familiarity and amusement with the text.
BENEDICK: Is it come to this? Shall I never see a bachelor of three-score again?
Just look at this burning marshmallow of anger, this evil victory cupcake, and this...
okay, that's just cute.
And sure, some things just make no sense in a modern setting.
I mean, who throws together a wedding in three days?
BEATRICE: Kill Claudio.
KYLE: And who thinks humiliation at that wedding is grounds for murder?
FRIAR FRANCIS: Your daughter here the princes left for dead.
Let her be kept awhile secretly inside,
and publish it that she is dead indeed.
KYLE: And who ever thinks faking a death is a good idea?
What is it with Shakespearean priests? Are they possums?
But there's plenty that works. The slapstick is great all round.
URSULA: --so entirely? [GASP, CRASH]
KYLE: I was unfair to the actors before, but the real sin is that the acting is uneven, not bad.
Clark Greg works with his gregarious, easy charm,
and while their Benedick is a bit stiff in his delivery,
Amy Acker's Beatrice practically sings her lines.
BEATRICE: I love you, with so much of my heart that none is left to protest.
She's no Emma Thompson, but then again, who is?
And Nathan Fillion as Dogberry is a revelation.
Most times he's played buffoonishly. Fillion plays him like Michael Scott trying to be Horatio Caine.
DOGBERRY: We are now to examination these men.
[CSI MIAMI THEME PLAYS]
KYLE: And it's one of the best performances here as a result.
DOGBERRY: But masters, remember that I am an ass,
though it be not written down, yet forget not
that I am an ass.
KYLE: And most interestingly, Whedon managed to make the main plot work.
Not Benedick and Beatrice. As fun as they are,
they are still, in TV terms, the B plot.
The A plot is the business with Claudio and Hero,
and it has always, always been less interesting than Benedick and Beatrice.
Joss Whedon...he always seems to be more interested in concept over plot,
his work with dialogue, while his signature, can be distracting,
his sense of how to move a camera is mediocre at best,
but.
His greatest strengths have always been
his culture savviness, his sense of humor, and his understanding of character.
And he uses all three here.
He glibly works through the absurdity of the primary comic plot,
and delves deep into the ugly, centuries-dated sexual politics of the play.
The original story is simple: a lie has been told, and the world cannot be set right unless the truth is told. Easy.
Here, Whedon spices it up by, well...being a harsher judge.
Most versions I've seen play the main plot as if they're innocents duped into cruelty,
Pedro, a magnanimous matchmaker, and Claudio, a starry-eyed dope.
The Branagh version did this, for example.
But Whedon decided that...
these guys are both dicks.
CLAUDIO: You are more intemperate in your blood than Venus!
Or those pampered animals that rage in savage sensuality !
DON PEDRO: I stand dishonored, that have gone about to link my dear friend to a common stale.
[MURMURING]
Claudio in particular is called out pretty heavily. Even openly mocked.
BENEDICK: Shall I speak a word in your ear?
CLAUDIO: God bless me from a challenge. [SMACK]
KYLE: Early on, he's established as being jealous, and bitter, and gullible, and...
well, stupid.
And more than a bit of a bigot.
Jesus, he slut shamed his fiancée, at their wedding, at the altar, in front of all their friends!
Prick!
Yes, this is all in the text, but Whedon's going through that text with a highlighter.
There's one line, usually cut from the text, that Whedon included just to make Claudio look bad.
Note the strategically placed extra.
CLAUDIO: I'll hold my mind were she an Ethiope.
KYLE: But in doing that, not only does it make the play relevant--sexual bullying is a hot topic in modern feminist discourse--
but he also changes the story.
In addition to correcting a lie, it's also about teaching Claudio a lesson.
Though, I don't think he learns it.
CLAUDIO: Another Hero!
KYLE: Dumbass.
But anyway, that attention paid to the text makes it feel a little bit less like a filmed theatre camp project.
But hell, why bash the low-fi approach? This works!
After all, it's adapted from a play designed for a bare stage,
with little set design and without high concept.
Tudor audiences would say "Let us hear a play". Not see, hear.
And so, downplay all else, and you're left with the words.
And when you're left with the words, you're left with the play.
Unlike Baz Luhrmann's frenetic version, text is not only adhered to, it is king.
Paring back, shooting cheap and on the fly, in a place of comfort, with people he's quite clearly comfortable with,
it has a cozy atmosphere. Downplayed. Like a black box theater.
Until all you're left with is the space, and the actors, and the language.
So, not all that surprising for a guy who likes making his words into...wordy playfully wordy things.
That's my Joss Whedon impression right there.
End of the day, I'm glad at least one Hollywood director is working small for a change.
Joss Whedon. He staged Shakespeare and stuff.
["SIGH NO MORE" BY PATRICK DOYLE PLAYS]
Grr. Argh.