from the director:
Much Ado About Nothing is one of Shakespeare's comedies, with one of the most popular romantic duos of all time. The play has wit, twists, turns... but, hey, it's a comedy. It combines a cheerful mood with an intricate series of trickery and miscommunications. Comedy is generally made up of complications, but in this play the complications could be disastrous. Hence, Much ado has the potential to turn into a tragedy.
Much ado About Nothing is warm as well as witty, and compassionate in its view of human frailties and limitations. The play focuses on the conflict between Beatrice and Benedick, whose relationship takes place as a subplot within the tale of Claudio's courtship, rejection, and rejuvenated love of Hero. The unconventionality of Beatrice and Benedick's relationship, which is based on an apparent mutual dislike, delight in wordplay, and the conspiratorial matchmaking of their family and friends, has frequently captured the interest of modern audiences.
Claudio's character in particular reveals the difficulty of the comedy: his enactment of the tradition of the courtly lover brings him to repudiate Hero without arousing the loathing of the audience, so that he can redeem himself fully at the second wed- ding. Shakespeare mocks these conventions of Courtly Love which was popular at the time.
Courtly Love began at the end of the eleventh century: the time period we place our production. In essence, Courtly Love was an experience between erotic desire and spiritual attainment that now seems contradictory; a love at once illicit and morally elevating, passionate and disciplined, humiliating and exalting, human and transcendent.
This definition of Courtly Love most certainly describes what directing a Shakespearean play means to me: passionate & disciplined, humiliating & exalting, human & transcendent!!
[Shakespeare] “hath indeed better bettered expectation than you must expect of me to tell you how.” Messenger Act I.i
To all who have helped make this romping fun journey become a reality: "I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest." Beatrice Act IV.i
THANK YOU and enjoy our creation!
Mary Beth “Bea” Geppert