For now...I'll confess, I don't think As You Like It is all that funny.
I did when I was younger, likely because I saw a cut version of the play in the park and enjoyed it. But after trying multiple versions this past summer, I determined, "Nah. I don't know what Shakespeare was doing here, but it's not comedy..."
The play drags as The Royal Shakespeare Company filmed version proves. The many, many, many conversations feel like clever people exchanging in-jokes while the rest of us look on. Shakespeare honestly doesn't have to feel that way.
Branagh's version starts out better than the others because he cuts it ruthlessly. However, I have to agree with various critics who don't understand the purpose of the Japanese setting. I liked it for its own sake but it doesn't contribute to the movie one way or the other.
Olivier and Elisabeth Bergner (image above) also have great chemistry. Granted, it's hard to believe that Olivier hiked into the forest to find the exiled duke (good heavens, he looks healthy for a starving man!). But once the two lovers meet, he has supposedly recovered. And she's adorable.
But I decided that the biggest problem with the couple is that the play is more Sleepless in Seattle than You've Got Mail--that is, the play is mostly about the leads when they are NOT together rather than ongoing interactions between the leads.
 |
| Not even Helen Mirren changed |
| my mind about the play. |
Much Ado About Nothing and Taming of the Shrew depend more on ongoing interactions. Twelfth Night is somewhere in the middle. As You Like It: not so much.
Granted, As You Like It has more interactions than Sleepless. But it takes a surprisingly long time for the couple to have anything approaching an actual conversation.
Maybe the play is a decent drama or an okay comedy about peasants. But as a comedy about a couple...frankly, I think it falls flat.
