Best and Worst Shakespeare You've Ever Seen

[BakerWilliams]

Posted: 6/9/17 at 10:52pm

I know I've started a lot of threads recently, but I was genuinely curious to hear from people (especially older posters) the best and worst productions of Shakespeare they've seen, both on Broadway and otherwise.

Best: Oregon Shakespeare Festival's Hamlet last season; The Globe's Twelfth Night on Broadway

Worst: The Taming of the Shrew at Shakespeare in the Park, Denzel Washington's Julius Caesar.

[BroadwayBeebe]

Posted: 6/9/17 at 10:59pm

Darko Tresnjak directed a production of Hamlet at Hartford Stage a few years back and it has to be the best I've ever seen when in comes to Shakespeare. The final moments had the entire audience with dropped jaws and silent. He does one a year and they are all fantastic. Looking forward to his interpretation of Midsummer in the fall. 

 

[JBroadway]

Posted: 6/9/17 at 11:17pm

Most of the live productions I've seen have been in the last few years, but in my defense, I have seen about 40 live Shakespeare productions in that time, which is nothing to sneeze at if I do say so myself. Plus I've seen tons of Shakespeare films, TV broadcasts, and professional recordings of live shows. So with that in mind, here are my picks:

Best:

-The Donmar Shakespeare Trilogy: Phyllida Lloyd's women's prison productions of Julius Caesar, Henry IV and The Tempest, which I saw all in one day in London. 

-Hamlet at the Almeida in London, directed by Robert Icke and starring Andrew Scott.

-Roman Tragedies, adapted and directed by Ivo Van Hove

-Troilus and Cressida - Shakespeare in the Park 2016

-Imogen (a renamed production of Cymbeline) - Shakespeare's Globe

-Richard III, by the Schaubuhne company, directed by Thomas Ostermeier (soon to be at BAM!) 

 

In terms of film and professionally filmed productions, I'd say:

--Branagh's Hamlet (I don't like him in the role, but I think it's an excellently made film) 

--A Midsummer Night's Dream (1999)

--A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935)

--Romeo & Juliet - dir. Baz Luhrmann 

--The entire Hollow Crown series (for the most part - I'm fairly indifferent toward Cumberbatch's R3) 

--Branagh's "Much Ado" 

--Macbeth - w/ Patrick Stewart, dir. Rupert Goold

--Olivier's Richard III

With some notable exceptions, I find I don't enjoy the older Shakespeare films as much, and I have seen a fair number of them. Maybe it's a generational thing, but I find most of them to be a bit too safe and traditional. Whereas modern directors tend to be more free with their adaptation of the text. 

Updated On: 6/9/17 at 11:17 PM

[JBroadway]

Posted: 6/9/17 at 11:23pm

Oops! I was so caught up in thinking about all the great Shakespeare productions I've seen that I forgot about the "worst" section:

-A dreadful production of Twelfth Night I saw in Greece

-The Tempest at the RSC, dir. by Gregory Borin' --- sorry, I mean Gregory Doran. 

-the current production of Julius Caesar at the Public

-The Romeo & Juliet film from 2013

And again, I find many of the older, more traditional ones to be pretty uninspired. 

[TotallyEffed]

Posted: 6/10/17 at 1:01am

Personally, I don't see anything ever topping Mark Rylance in Twelfth Night.

[ColorTheHours048]

Posted: 6/10/17 at 1:29am

Best was a three-actor chamber production of MACBETH that stripped away all scenes that didn't include of reference Macbeth (they did the same for Hamlet, Othello, and something else I can't remember).

Worst would honestly have to be Oskar Eustis's current SitP production of CAESAR.

[wonkit]

Posted: 6/10/17 at 9:15am

Great topic! I have been fortunate enough to see a lot of Shakespeare over the years and I personally prefer even bad Shakespeare to good anything else.

If I had to pick one best performance, it would be Peter Brook's MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM around 1970. Fast, clever, impeccably cast, giving new meaning to virtually every word in the play. Alan Howard in particular won my heart - an extraordinarily vivid Theseus/Oberon.

Worst - probably the Lincoln Center Scottish Play a few years back. A friend I took to the performance with me still talks about it, and I don't think she has entirely forgiven me. I didn't care for Denzel's JULIUS CAESAR either but loved Colm Feore in it.

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 6/10/17 at 9:29am

Best is without a doubt Fiasco's production of Cymbeline a few years back- I loved every second of it. 

Worst would be TFANA's production of Pericles last year. I'm not sure that play marks among anyone's favorites regardless, but it was pretty awful.