Thomas Ouphe

Benedick and Beatrice, still work as a comedic device. If you're going to have a bad guy, why not call him Don Jon the Bastard? If he happens to be an actual bastard so much more the better. Much Ado About Nothing isn't as original or entertaining as Midsummer Night's Dream, but it is more consistent.  There's no onerous songs or tedious play within a play stuff, just two straightforward intersecting plots. One is about a rich guy (Don Pedro) who is marrying a perfect rich gal (Hero).  The big obstacle being that his bastard brother (Don John the Bastard) convinces everyone she's having an affair and the marriage falls through and she appears to have killed herself.  It's pretty good, but nowhere near as funny as the suicide gag in Romeo and Juliet.  Anyway, it all works out, and since Hero's hymen is intact she gets the green light for a quicky marriage and an expedient hymen cracking.  Btw, if you're finding all this hymen talk a little gross, you may

Not this clever! I wouldn't be the first person to point out that this play has some things in common with Allo Allo.  Outrageous foreign accents, a plump libidinous protagonist (Falstaff) embroiled in a farce of misunderstandings and unseen comeuppances.   Nor would I be the first person to notice that it's just God awful. There is a list of ardent bardophiles who have condemned the play.  Being a natural contrarian I had been hoping to prove them wrong, but they're right on this one.  It has all the hallmarks of bad Shakespeare comedy (animal jokes, xenophobia, flat characterisation and misogyny) without any of the clever prose. It's the worst. Allo Allo is self-aware, the Brits get as much of a roasting as the Germans and French.  That's not really the case in Merry Wives, which takes more of an It Ain't Half Hot Mum approach (though, it has to be said, nowhere near as offensive).  But, you say, Shakespeare was way ahead of his time doing funny accents.  Unfo