it's getting away from the message that good women are doormats.

Yeah, Kate was no doormat in the all-women production we saw.

it's getting away from the message that good women are doormats.

To me this is the difference between the text and the subtext. Kate is not a doormat. That is not how you think of her or remember her.

I often feel like conventional endings which tie things up in neat audience pleasing packages are seen as "the message" but the rest of the text and subtext subvert that message. Kate is memorable and likeable because she's a shrew. And Shakespeare obviously doesn't think she is a shrew. And to me her compliance at the end doesn't mean she's a doormat but rather that she's discovered sex and somebody worthy of her. She's happy; she didn't get a lobotomy.

I think more romantic comedies need guns and stuff blowing up.

See also, Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

See also, Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

Ah ha. You reminded me of the movie I've hated the most in the last decade. Thank you!

Hmm, I was typing (and still am) on my iPhone, so I shortened a bunch of gender issues into "making Kate and Petruccio sympathetic and likable."

but I intended all that to be included in my shorthand. The productions I saw include not making Kate a doormat.

I think it's certainly possible to deal with the gender issues in TotS, but it's rare that it's done successfully. In too many cases, productions "fix" the last scene but play the rest of the script straight, as if making Kate's final speech sarcastic makes up for the fact that Petruchio's just spent the last 2 hours being more or less psychotically abusive.

I'd have liked Mr. and Mrs. Smith better with a different Mrs. Smith. She's not someone I see in a fistfight with Brad Pitt. But Brad? I don't think I've liked him more. He cracked me right up. And, weirdly, one of my krav teachers was in it, and I recognised him under all his SWAT gear. Which isn't creepy, honest. He just moves like him.

What about all the Apatow bro-movies like "I Love You, Man(which I really liked, btw.) Rom-com or just coms. "Object of My Affection"...I think it's sort of a romcom and sort of a dramedy.

Oh, I thought of two rom-coms I liked which are generally overlooked.

Only You with Marisa Tomei, RDJ and all of Italy.

Also Housesitter with Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn where she plays a very smart cookie instead of a ditz and does it very well.

I think it's certainly possible to deal with the gender issues in TotS, but it's rare that it's done successfully. In too many cases, productions "fix" the last scene but play the rest of the script straight, as if making Kate's final speech sarcastic makes up for the fact that Petruchio's just spent the last 2 hours being more or less psychotically abusive.

Both of the good productions of Shrew were because of the top notch performances of the actors playing the leads, and not due to any modification of the text, or a sarcastic last speech delivery. It's part of why they stood out as performances.

I agree that it's rare and difficult to pull off, but in my experience it's rare and difficult to pull off a really good production The Glass Menagerie. Good theater is difficult to do well.

But you'll never get me to agree that it's impossible to be both faithful to Shakespeare's text and deliver a good, sympathetic, enjoyable performance of the piece, because I've seen it happen twice.