my-server
← Wiki Redirected from Shakespeare adaptations

List of William Shakespeare screen adaptations

The Guinness Book of Records lists 410 feature-length film and TV versions of William Shakespeares plays, making Shakespeare the most filmed author ever in any language.

, the Internet Movie Database lists Shakespeare as having writing credit on 1,800 films, including those under production but not yet released. The earliest known production is King John from 1899.

Comedies

All's Well That Ends Well

As You Like It

The Comedy of Errors

Love's Labour's Lost

Measure for Measure

The Merchant of Venice

The Merry Wives of Windsor

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Much Ado About Nothing

The Taming of the Shrew

Twelfth Night

The Two Gentlemen of Verona

Tragedies

Antony and Cleopatra

Coriolanus

Hamlet

Julius Caesar

King Lear

Macbeth

Othello

Romeo and Juliet

Timon of Athens

Titus Andronicus

Troilus and Cressida

Histories

Henry IV, Part 1

Henry IV, Part 2

Henry V

Henry VI, Part 1

Henry VI, Part 2

Henry VI, Part 3

Henry VIII

King John

Richard II

Richard III

Romances

Pericles

Cymbeline

The Winter's Tale

The Tempest

Other

Shakespeare as a character

Acting Shakespeare

Television series

NOTE: "ShakespeaRe-Told", "The Animated Shakespeare" and "BBC Television Shakespeare" series have been covered above, under the respective play performed in each episode.

  • Playing Shakespeare (TV, UK, 1979–1984) began as two consecutive episodes of the UK arts series The South Bank Show, and developed into a nine-part series of its own. It features director John Barton, then a leading light of the Royal Shakespeare Company, putting a host of actors through their paces. Many of those actors are now household names, including Judi Dench, Michael Pennington, Patrick Stewart, Ben Kingsley, David Suchet and Ian McKellen. The episodes were:
  • The South Bank Show: "Speaking Shakespearean Verse"
  • The South Bank Show: "Preparing to Perform Shakespeare"
  • 1. "The Two Traditions"
  • 2. "Using the Verse"
  • 3. "Language and Character"
  • 4. "Set Speeches and Soliloquies"
  • 5. "Irony and Ambiguity"
  • 6. "Passion and Coolness"
  • 7. "Rehearsing the Text"
  • 8. "Exploring a Character"
  • 9. "Poetry and Hidden Poetry"

Three further episodes were filmed but never edited or screened. They were to be called "Using the Prose", "Using the Sonnets" and "Contemporary Shakespeare". Their text can be read in the book "Playing Shakespeare" by John Barton.

  • The Shakespeare Sessions (USA 2003): An American spin-off from Playing Shakespeare (above) in which John Barton directs notable American actors in Shakespeare scenes.
  • Conjuring Shakespeare (TV, UK, 199?): A series of half-hour documentaries hosted by Fiona Shaw, each episode dealing with scenes from a particular play.
  • In Search of Shakespeare (TV, UK, 2003): A BBC documentary series of four 1-hour episodes, chronicling the life of William Shakespeare, written and presented by Michael Wood.
  • Slings & Arrows (TV, Canada, 2003–2006): A Canadian comedy drama set in the New Burbage Shakespeare Festival, a fictional Shakespearean festival in a small town in Canada comparable to the real-life Stratford Shakespeare Festival. With its entire run written by Susan Coyne, Bob Martin and Mark McKinney, directed by Peter Wellington, and starring Paul Gross, Martha Burns and Stephen Ouimette, it aired in three seasons of six 1-hour episodes each.
  • Som & Fúria (TV, Brazil, 2009): A Brazilian adaptation of Slings and Arrows.

Academic

  • The "Themes of Shakespeare" series contains straight-to-video short documentaries, each considering the theme of a particular play. The contributors are Professor Stanley Wells, and Dr. Robert Smallwood of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.
  • Two lecture series given by professor Peter Saccio were filmed and are commercially available on DVD.

Miscellaneous

  • Theatre of Blood (UK, 1973). Vincent Price plays a Shakespearean actor who takes poetic revenge on the critics who denied him recognition. He kills his critics using methods inspired by several of Shakespeare's plays: Julius Caesar, Troilus and Cressida, The Merchant of Venice, Richard III, Othello, Cymbeline, Romeo and Juliet, Henry VI Part One, Titus Andronicus, and King Lear.
Douglas Hickox director
Vincent Price as Edward Lionheart
Diana Rigg as Edwina Lionheart

See also

Notes and references

Notes

References

Sources

Further reading

External links