After the bigger-than-life superheroes of Avengers, the vampires of Buffy, and the spaceships of Firefly, it’s definitely a head-trip to watch a Joss Whedon movie about a 400 year old play. But it’s a good head-trip, one that you need to go experience.
Yes, I know it’s Shakespeare. You’ll like it. And you’ll understand it, I promise.
Many people are going to watch Much Ado About Nothing so they can see their favorite Whedonverse actors, and they won’t be disappointed on that account. Alexis Denisof (Wesley from Buffy) does nice work as the woman-hating Benedick. He doesn’t have a lot of highs and lows in his performance, but he’s fun to watch. And the exaggerated hide and seek he plays while trying to eavesdrop was one of my favorite scenes in the whole movie.
Amy Acker (Fred from Angel) likewise turned in a very solid performance as the man-hating Beatrice. Acker has always seemed hit-or-miss to me. I feel she does better in quieter moments, while her portrayal of louder emotions feels a little forced. She turned that around in her speech after the failed wedding, where she curses Claudio,
“O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the marketplace!”
That was probably her best work in the whole movie. She was believably furious, almost incoherent in her grief. I don’t always believe her more sarcastic moments, I still think there’s a little too much effort in her acting. But her quieter scenes, such as when she sits at the window with a glass of wine and wonders if she’s in love with Benedick, are very sweetly done.
Clark Gregg (Agent Coulson) unsurprisingly does a great job with a character I’ve always found forgettable: Hero’s father Leonato. When the Prince tells Leonato “I think this is your daughter,” Gregg’s delivery of “Her mother hath many times told me so” is such casual, self-deprecating, good-humored sarcasm, that it was the first time I’ve seen the humor in it. It’s a very quick moment, but drew the first laugh of the movie from the audience.
Sean Maher (Simon from Firefly) is always fun to watch no matter what he’s doing. He was quietly chilling and evil as the Prince’s brother John, but I never found his scenes to be all that interesting. Though he has some nicely steamy moments with Conrade who, in a nice twist, is played by a woman, the first time I’ve seen that done. Likewise, the scenes with his henchmen Borachio and Conrade (played by Spencer Treat Clark and Riki Lindhome) didn’t really draw me in.
But I’m thinking that’s not completely the actors’ fault. John’s role is to be the villain, plain and simple, and Borachio and Conrade deliver exposition and not a lot else. It’s one of those times where Shakespeare is doing a lot of “telling not showing”, and it’s hard to make those long explanatory speeches interesting. (Whedon adds in some flashbacks, which helps you visualize what they’re going on about.) These actors did a perfectly good job with the lines they’re given. And yes: Sean Maher plays the part that Keanu Reeves had in the Kenneth Branagh version much, much better.
Fran Kranz (Topher from Dollhouse, and Marty in Cabin In the Woods) seems made to play good-hearted, smart-yet-easily-confused characters, so he was perfect in the role of Claudio. He bounced very well from being love-lorn, to sulking, to love-lorn again, to mischievous, to enraged, to guilty, and back to love-lorn.
I was surprised at how much I appreciated Reed Diamond (Laurence from Dollhouse) in the part of the Prince Don Pedro. It’s another one of those roles I tend to forget about. But Diamond did a lot of emoting in the role, bringing out the meaning of some of the more difficult-to-understand speeches. And Jillian Morgese, who I don’t believe I’ve seen before, played Hero with a quiet strength, and really got to shine in the scene where she’s unjustly accused.
But who am I kidding? I know who you want to hear about.
Nathan Fillion (do I really need to tell you who Nathan Fillion has played?) was wonderful. Though both are incompetent, Michael Keaton’s Dogberry (in the Branagh adaptation) was spastic and unhinged, whereas Fillion’s Dogberry is suave and self-assured — if also completely clueless and thick-headed. Whedon’s Dogberry and Verges (Tom Lenk) are hilarious refugees from a modern-day cop drama: hissing at each other with corrections and backing up the other’s stupid statements and bumping into each other because they can’t see past their sunglasses. I love to see Fillion acting goofy, he’s so good at it.
Whedon’s direction brings out the best parts of the movie. The scene in the pool (the one from the movie poster) is simple and striking in how well it’s shot. The memorial scene with the candles, and Hero and Beatrice looking on from above, was lovely (with my favorite song of the movie too.) Whedon’s decision to show Beatrice and Benedick in flashbacks was a good choice. In the play, Beatrice only mentions one time that she and Benedick have a history. Showing exactly what that history was makes both characters seem less mean-spirited and more human.
Something is always going on in the background of each scene during another character’s speech: the maid and the security officer making out in the kitchen, Leonato falling asleep at the table, the villain John sneaking a cupcake, Hero and Margaret frantically and silently trying to figure out what to say next, Benedick setting his marshmallow on fire, all things that you won’t find in the original play, but they add a funny little subtext to whatever else is going on.
It’s Whedon’s interpretation of Shakespeare’s lines and how he has the characters react to those lines that makes the story clear, even for people with no love of Shakespeare. Benedick rants and complains at length about Beatrice, and then says he doesn’t want to talk about her anymore. Whedon has everyone pause behind his back, and when he starts talking about Beatrice again, everyone laughs, including the audience, who might not have understood why the line was funny if not for that direction.
It’s not that I thought the movie was perfect, it had a few flaws. The party scene with the acrobats seemed off somehow, like Whedon was going for decadent, but it came off too quiet to be decadent, yet too decadent to be classy. The dance at the end was done much better. Benedick’s exaggerated yet casual exercise moves in front of Beatrice were good for a quick laugh, but was a little too campy for me. And I didn’t think the movie needed to open with a scene of Benedick and Beatrice, the flashbacks we got later would’ve been enough. In spite of any flaws, though, it was definitely adorable, interesting, funny, and sweet. It emphasizes the beauty of the language, but it never took itself too seriously. And I liked it better than half of the movies I’ve seen all year. But it’s Joss Whedon and Shakespeare, so really, I expect nothing less.