Shakespeare Plays Available in Video Format
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All’s Well That Ends Well
Antony and Cleopatra
As You Like It
The Comedy of Errors
Coriolanus
Cymbeline
Hamlet
Henry IV, part 1
Henry IV, part 2
Henry V
Henry VI, part 1
Henry VI, part 2
Henry VI, part 3
Henry VIII
Julius Caesar
King John
King Lear
Love’s Labour’s Lost
Macbeth
Measure for Measure
The Merchant of Venice
The Merry Wives of Windsor
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Much Ado About Nothing
Othello
Pericles
Richard II
Richard III
Romeo and Juliet
The Taming of the Shrew
The Tempest
Timon of Athens
Titus Andronicus
Troilus and Cressida
Twelfth Night
Two Gentlemen of Verona
The Winter’s Tale
Shakespeareana

Available versions

1936: Paul Czinner

1978: Basil Coleman

1983: Sam Levene, Herb Roland

1992: Christine Edzard

2006: Kenneth Branagh

2010: Thea Sharrock

2011: Kymberly Mellen, Vance Mellen

2018: Kimberley Sykes


Adaptations

1994: Alexei Karaev (animated)


Related

1999: Never Been Kissed


As You Like It
1936: Paul Czinner

This is the first of Laurence Olivier’s six film productions of Shakespeare. Not all of them are, unfortunately, of equal quality, and this is somewhat uneven. Aside from Olivier himself, perhaps the greatest talent in the project was off the screen — the score is by Olivier’s frequent collaborator, William Walton, who also wrote the scores for Olivier’s Hamlet, Henry V, and Richard III, and the editing was done by David Lean, who went on to become one of the foremost directors of his or any age, scrupulously crafting such works as Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago.

The most peculiar and perhaps initially disturbing thing about the film is Elizabether Berger (Rosalind) herself. She came from Austria shortly before the film was made, and she plays the whole with a slight but unmistakable Austrian/German accent. If you can believe that Arnold Schwarzenegger is a middle-American native son named Jack Slater or Harry Tasker, you can probably swallow this too.

The play has the exuberance of a first effort, and it manages to remain relatively engaging throughout. It is rather severely cut (as is most cinematic Shakespeare), so many of its nuances are simply missing. It’s an interesting period piece, perhaps saying more about British-American esthetics in the mid-1930s than about Shakespeare, but it’s worth watching.


Adam: J. Fisher White

Amiens: Stuart Robertson

Audrey: Dorice Fordred

Celia: Sophie Stewart

Charles: Lionel Braham

Corin: Aubrey Mather

Duke Frederick: Felix Aylmer

Exiled Duke: Henry Ainley

Jacques: Leon Quartermaine

Le Beau: Austin Trevor

Oliver: John Laurie

Orlando: Laurence Olivier

Phoebe: Joan White

Rosalind: Elisabeth Bergner

Sylvius: Richard Ainley

Touchstone: Mackenzie Ward

William: Peter Bull