Authorizing Shakespeare on Film and Television: Gender, Class, and Ethnicity in Adaptation

Pittman opens by suggesting that the relationship between Shakespeare and those who adapt his plays for the screen is not unlike that of King Lear and the earl of Kent: both are involved in a master/servant role and thus struggle over real or perceived authority. In trying to create their own interpretations, adaptors must contend with and at times defy not only Shakespeare's iconic status, but also the accumulated weight and history of all past adaptations. This in turn helps shape how they depict issues related to gender, class, and ethnicity in their own productions (possibly revealing more about themselves than they intended) and forms the major focus of Pittman's book. Chapters are devoted to both high culture (Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet and As You Like It) and pop adaptations (101 Things I Hate About You, Scotland, PA,) and both receive the same exacting scrutiny under Pittman's probing eye. Along the way she unfolds such seemingly familiar and fixed terms as "author," "authority," and "original" to reveal them as both mutable and, in this context, perhaps irretrievable, forever slipping away just out of reach, like the lost sanity of a mad king. Pittman is an associate professor of English at Andrews University and the author of previous publications on Shakespeare and film. Annotation c2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

L. Monique Pittman is Associate Professor of English and Director of the J. N. Andrews Honors Program at Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan. She earned her PhD from Purdue University. Her previous publications examine film adaptations of Shakespearean drama.