Thursday, September 3, 2009

Another Return to Measure for Measure


A Waste of Shame. By William Boyd. Perf. Rupert Graves, Tom Sturridge, Indira Varma, and Anna Chancellor. Dir. John McKay. Shakespeare Retold. 2005. DVD. Open University / BBC, 2005.

The incomprehensible magic of iSquint, combined with other programs, has enabled me—for educational purposes only—to conquer the Region Two DVD Barrier. I recently learned of a derivative version of Measure for Measure released in the UK, and I needed to be able to view it in the US.

But I told you that to tell you this.

When I converted the extracted file with iSquint, I realized that I might be able to do the same with another Region Two purchase from some time ago: The Shakespeare Retold series' A Waste of Shame. And if I could convert it, I could provide an extract from it, something I'd hoped for since I last wrote on the work (for which, q.v.).

Here, then, is the speech in question. We are to imagine it being presented to an audience (amongst whom is Shakespeare himself) in 1604:


The speech comes from (Measure for Measure, II.ii.181-87). It follows forthwith:
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Most dangerous
Is that temptation that doth goad us on
To sin in loving virtue: never could the strumpet,
With all her double vigour, art and nature,
Once stir my temper; but this virtuous maid
Subdues me quite. Ever till now,
When men were fond, I smiled and wonder'd how.
I'll have to write about the new derivative later—once I've had time to view it!

Links: The Film at IMDB.

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Bardfilm is normally written as one word, though it can also be found under a search for "Bard Film Blog." Bardfilm is a Shakespeare blog (admittedly, one of many Shakespeare blogs), and it is dedicated to commentary on films (Shakespeare movies, The Shakespeare Movie, Shakespeare on television, Shakespeare at the cinema), plays, and other matter related to Shakespeare (allusions to Shakespeare in pop culture, quotes from Shakespeare in popular culture, quotations that come from Shakespeare, et cetera).

Unless otherwise indicated, quotations from Shakespeare's works are from the following edition:
Shakespeare, William. The Riverside Shakespeare. 2nd ed. Gen. ed. G. Blakemore Evans. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997.
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