Love's Labours Lost Play Analysis

Improved Essays
Though written as a comedy, Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost both begins and ends in death. With an impressive score, an even more impressive stage, and an early 20th century setting, Director Christopher Luscombe sets an ambitious goal to produce a successful comedy steeped in war motif. He plays his own game of wits, much like the characters, with Shakespeare’s words by taking advantage of already present themes of life, death, and time, and gives them applicable meaning to a pre-World War I setting. This war imagery parallels Shakespeare’s own juxtaposition of life and death in the play beginning subtly and ending just as forcefully. The Royal Shakespeare Company’s Love’s Labour’s Lost takes place before the onslaught of World War I in a bubble of gaiety and witty banter. In what can be an otherwise disorienting play, Luscombe and the actors manage to bring vivacity and personality to the many characters of one of Shakespeare’s earliest comedies. The very first action in the play involves the King of Navarre, played by Sam Alexander, and his three friends Longaville, Dumaine, and Berowne marching onto the stage in step, one behind the other, yet dressed in civilian clothes. In …show more content…
In the field, rows of unruly poppies grow along a fence, a slash of blood against the pastel blue background. When the Princess of France and her ladies meet their suitors dress both as Russians and themselves, red roses are present. Although this may be a romantic gesture, Luscombe recognizes that the English War of the Roses was still heavily relevant during Shakespeare’s time, making appearances in some of his other works. Just as Lancaster and York fought for the upper hand, so too, to the lords and ladies. Finally during the Nine Worthies play within a play, Don Armado releases a shower of scarlet flower petals on the field that remain far longer than the gaiety, expressing blood on the battle field of the impending

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Dim Lady Shakespeare can be boring and drab in comparison to the world today. Our lives and experiences seem extremely different in comparison to shakespeare 's, and the antiquated language doesn’t make connections to his work any easier. Books today such as “No Fear Shakespeare” make millions, translating his work to something a modern day student can experience in its glory without the boredom of classical language. ALthough entire works have been “translated” into modern language none of them have picture shakespeare 's humor and wit quite as elegantly as Harryette Mullen in her poem “Dim Lady” In Mullen 's work she uses colorful language, humor and structure is used to create a modern take on a classic form of poetry.…

    • 950 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Love Sick Play Analysis

    • 602 Words
    • 3 Pages

    On October 28, 2017, I attended Desert Hot Springs High School’s theatrical performance, Love Sick, a play produced by John Cariani. Mr. Landmann is the head director of the theater department at DHSHS and was able to execute a great show with the help of his students: Matilde Alejandro, Megan Johnson, Bethany Navarro, Luis Salazar, Nathaniel Esparza, Natalia Martinez, Angel Limas, Esmeralda Hernandez, Esmeralda Salazar, Nicholas Jacob Gamboa, Baylee Bryant, Jonathan Calderon, Erika Aleman, Jesus Hernandez, Austin Aguirre, Edna Escobedo, Anjali Singh, Angel Ramirez, Elijah Cross, Michelle Lopez, Alondra Campos, Sadie Cunningham, Joseph Arisco, Maya Souza, Efrain Flores, Kimberly Solano, and Zauriah Cotton. Love/Sick is a play that contains lovers and dreamers that look into the agony and the happiness that comes with being in love and in relationships. To begin with, the plot of the play was very straightforward and unmissable. It outlined all the effects, good and bad, that comes with being in a relationship as well as depicting all the dilemmas.…

    • 602 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    I was fortunate enough to be able to attend a production of ''The Diviners,'' on Sunday, March the Nineteenth. The performance was put on by the Calhoun Community College theatre department. The play was staged in the black box theatre of The Alabama Center for the Arts in Decatur, Alabama. It was an impressive performance especially when considering the size and arrangement of the stage. Even with such limitations, the cast were able to turn the stage into a window into prohibition era Indiana.…

    • 542 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a play packed with mischief and mayhem. It is often referred to by modern-day scholars as the Elizabethan Inception, as there are multiple examples of “play within a play” devices, each embodying several themes and concepts. Among these are examples of the contrast of tragedy and comedy, the dynamics of the written and spoken word, and imagination vs. reality.…

    • 1186 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    If a man represents himself as something that deviates the slightest from his true self, is that not in itself an act of manipulation? Today’s speech in regards to Module C will discuss how all representations of people and politics are undoubtedly acts of manipulation as true political agendas must be hidden behind a misleading facade. Language plays a particularly powerful role in portraying these political representations. However ambiguous the political motive may be, control is the ultimate goal in the world of politics.…

    • 1513 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This passage articulates the intention of Shakespeare ’s play Macbeth in historical means as it serves as both a historical allusion and a royal pageant. Greenblatt illustrates that the grotesque bloodiness such as the Macbeth couple’s longing for “murderous ferocity” in the play is the manifestation of the public’s amusement by intensified punishment in seventeenth century London. By extending the scope of a spousal relationship into the fundamental human nature of relishing tyranny, Greenblatt successfully combines the seemingly abnormal human instinct implied by Elizabethan era with Shakespeare’s repeated motifs of absurd human nature. In addition to explaining the ubiquitous violence in scenes, Greenblatt also points out that Macbeth is…

    • 258 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Falstaff's Honor

    • 811 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The battlefield is not a venue for honor, but a playground; the highway is not for traveling, but for thieving; the throne is not for a king, but for a drunk. Thus, the movement of I Henry IV is not Hal’s rise to royalty, but his tragic loss of the most essential human quality, passion for life; in Falstaff, Shakespeare’s play finds not simply comic relief but an antidote to the power and corruption that threaten the fragile conception of what it is to be a living…

    • 811 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Lovesport Play Analysis

    • 875 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Lovesport by Tony Padilla, A Play For The Modern Age On March 26th 2017, I attended the Palm Springs Woman’s Club’s Pearl McManus Theatre and watched the show Lovesport. The play takes place in the present, 2017, in Josh and Marty’s house which is near San Francisco. One night after a party, Josh and Marty invite Gary and Ben over and they all hang out and talk.…

    • 875 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Evaluate how dramatic techniques have been used to reveal enduring ideas in Shakespeare’s plays. Support your view with detailed reference to the play you have studied. Dramatic techniques play a significant role in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth (1606). By interweaving interpretations of dramatic tragedy ahead of his time, Shakespeare juggles the enduring ideas still relevant in today’s society.…

    • 1395 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Over the last five centuries one could say that our world has changed substantially. Between cultures and religions, knowledge and power, entertainment has always been a way to alleviate the changes and stress of the world. In the late 1500’s and early 1600’s there was one dramatist famous for his specific type of entertainment known as William Shakespeare. Shakespeare was born in 1564 and was known as the greatest playwright of all time. “He makes his audience laugh and cry; he turns politics into poetry; he recklessly mingles vulgar clowning and philosophical subtly” (Greenblatt, 11).…

    • 537 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Lost in Lust The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, with music and lyrics by William Finn, book by Rachel Sheinkin, and conceived by Rebecca Feldman, explores a lighthearted event, as the play title suggests, a middle school spelling bee. I watched the production on February 7, 2016 at 2:00 PM at the University of Washington’s Floyd and Delores Jones Playhouse. This production was directed by Brandon Ivie, musically directed by Jordyn Meeker, and choreographed by Steven Sofia.…

    • 985 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Investigating the genre identity of William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, first of all, I need to define the terms history play and tragedy, which are key instruments for the analysis. This essay suggests that they are not mutually exclusive theatrical genres, and thus can be combined in one dramatic work. From the times of Aristotle’s Poetics, tragedy is supposed to portray exceptional characters suffering and experiencing misfortunes that climax in the catharsis – emotional purification felt by the compassionate audience. History play represents actual events that took place in the past including those with tragic finales. However, defining a history play within the framework of English literary criticism is not as obvious as it seems.…

    • 844 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Fair is Foul: Oppositions in MacBeth Opposition in Shakespeare’s MacBeth, is displayed almost immediately, when the witches croak the foreboding lines “Fair is foul and foul is fair” (I, i, 11). This theme recurs throughout the play, constantly challenging the expected and disrupting the natural order of things. MacBeth fights an ongoing struggle between choosing right over wrong, often wondering if the risk of murder is worth the reward of kingship. In contrast, Lady MacBeth breaks the mold of a perfect wife, one who should have a kind and fair heart, through her constant acts of greed and malice. Finally, the fate of the characters are both fair and foul, The patterns of opposition are ever-present in the lives and thoughts of the characters,…

    • 1047 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In the play Love’s Labour’s Lost, by William Shakespeare, five men, after swearing to not talk to women at all for three years, fall for five women. Hysterics ensue. In an effort to woo the women they have fallen for, these five men, composed of a King and his Lords and constituents, decide to write poetry. Unfortunately for them and the ladies they have fallen for, none of their works are particularly outstanding. However, compared to his four peers, Biron does the finest job of writing his poem, as he flatters the woman he is writing to, stays on topic, and acknowledges her intelligence and wisdom-- all things that are rare to find in the other poems.…

    • 1660 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Merchant of Venice: Comedy or Tragedy? Many would agree that William Shakespeare is one of the world’s greatest playwrights. He is known for his ability to entertain audiences and capture their affections through his beloved characters. Many of his plays contain themes that are everlasting and able to move audiences through several generations.…

    • 1297 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays