Word: shrews
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...virtues, this particular taming is sometimes more shrewd than Shrew. The writers have edited Shakespeare's speeches, transposed lines, and improvised bits of business for the Burtons that never took place in the Globe's wooden O. Despite such wild tampering, most of the words and-more important -all of the spirit of the play have been maintained. To make sure that the viewer's eye never rests long enough to get restive, Zeffirelli builds the production against a background of burnt sienna, vermilion and viridian-the splashiest colors of the Renaissance palette. He also keeps Taylor...
...decided to join it. New Hollywoods, largely supported by U.S. capital, arose on the Seine and the Isar, the Tiber and the Thames. In 1966, every other movie made with American money was made abroad, and many of them (A Man for All Seasons, Blow-Up, Taming of the Shrew) were made by European directors and actors. Moreover, moviemaking at last fell out of the pockets of the moneymen in the front offices and into the hands of directors, writers and actors who suddenly found themselves with more freedom than they had ever known in the dear dead days that...
...Taming of the Shrew. "We intend to make Shakespeare as successful a screenwriter as Abby Mann." Thus spake Director Franco Zeffirelli last year when he began filming The Taming of the Shrew. The screen credits maintain the mock-the-bard tone: script billing goes to Zeffirelli, Paul Dehn and Suso Checchi D'Amico, with a coy acknowledgment "to William Shakespeare, without whom we would have been at a loss for words." The irreverence in this case is less a shame than a sham. Despite the disclaimer, Zeffirelli has succeeded in mounting the liveliest screen incarnation of Shakespeare since Olivier...
...salty salvo in the war between the sexes, Shrew has already been through several screen treatments, including one with Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks Sr., a long-running road-company revival with the Lunts, and a Broadway musical adaptation (Cole Porter's Kiss Me Kate). Zeffirelli has refurbished the oft-told tale by styling it with the brio of the 16th century commedia dell'arte. Moreover, his casting seems to be a case of art's imitating life: Elizabeth Taylor as the sharp-tongued tigress, Kate, and Richard Burton as her hard-nosed trainer, Petruchio...
Shakespeare cared too much for his satellite roles to give the entire show to the stars, and it is as much the supporting players as the Burtons who give the Shrew vitality. Victor Spinetti, Cyril Cusak and Michael Hordern are a brilliant bunch of second bananas. Natasha Pyne, as Kate's sister Bianca, plays with a wide-eyed vanilla-pudding approach that deliberately lends Kate more flavor...