Ham.net

Recorded from the West End, Kiss Me Kate follows a pair of divorced actors brought together to participate in a musical version of The Taming of the Shrew. Of course, the couple seem to act a great deal like the characters they play, and they must work together when mistaken identities get them mixed up with the mafia.

Shakespeare’s Othello is revisited exactly as it was written, brought into the present through the power of dialect alone. Iago, Othello, and Desdemona are regrettably still among us, in contemporary events told through a great classic. Set in the early 2000s, it is a timeless story where good and evil intertwine in a maelstrom of deceit, betrayal and mad jealousy.

In director Baz Luhrmann's contemporary take on William Shakespeare's classic tragedy, the Montagues and Capulets have moved their ongoing feud to the sweltering suburb of Verona Beach, where Romeo and Juliet fall in love and secretly wed. Though the film is visually modern, the bard's dialogue remains.

Young lovers living under an oppressive state-rule flee their home-city to change their lives, and end up changing the world. After all, love changes everything.

When a secret marriage is planned between Othello, a Moorish general, and Desdemona, the daughter of Senator Brabantio, her old suitor Roderigo takes it hard. He allies himself with Iago, who has his own grudge against Othello, and the two conspire to bring Othello down. When their first plan, to have him accused of witchcraft, fails, they plant evidence intended to make him believe Desdemona is unfaithful.

James Earl Jones delivers a riveting performance as paranoid patriarch King Lear, an aging monarch who insists that his three daughters prove their love for him, only to learn he's exalted the two who seek to destroy him. This live performance recording of Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival production deftly envisions the bard's haunting tragedy with a fine supporting cast, including Raul Julia, Paul Sorvino and Rene Auberjonois.

Titus Andronicus returns from the wars and sees his sons and daughters taken from him, one by one. Shakespeare's goriest and earliest tragedy.

Dame Maggie Smith stars in the 1967 screen version of Franco Zeffirelli's exuberant National Theatre production of Shakespeare's romantic comedy, in which young lovers Hero and Claudio conspire to make sharp-tongued rivals Beatrice and Benedick fall in love with each other.

The evil Iago pretends to be friend of Othello in order to manipulate him to serve his own end in the film version of this Shakespeare classic.

General Othello's marriage is destroyed when vengeful Ensign Iago convinces him that his new wife has been unfaithful.

King Lear is a proud man who solicits praise from his three daughters in return for inheritance of the kingdom. Daughters Goneril and Regan profess their affection vehemently. Cordelia, who does not respect the process her father has chosen, does not humor him. Lear's perceived rejection from Cordelia leads to her banishment, thus splitting the kingdom between the other two. This hasty decision becomes his fatal error.

King Lear, old and tired, divides his kingdom among his daughters, giving great importance to their protestations of love for him. When Cordelia, youngest and most honest, refuses to idly flatter the old man in return for favor, he banishes her and turns for support to his remaining daughters. But Goneril and Regan have no love for him and instead plot to take all his power from him. In a parallel, Lear's loyal courtier Gloucester favors his illegitimate son Edmund after being told lies about his faithful son Edgar. Madness and tragedy befall both ill-starred fathers.

Even without the benefit of sound, the 1922 German adaptation of Othello seems more operatic than Shakespearean. This may be due to the casting of Emil Jannings, to whom restraint and subtlety were strangers. Werner Krauss, of Cabinet of Dr. Caligari fame, is on hand as the duplicitous Iago. Appearing as the unfortunate Desdemona is Lea Von Lenkeffy, better known as Lya de Putti. Produced on an elaborate scale, Othello may not be true to the letter of Shakespeare, but is undeniably a smorgasbord of visual delights.

In the heat of the summer of 1976, drama teacher Vivienne fights sweltering heat and general teenage apathy to put on an end-of-term version of Shakespeare's The Tempest.

An ancient family feud casts a long shadow over the town of Verona. In this hothouse of tension, brawls are quick to break out and both sides get caught in the crossfire.

A young prince's epic journey of love, obsession and betrayal

With freshly rechristened characters and brand-new dialogue, this British TV production of Othello is a "rethinking" of Shakespeare's play, albeit still retaining the original's power and potency. The story is set in the London of the near future, a crime-ridden metropolis virtually torn apart by racial hostilities. By order of the Prime Minister, black police officer John Othello (Eamonn Walker) is promoted to Commissioner, a post dearly coveted by Othello's friend, mentor and fellow officer Ben Jago (Christopher Eccleston). Seething with jealousy, Jago contrives to discredit Othello in the eyes of the public, and to destroy John's interracial marriage to the lily-white Dessie (Keeley Hawes). Among those used as unwitting dupes to gain Jago's ends are Othello's trusted lieutenant, Michael Cass (Richard Coyle), scrupulously honest police constable Alan Roderick (Del Synnott), and Jago's own wife, Lulu (Rachael Stirling).

King Lear, old and weary, divides his kingdom among his daughters, placing great weight on their declarations of love for him. However, when Cordelia, the youngest and most honest, refuses to flatter the old man in exchange for his favour, he banishes her and seeks support from his remaining daughters. Goneril and Regan, however, harbour no love for him and instead conspire to seize all his power. In a parallel, Lear’s loyal courtier Gloucester favours his illegitimate son Edmund after being deceived by lies about his faithful son Edgar. Tragically, both ill-fated fathers are consumed by madness and experience immense suffering.

The head of the Kimberly household rules it with an iron fist. Unfortunately the head of the Kimberly household isn't Grant (J.H. Gilmore), the father and wealthy Wall Street magnate -- it's his spoiled, headstrong daughter Catherine (Virginia Pearson). She is so willful that she has earned the name "Impossible Catherine," and her whole focus in life is to prove women's superiority over the masculine gender.

A dog decides to quit the slapstick comedy of cartoons and go to his country home to concentrate on Shakespeare, but two troublesome yet polite gophers foil his grand plans.