Terrific Script

Rating: Null/10 (14 February 1999)

What a wonderful conceit! Imagine being at the first performance of Romeo And Juliet, in a London theatre all those years ago, and Will Shakespeare himself is playing Romeo!
Shakespeare In Love was co-written with Marc Norman by Tom Stoppard. They also penned Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead; a marvellous play which retold Hamlet from the point of view of two of Hamlet's minor characters.
Their latest film imagines that Shakespeare (Joseph Fiennes) wrote Romeo And Juliet when he himself was a star crossed lover and that his Juliet was Viola (played by Gwyneth Paltrow). She plays Juliet against his Romeo on stage with him!
Now that's a delightful idea and only one aspect of what is a very witty and clever script. There's a good deal of pleasure to be had enjoying the many references to a good number of the Bard's famous lines from his other plays.
The film has a lot of fun with Shakespeare's rivalry with contemporary playwright Thomas Marlow and with the sheer mechanics of getting a play onto the stage especially if the money has dried up and if there's a bad case of writer's block.
And how better to overcome a wilting of the quill than with a rich lover like Viola. She's pledged to another man and they are denied one another. As they play out the Romeo And Juliet scenes in real life, they later create the same magic on the stage, triumphantly. Shakespeare In Love even manages to bring some life to the acting of the wooden Gwyneth Paltrow.
Geoffrey Rush's part is fun but you'd think a little light on for an Academy Award but Judi Dench as the elderly Queen Elizabeth is masterful. Jo Fiennes is a bit too even throughout the film but the music from Australian composer David Hirschfelder, the sets and particularly the script is first class.
And I'll be always grateful for the recreation of that original Romeo And Juliet performance.