I don't hate farce. I like Trey Parker and Matt Stone's That's My Bush, precisely for the farcical situations and premises. I love Moliere, specifically A Doctor in Spite of Himself. But A Comedy of Errors has the most ridiculously flimsy pretense of a premise, and then ignores the fact that at least three of the main characters are in the know about what could be the cause of all the mistaken identities. If you are going to have the crazy misunderstandings, and the sudden starting/stopping of pointless, mindless violence, maybe you shouldn't have the ridiculously slow Shakespearean style dialogue. I mean, this above all, to thine own self be true and all that crap, but DUDE. Get thee to a freaking clue. Moliere - zing zing ZING - fast dialogue.
This one does have the first appearance of "Butterface/But her face" in popular culture - 400 plus years before someone in America (I'm assuming) felt they hand-crafted some really clever sexist invective. I don't think that really qualifies as a plus.
I might have laughed more if it had been titled "A Tragedy of Errors". Then the rare attempts at humour might have been surprising, at least.
Mary's already complained about Love's Labour's Lost. I'm going to start it tomorrow when we get home from our trip, but if you want to see something better and more summatively descriptive, please look at her comic version.
http://shakespearethisyear.blogspot.ca/2013/03/day-70-what-i-learned-loves-labours.html
-Mike
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