Twelfth Night, or What You Will

We won't go into the screenplay here...we're talking Shakespeare, after all. Now, the sets were very sparse, but then, this was live theater. So what can you criticise? The casting!!!

Paul Rudd is wonderful, just masculine and sexy and totally at ease with his dialogue and his role. I couldn't take my eyes off him when he was present, and missed him tremendously when he wasn't on stage.

But Helen Hunt? Whose idea was it to cast this brittle, TV-groomed actress in such a demanding role? The poor woman doesn't pull it off. She seemed to stamp around the stage like she was lost, that terrible wondering frown on her face making it look like she was trying to keep her lines straight. The magnificent Mr. Rudd looking twice at the asexual Miss Hunt? I don't think so. Their mismatching ruined what would have been a great presentation of this classic.

I'd still watch it again, though, for Paul Rudd.

I was very excited to see that Twelfth Night was being broadcast on our local PBS station, especially since I had the pleasure of seeing it live in New York City over the summer. I was truly impressed by ALL the performances and was excited to see some "lost" actors from other favorites of mine (i.e. Warriors).

I am a true follower of Helen Hunt and was quite surprised to watch the Season Premiere of Mad About You and recognize some of the actors from the play.

Twelfth Night was a nice introduction of Shakespeare and has aroused my curiosity for other plays. Thanks for the space!

Although this production has a comparatively complete text, some good comic bits, and a number of well-known faces, the costumes and sets were peculiar, and the acting was inconsistent.

Andrew was both pathetic and silly; Feste was the perfect fool who is not perfectly foolish; and Malvolio was so thoroughly serious that he became remarkably funny.

Olivia, Viola and Orsino were less successful. Orsino's readings were effective, but he lacked the romantic energy that makes the part believable; Viola's performance was acceptable but never electric; and Olivia overacted her way into high energy and almost out of the part.

Still, as a filmed version of a stage production, it is humorous and occasionally touching.

I thought this was a wonderful performance. The set was rather lacking but some how that added to it and let your imagination run.

I enjoyed the acting. When I first saw this I had never read the script and yet I understood everything the actors were saying (because let's face it...Shakespeare is hard to understand and perform).

Helen Hunt's performance as Viola amazed me. She was very well into character and even added humor to her part without over doing it or not doing it enough. Kudo's to her. My same comment to all the other actors in the cast. They did a great job with their performance (and even though it was Shakespeare I went "wow") but Helen Hunt seemed to stand out.

I give the entire performance 9.5/10 but I thought this was one of the best Shakespeare performances I ever have seen.

I was delighted to see "Twelfth Night" broadcast on PBS, since I got the opportunity to see this play performed live over the summer. I thought it was an excellent production! While this was not my first introduction to Shakespeare, in my opinion the actors and everyone involved worked very hard to bring the audience into the play and make sure they didn't get lost. Their hard work really payed off. I must admit that I am a huge fan of Helen Hunt's, not to mention Kyra Sedgewick and Paul Rudd, so this made the play even more exciting to watch. I enjoyed the season premiere of "Mad About You", thrilled to see some of the actors from "Twelfth Night" making cameos. All in all, I thought that this was an exceptionally well-done production, and although it's no longer running, is a must-see!