Film "Shakespeare in Love” Synopsis
16世紀末のロンドン。スランプに陥っていた劇作家シェイクスピアはオーディションにやって来た一人の若者トマス・ケントを追ってとある屋敷へたどり着く。そこには以前、芝居の最中に目を留めた美しい女性ヴァイオラの姿があった。シェイクスピアと彼を信奉するヴァイオラはたちまち恋におちてしまう。燃え上がる恋心によりシェイクスピアが創作意欲を取り戻す中、トマスはヴァイオラからの別れの手紙を彼に渡す。(English) London at the end of the 16th century. Playwright Shakespeare, who was in a slump, followed a young man, Thomas Kent, who came to audition at a mansion. A beautiful woman, Viola, had previously caught his eye during a play. Shakespeare and his follower Viola quickly fall in love. Thomas gives him a farewell letter from Viola as Shakespeare regains his creative urges due to a burning passion.
Film "Shakespeare in Love" Synopsis
1)
1593 London. William Shakespeare is coming out of a slump and writing "Romeo and Juliet" while the playhouse is closed due to the plague.
Viola de Lesseps, the daughter of a wealthy family and a theatre lover, was rejected because, for moral reasons, female roles on stage had to be played by male pre-metamorphosis men. Although she longs for a burning love, Lord Wessex, a poor nobleman, is being proposed to her.
2)
Disguised as a boy, Viola attends the audition for Shakespeare's new play under Thomas Kent. Moved by her performance, Shakespeare calls out to her, but Viola runs away. Shakespeare follows her home but cannot find her.
Shakespeare attends a party for the Lesseps family, to which Lord Wessex is invited and is captivated by Viola's beauty. They gaze passionately at each other while she dances. However, Lord Wessex finds out and throws out Shakespeare, who has adopted the pseudonym Marlowe.
3)
Viola admires Shakespeare's poetry and works. But on the other hand, Shakespeare got a beautiful muse called Viola and wrote his works with great verve.
While her parents are away, Viola enlists the help of her nanny and ends up playing Romeo as Thomas Kent.
4)
Lord Wessex appears before Viola, who is moved by Shakespeare's poem. Viola, who has been told that she will marry him for the first time, decides to fulfil her duty even though she is hurt, and she cries and writes her farewell letter to Shakespeare.
Viola disguises herself as Thomas and gives the letter to Shakespeare, but when Shakespeare tells her of his passionate love for Viola, she involuntarily kisses him.
5)
When Shakespeare realises that her Thomas is Viola, he sneaks into her room and embraces her passionately.
Even while rehearsing his play with Viola, who plays Romeo, Shakespeare continues to write love poems to her.
6)
But the day finally came, at court, when her family announced her marriage to Lord Wessex before Her Majesty the Queen. Viola took Lord Wessex by the hand, and Shakespeare, disguised as her lady-in-waiting, accompanied her.
Queen Elizabeth doubts whether theatre can portray true love and decides to make a bet with Kent.
The Queen then whispers to Lord Wessex that another man already has Viola's mind.
7)
After rehearsing as Thomas Kent, the sad news arrives that someone has killed Marlowe while Viola and Shakespeare are drinking in a bar. Shakespeare, who thought he had died in his place, is overwhelmed by his guilt.
Viola embraces Shakespeare and says her heart would be yours even if she married another man.
8)
Lord Wessex, driven mad by her jealousy of Shakespeare, visited Shakespeare's rehearsal room and attacked him with a sword. However, when things calm down, Shakespeare learns that Lord Wessex did not kill Marlowe.
A boy named John, who had a grudge against Shakespeare's previous role, informed them that Thomas Kent was a woman and the theatre was closed for disturbing public morals.
9)
However, "Romeo and Juliet" is performed because the hostile Curtain Theatre offers to cooperate.
The day has come for Viola's wedding to Lord Wessex. During the ceremony, Viola sees an advertisement for the performance and sneaks into the theatre.
Shakespeare ends up playing Romeo instead of Viola. Then, finally, the curtain rises to a packed audience.
10)
However, the boy playing Juliet had a voice change that morning, and the theatre company was in trouble. Viola, in the audience, knew the performance was in jeopardy. Having memorised all her lines, she suddenly plays Juliet as a male actor disguised as a woman.
The play was a great success, and the audience applauded generously as the two acted out passionate love and tragedy.
11)
The head of the Imperial Household Agency appears and tells them that they are to be arrested on behalf of the Queen. But Queen Elizabeth, who has come incognito, releases Viola as Thomas Kent. The Queen tells Shakespeare to visit the castle without disguise next time.
Lord Wessex tells the Queen that her wife has fled. So the Queen tells Kent to call Viola back to her husband. Fifty cents of the wager lost by the Queen is given to Kent.
Viola asks Shakespeare to keep writing, and they part with a final kiss before leaving.
12)
Shakespeare, who had become famous with the success of "Romeo and Juliet", began writing the comedy "Twelfth Night" at the Queen's request.
The heroine's name is Viola. Imagining her new life in America, Shakespeare also embarked on a new journey.
13)
Epilogue
The charm of this work is that the passionate love lines of "Romeo and Juliet" on the stage and the sweet and painful emotional love scenes of Shakespeare and Viola in real life are intertwined and connected.
The two worlds merge so much that it is hard to tell whether it is the real world or the world of the play.
Beginning with Joseph Fiennes, also a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, the final stage scene of the tense climax is a masterpiece unfolded by talented people.
You will be even more impressed by the look of the theatre in the reproduction of the stage of the period.
Considering that Shakespeare created these masterpieces from a humble desk and pen, you will be moved by their greatness.
A man and a pen, a man and a stage, an actor and an audience. A pure play in an age where there is nothing extra. This work directly conveys how enthusiastically people embraced Shakespeare's plays.
Shakespeare in Love
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare_in_Love
Film "Shakespeare in Love" Synopsis
https://mihocinema.com/shakespeare-in-love-4427
Film "Shakespeare in Love" Synopsis and ending commentary
https://cinemarche.net/lovestory/shakespeareinlove-tanigawa/