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An overview of William Shakespeare's play, The Two Gentlemen of Verona. The play explores themes of friendship, love, and betrayal as two young men, Proteus and Valentine, compete for the affections of Silvia. The document also discusses the characters, setting, and sources of inspiration for the play. Julia, another loyal character, plays a significant role in the story as she follows Proteus to Milan and discovers his deceit. The document concludes with an analysis of Proteus's soliloquies and the themes of love and identity in the play.
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Study materials written by Susan Willis, ASF Dramaturg swillis@asf.net Contact ASF at : www.asf.net 1.800.841-
Director Greta Lambert Set Design Rob Wolin Costume Design Elizabeth Novak Lighting Design Tom Rodman Sound Design Will Burns
Characters in the Tour in Verona : Valentine, a young gentleman Speed, Valentine's page Proteus, a young gentleman, Valentine's best friend Launce, his servant Crab, Launce's dog, a mutt Julia, the girl Proteus loves Lucetta, her maid Antonio, Proteus's father in Milan : The Duke, Silvia's father Silvia, Valentine's beloved Sir Thurio, a wealthy nobleman in love with Silvia in the forest : Outlaws Place : Verona, Milan, and a forest on the way to Mantua Time : 1960s Shakespeare knows young love—we immediately think of Romeo and Juliet and the host of romantic comedies he penned. The truism is that "the course of true love never did run smooth," for the Bard rarely gives any of his young lovers an easy time on their way to the altar. Challenges and hardships season the lovers— their affections are mangled, their friendships tested, their self-knowledge questioned, and their behavior turned unrecognizable even to themselves. Why? Because they are young and in love, so both inside and out things seem confusing, uncertain, and unsettling. In this play, Shakespeare sets his scene in fair Verona, or at least starts it there. Verona is home to the two gents who now must leave and make their way in the larger outside world of the Milanese court, where ambition and love will entangle and complicate their lives—and the lives of the young women who love them. After all, what's the worst thing that could happen when a guy introduces his best friend to his new fiancée? Yes, indeed. The friend behaves like a cur and tries to steal the girl. That is the crux of this play—friendship, young love, an elopement plot, betrayal by one, loyalty in others, and a high stakes ending that manages to test all the lovers and still get them to the altar. Shakespeare not only knows young love; Cover: Valentine introducing Silvia he knows good theatre, too. to Proteus (Walter Crane) Our love of Shakespeare runs deep at ASF, and we are happy to share it with schools across Alabama and our neighboring states, because there is just nothing like the powerful effect of seeing Shakespeare live. This version of Shakespeare's play trims The Two Gentlemen of Verona to fit a one-hour class period while keeping the great characters, the verse, and the compelling comic action. Directed by ASF's Greta Lambert, herself a renowned Shakespeare actress, the touring show features eight actors chosen from New York auditions who join the ASF company for the 2016-17 season. These eight will perform all the roles in the play, doubling or tripling roles just as Shakespeare's own company did. They bring you a complete theatre with set, costumes, props, and actors in a van and a trailer. In addition, we offer your students a series of workshops following the play, so they can work with the actors on theatre skills and Shakespeare's
with the Bard!
Proteus's servant Launce scolding Crab, his dog (Sir John Gilbert) The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare Your acting company : L to R seated, Ann Flanigan, Kate Owens, Joshua Sottile, and Andre Revels; standing, Tirosh Schneider, Joe O'Malley, Javon Q. Minter, and Justy Kosek
Comedy and romance share an essential pattern of separation and reunion, and that pattern accurately describes the action of The Two Gentlemen of Verona. The details of each genre, however, offer us quite different journeys to that reunion.
Unlike tragedy, which focuses on the individual, comedy emphasizes the group, often a family. Two Gents almost immediately separates its gentlemen from their families, however, so the "group" more nearly seems to be the duo of friends headed to Milan, along with their attendants. This small group also becomes attached to the women each loves, women who might join or alter the friendship group. The classical tradition of comedy that flows into the Renaissance pits young lovers against the father—it is a battle over who picks the spouse. There are often several suitors for the daughter's hand, and she sees all but one as Mr. Wrongs. Daddy, however, uses different criteria and says "no" to the beloved, picking his own version of Mr. Right, so the melée is on to help love triumph.The major actors in that effort in classical and Italianate comedy are the servants—witty, perceptive schemers who can make things happen and steer events in the right direction. Many commentators on Two Gents note that the attendants in the play do not function as classical servants do; Speed and Launce do not scheme so much as crack jokes at each other's and their masters' expense. They truly are a comic subplot. Some feel the juxtaposition o f t h e i r d i a l o g u e w i t h t h e i r masters' may even satirize t h e l o v e and loyalty p r o c l a i m e d in the main plot, and that aspect should be assessed.
The Norton Anthology of English Literature describes romances as "narratives of separation, errancy, and loss" that "satisfy our deepest imaginative desires" as they "therapeutically deliver endings of reintegration, recovery, and return. That which was lost is found." This description fits Two Gents well and highlights different aspects of the story than does the standard definition of comedy. Comedy focuses on the lovers and marriage; romance focuses on identity, tests, and learning from expulsion so that one can be reintegrated. As well as Valentine, romance might privilege Proteus, for ultimately it is not the women who shatter the friendship bond but one of the friends. Proteus falls into the very rivalry and selfishness ("errancy") that friendship is supposed to transcend, and as a result he becomes a liar, a backstabber, a false advisor, a self-interested flatterer, and a total jerk, not to mention a potential rapist. Yet in romance someone who makes himself a Mr. Wrong can learn to be a Mr. Right, as rarely, if ever, happens in comedy. Romances combine adventure and love; they move from civilization into the wild both geographically and psychologically, and the emphasis is on the young. In the wild the young hero or heroine is tested—a test that can often ultimately lead to marriage. Getting lost is essential to the process—and all four young protagonists of Two Gents qualify as lost at different times and in different ways during the play. Shakespeare ends his formal playwriting career with four plays that are labelled romances— Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, and The Tempest (which is in ASF's repertory this season). These plays all adhere to the principles of romance, but Shakespeare also explores these elements early in his career as well, most notably in Two Gents and the frame story of The Comedy of Errors. The play in the First Folio (1623) under Comedies; the romances are also in Comedies in the Folio (except for Cymbeline , which is in Tragedies).. The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare Silvia and the substitute dog (Augustus Egg, 1849)
Shakespeare builds plays by thematically interweaving plot lines, usually a main plot with a subplot or higher status characters with lower status servants. In The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Shakespeare often follows a piece of major action with attendants' banter. Does this juxtaposition highlight and contrast issues and values, or, as some scholars wonder, does it satirize the lovers' feelings? Analyze some of the juxtapositions and decide what do you think. Places to Consider Scene Juxtapositions : 1.1/1.2 Proteus says farewell to Valentine, then banters with Speed about his love letter, a passage that links directly to the banter in 1.2 between Julia and Lucetta about receipt of that letter. Both attendants are way ahead of their master or mistress. 2.1 Finding Silvia's glove at the top of the scene leads to Speed's comic anatomizing of Valentine as a lover. Valentine is clueless in both halves of the scene, even when Silvia returns, and Speed must do all the explaining. 2.2/2.3/2.4 Proteus's leavetaking from Julia is followed by Launce's description of his family and their tearful farewell, with much focus on his seemingly unweeping dog. Launce apparently loves the dog more than the dog loves him. Also watch how 2.3 sets up issues of affection and loyalty that will begin to arise in 2.4. 2.4/2.5 Proteus's arrival in Milan and meeting Valentine and Silvia is followed by Launce and Crab's arrival in Milan and meeting with Speed. 2.6/2.7 Proteus's decision to betray both love and friendship is followed by Julia's decision to visit him in Milan, travelling in disguise as a page, a point about which Lucetta teases her. 3.1 Proteus betrays Valentine's elopement plot to the Duke, so that the Duke then exposes Valentine's letter and rope ladder and banishes him. Launce jokes briefly about the banishment when he and Proteus enter, and after they leave, he produces his own letter or list of qualities about the milkmaid he loves, which Speed discovers and banters about—the crisis about Silvia is followed by banter about the attractions of a milkmaid. 4.4 This scene reverses the usual pattern, for here Launce begins the scene with his soliloquy about his dog's misbehavior and his willingness to take the blame. Following this, Proteus enters, charging his new "page" (Julia in disguise) to go get the portrait from Silvia, which Julia does, finding an ally rather than a rival in Silvia. Julia's soliloquy ends the scene, and it is worthwhile to compare Launce's and Julia's soliloquies here. Misbehavior by both Crab and Proteus is apparent and parallel. Things to Consider or Compare
Watch how the play defines the idea and values of being called a gentleman :
As in many cultures today, in Renaissance England the standard route to the altar for most middle-class and all aristocratic youth was an arranged marriage, that is, a business alliance between families agreed on by the fathers—not by the spouses to be. (Only Puritans and the lower class had companionate marriage.) A marriage, thus, was a business deal, and love, if it occurred—which was not expected—would be a bonus. Erotic love was considered unstable and fickle, no fit basis for so important a bond as marriage. So where did one find a soul mate if not in marriage? In friendship—the only close personal relationship one could choose for oneself. In the Renaissance, friendship was considered a higher form of human affection than erotic love; it was disinterested, platonically pure, capable of teaching selflessness. As it was considered "a supreme achievement of the human spirit, it must transcend humanity's all-too-common penchant for rivalry and ingratitude." "Friendship is … seen as an institution that enables man to develop his mental and moral potential to the highest possible degree" and thus offers an example for ordering all human relationships. In the Renaissance the word lover was often used non-sexually as a synonym for friend, and Shakespeare so uses it in several of his plays. Today's popular culture values friendship in a similar way—consider the mass of buddy films involving soldiers, cops, cowboys, or v a g a b o n d s a n d the tight bond that forms when men grow up or face crisis together. Two Gents is a buddy play, and the crisis is not war but love, though Proteus seems to turn it into a guerrilla conflict.
Betrayal and Forgiveness Where Valentine is inclusive with his relationships in Milan, Proteus is selfish. He re-casts his friend as a rival (despite Silvia's insistence that she loves only Valentine) and changes from friend to an adolescent version of Iago. How can a romantic comedy sustain such a character? He calls himself a lover, but that term does not describe the emotions he feels. He betrays his friend, putting himself first; the ideal crashes and burns in him—and so, ultimately, will he, for his protest is: "In love / Who respects friend?" (5.4)—a question he and Valentine will answer differently. Thus he fails others and he fails himself; he is lost. His failure becomes the challenge for others. How does one respond to a friend's betrayal? Valentine tongue-lashes him: Thou common friend, that's without faith or love, For such is a friend now. Treacherous man, Thou hast beguil'd my hopes; nought but mine eye Could have persuaded me: now I dare not say I have one friend alive; thou wouldst disprove me. Who should be trusted now, when one's right hand Is perjured to the bosom? Proteus, I am sorry I must never trust thee more, But count the world a stranger for thy sake. The private wound is deepest: O time most accurst, 'Mongst all foes that a friend should be the worst! (5.4) Valentine shows him what he has become and rescinds his trust, the deepest bond they have. Now Proteus is truly alone, lost. To whom should he turn? Who will help him? Shamed and guilty, he repents and asks his friend to forgive him. In this reverse test, what should Valentine do? Can he or should he embrace the snake who betrayed him and his beloved? Living up to the ideal, Valentine finds he can credit repentance, follow the divine model, and accept a changed Proteus, a Proteus now, we hope, in his "true nature." Valentine's last line in this sequence is the kicker for scholars and directors, though: "All that was mine in Silvia I give thee." What? After all this? But that is, in fact, the classical model of the friendship bond, to give one's life or beloved for one's friend. Silvia has no line, but Julia seizes the moment by swooning, thus instigating the final revelation and reintegration of Proteus. Good timing! The forgiveness moment in 5.4 by William Holman Hunt (1851). Is this Valentine giving Silvia away? Quotations from David Bevington's introduction to the play in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare _, 4th ed. (HarperCollins,
The Courtly Love Ideal In the Renaissance courtly love tradition, which based its values on the image of chivalry, the beloved lady is a spiritual ideal, virtuous and pure, and by faithfully serving her without the corrupting force of sexual desire, the man himself can grow toward the ideal, become a better man. The beloved is the "guiding star" to the lover's "wand'ring bark [ship]," the deer/dear that he hunts or pursues, her eyes the sun that illuminates his life. Much of the love imagery in the play is related to or plays off of the courtly love tradition, just as Launce's list describing his beloved milkmaid's traits is also a comic commentary on the courtly love attributes given women (he would appreciate "Sonnet 130"). Valentine is the primary voice of courtly love values and imagery in the play, though Proteus tries to match him when he woos Silvia in his desperate rhetoric as the unrequited lover, the usual plight of the courtly love speaker in poetry.
- The Banishment Soliloquy, 3. While Proteus's secret betrayal emerges in his soliloquies, Valentine's secret—or not-so-secret— love for Silvia comes out in dialogue with both Silvia and Speed. Requited love is not a spiritual crisis but a fulfillment for Valentine; his crisis doesn't occur until he is banished, until he is separated from Silvia and his love seemingly denied forever. Now he registers how his sense of himself and his soul have been changed by love and how much of his very being Silvia is. The Duke's parting word upon banishing Valentine is "as thou lov'st thy life, make speed from hence" (3.1). Stunned Valentine begins to process this cataclysmic change: And why not death rather than living torment? To die is to be banished from myself, And Silvia is myself. Banished from her Is self from self—a deadly banishment! He will die physically, be put to death, if he stays, but he realizes he will die emotionally if he leaves.He tries to fathom life without Silvia: What light is light, if Silvia be not seen? What joy is joy, if Silvia be not by? Unless it be to think that she is by And feed upon the shadow of perfection. Except I be by Silvia in the night, There is no music in the nightingale; Unless I look on Silvia in the day, There is no day for me to look upon. She is my essence, and I leave to be If I be not by her fair influence Fostered, illumined, cherished, kept alive. He recognizes that his life is joined and wedded to Silvia's now, whether or not they are officially married, a union he sought in the now thwarted elopement. While we may uncharitably hear the echo of adolescent hormones and reactive extremity in his words, he is speaking the ideal language of courtly love, the spiritual bond—"she is my essence." She is the influence that makes him the man he wants to be, a man he does not believe he can be without her. At this moment he sees the situation completely opposite to the Duke's parting view, for Valentine knows that "fly I hence, I fly away from life." - Valentine's Forest Soliloquy, top of 5. Courtly love rhetoric is more than words for Valentine, for he actually considers Silvia to be his inspiration and guide. As an "outlaw" in the forest without her, he calls himself a tenantless mansion, "growing ruinous" (a shell and not a being), and beseeches her unseen, "Repair me with thy presence, Silvia." Her virtue and purity continue to call forth his better self, values which now he uses to curb his "mates [the gentleman/outlaws], that make their wills their law" so as to "keep them from uncivil outrages"—which is the perfect cue for Proteus's entry with rescued Silvia, for Proteus now wants to make his will his law with an uncivil outrage center stage, an impulse Valentine will thwart and "curb" on the spot. Valentine vs. Romeo when Banished
In Shakespeare's romantic comedies, women often drive the action—Portia, the French princess and her ladies, the merry wives, Rosalind, and Olivia and Viola. Others who find themselves driven—Katherina, Adriana, Titania, Beatrice—are the spice of the action. It's hard to have a romantic comedy without some smart and witty girls with hearts! In Two Gents , Julia considers her options, asking Lucetta, "Wouldst thou then counsel me to fall in love?" (One wonders how she might answer that question near the end of the play.) The lady and her maid then engage in one of Shakespeare's favorite comic games for women—evaluating the list of suitors— which shows that the women are aware of the mating game and its consequences. Julia asks Lucetta to assess the suitors, "In thy opinion which is worthiest love?" Given the criterion of worthiness, one suitor she calls "fair," one "rich," Lucetta yet finding both unworthy. Proteus is called "gentle," which can mean tender or genteel, well-born, and Lucetta favors him. But he has not yet declared himself as the others have, so Julia wonders if few words mean little love: "I would I knew his mind" (and she's still wondering near the end of the play), just as Lucetta delivers his love letter. In fact, both Julia and Silvia are introduced by means of a love letter in this play—Julia is teased until she shreds Proteus's letter and then has to read the gratifying scraps, while Silvia, trying to get Valentine to declare himself, requires him to write a letter proclaiming her love. Confused, he complies, becoming more confused when she delivers the letter back to him, to Speed's vast amusement. Both women have other wooers, but they want one of the gentlemen from Verona. While Proteus fears parental problems about a match with Julia for reasons that are never explained, Silvia knows all too well what she faces. Her father, the Duke, has already said he favors, the dull, rich Sir Thurio—a classic Mr. Wrong among comic wooers. Valentine is not as rich, but also not as conceited or foolish. She chooses the one she considers to be the better man and stays true to him, first braving elopement, and when that falls through, fleeing the court, her father, outlaws, and Proteus, in that order, in an effort to find and marry banished Valentine. These two loyal, loving women are tormented by their situations: Silvia by a lover denied and banished while she is beset by unwanted wooers; Julia eagerly seeking her love via a disguise and then trapped as a page serving Proteus's love for Silvia. When challenged, both women put on a cloak and hit the road to pursue their loves. Yet in Silvia Julia finds a true friend because a faithful lover; Silvia rejects Proteus, leaving Julia to look at Silvia's picture and wonder what Proteus sees in her. Like a faithful dog (the image appears everywhere in the play, thanks to Crab), she follows Proteus even into the forest. Love can cost us our dignity as well as our emotional stability and self-respect at times, but Silvia and Julia remain true, loyal, and committed, and at the end are rewarded with the men they love and, we hope, a happy ever after. Lucetta delivers Proteus's love letter to Julia (Walter Crane, 1857) "Silvia" by Edwin Austin Abbey (1899) The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare Song (4.2) Who is Silvia? What is she That all our swains commend her? Holy, fair, and wise is she, The heaven such grace did lend her, That she might admired be. Is she kind as she is fair? For beauty lives with kindness. Love doth to her eyes repair, To help him of his blindness; And, being help'd, inhabits there. Then to Silvia let us sing, That Silvia is excelling; She excels each mortal thing Upon the dull earth dwelling. To her let us garlands bring. T h e s o n g m a t c h e s Valentine's earlier praise that Silvia is "divine." Here Silvia is praised for beauty and for virtue (which some sonneteers call "true beauty").
In Shakespeare's time, Engish acting companies were all-male—boys and men played all the roles. A young boy in the 1590s who was an apprentice with the Lord Chamberlain’s Men not only got to study the art and craft of acting by living and working with a professional actor, but also got to perform some of the greatest female roles ever written. The irony that these roles were written for and played by pre-pubescent boys is not lost on modern actresses or scholars. In several comedies, Shakespeare used the male-actor identity of his female characters as an “in” joke with his audience, shifting the "girls" into male disguise and out again as necessity demanded. To have a boy actor disguised as a "boy" was perfect; no one on stage or off could tell he wasn't a boy. The actual "disguise" was his role as a young woman. Julia in Two Gentlemen of Verona , Jessica, Portia, and Nerissa in The Merchant of Venice , Rosalind in As You Like It , and Viola in Twelfth Night all adopt a male disguise. Julia is the first in this line, just as Two Gents may be the first in Shakespeare’s long line of romantic comedies. After these plays, Shakespeare's comedy moves to tragicomedy and eventually to the adventure-and-reunion plays known as romances, where again in Cymbeline Imogen disguises herself as a boy. In the modern theatre, these roles are played by women, so the page disguise is often transparent (we can see it's a girl) as it would not have been in the Renaissance, undermining Shakespeare's metatheatrical joke. Julia’s Experience Julia's disguise protects her as she travels alone to another city. Travel, as Valentine and Silvia also both learn in the play, is fraught with dangers. Julia no sooner puts on the disguise, however, than it traps her, as it does all of Shakespeare’s cross-dressing heroines, for she finds her beloved desperately in love with another woman. He doesn’t even look at his new page closely enough to realize who it is. Her love is challenged by betrayal— should she just tell him off and go home, or should she trust her commitment and stay true to it? Far more even than in our world of conspicuous display, Renaissance society considered one's clothing as the key to one's identity. Only a lord might wear silk, only royalty could wear purple or ermine, only the privileged might wear spurs or jewels, servants wore blue—England's sumptuary [clothing] laws were specific and clear. One need look only at the garment, the surface, to learn the essential truth of birth, status, and degree. Whereas in our world someone can choose to dress up or dress down, to dress goth or preppy or grunge or jock whatever one's social status, in the Renaissance one was supposed to dress "properly," according to social station—so of course everyone tried to dress better than his or her actual status. As a result, Philip Stubbes protested in 1583 that when "every one is permitted to flaunt it out, in what apparell he lust [chooses] himselfe … it is verie hard to knowe, who is noble, who is worshipfull, who is a gentleman, who is not." Regarding gender, the Renaissance viewed human biology as more or less unisex, all having the same analogously shaped sexual equipment, but men's superior "heat" even in utero made theirs external and visible, while women's inferior, "less hot" nature kept theirs internal and invisible. Women were considered to be "imperfectly formed" men (male being the ideal for the Renaissance—have things changed?). So if the sexes were structured analogously, the clothes make a huge difference in stating one's gender. Male dress equals a male; female dress equals a female. To transgress this code off stage caused ructions and prompted sermons from the pulpit or pillorying and imprisonment—especially if the person transgressed by dressing in the more privileged status of the male and took on that authority. However, many of Shakespeare's disguised heroines, such as Julia and Viola (as Jean Howard argues of Viola), are not transgressive; they wear masculine apparel not to act out (or "up") but for temporary safety. They know they are female, which is what they want to be; we meet them first in female apparel. They want Proteus's or Orsino's love, but each disguised page confronts a beloved female, Silvia or Olivia, and must negotiate the fact that her beloved loves this other woman.
Walter Crane's illustration of the page (Julia) meeting Silvia Seen but not Regarded
Attendants such as pages and servants have an important role in the history of romantic comedy. Traditionally, they are often the schemers who get things done, and while that scarcely seems likely with a servant such as Launce, only by acknowledging the classical pattern can we fully appreciate the new pattern Shakespeare is creating here. Verona's Male Attendants To be a servant in a comedy is to find opportunities for banter and byplay. In Two Gents , each leading man has an attendant, but these are very different comic types. Valentine has a page, Speed, whose name alone describes his mental and verbal abilities. Being a page was part of the upbringing of an aristocratic child, so Speed is genteel and played by a boy actor. He's a quick thinker, a quick talker, and a quick jokester. This kind of saucy page was made popular by John Lyly, who wrote for the boys' companies in the 1580s and whose comedies immediately preceded Shakespeare's. Shakespeare clearly adopts the witty page character in this and other plays. On the other hand, Shakespeare also uses the skills of one of the Elizabethan stage's great comic actors, Will Kempe, to write another kind of comic role, the slower-witted rustic known as the clown (and in many of the original printings of the plays, the speech headings for Kempe's roles simply read "Clown"). Kempe also apparently played such self-satisfied types as Bottom, Launcelot Gobbo, and Dogberry. Launce is an adult, not a boy. Wit and intelligence are not beyond such a character, but they come at a different rate and from a different angle than Speed's do. The word play between Speed and Launce shows what an effective comic team they are, the slower one often scoring at the expense of the quicker—here again the tortoise can best the hare. Compare P r o t e u s ' s o p e n i n g exchange with Speed to any dialogue between Speed and Launce to see this contrast. Proteus's Page in Milan In meeting Speed, the audience sees the Renaissance witty page in action. It is impossible for them to consider Launce a page; he is a servant, and the contrast between these attendants tells us much about the difference between the masters. Valentine has a "proper" attendant, a gentleman's page. Proteus has a rustic, one who is loyal enough to offer his own misbehaving dog when Proteus's canine present for Silvia is stolen, but nonetheless a yokel compared to Speed, who is himself well-born. Yet Proteus does gain a proper page during the action, one "Sebastian," who is actually Shakespeare's first use of the girl-disguised-as- a-boy gambit, and the disguise is naturally that of a page—the disguise easiest for a girl and much the easiest for the Renaissance boy actor playing that girl, for now he's playing a boy again. Julia as Sebastian proves to be a remarkably loyal servant, though a bit preoccupied at times—she gives Silvia the wrong love letter (accidentally or on purpose?), she gives Proteus the wrong ring (accidentally or on purpose?), and yet she also proves able to banter and observe her master with a perception comparable to Speed's. Julia's loyalty is tested to the limit in the forest when Proteus re-captures Silvia; the faint and the confusion are not impossible for a boy but more appropriate for the girl who has found her love again betrayed. Just how good is that disguise, and how close are the roles of page and girl in love? Henry James Haley's early 20th century illustration of Speed watching Valentine's confusion about the letter he wrote for Silvia Richard Yates as Launce with Crab, as played at Drury Lane in 1762 (by Henry Roberts) Let's Not Forget Lucetta… In a play called Two Gents , it's easy to overlook the females, but even among the help there's a witty woman. Lucetta is the female complement of Speed (although her role can be played young or older). She is knowing, wise, witty, and perceptive— she's on to Julia's games and teasing her for playing hard to get. Julia's sudden tearing up of that love letter may seem harsh, but it is the quickest route to fun for the scene and the most clarifying for Julia's true feelings. The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare
W. C. Fields himself decreed that an actor should never perform with children or dogs. Any actor playing Launce in Two Gents can tell us why, because he appears with Crab, the only dog Shakespeare scripted into a play. Perhaps Will Kempe owned a dog which he trained for stage; perhaps there was another trained dog available—we do not know. But we do know that every director must decide what breed of dog will best serve her production of Two Gents. Some breeds are more tractable on stage than others, but most often shows seem to look for a dog that in some way or another looks like Launce—a particularly long-faced Launce may have a wolfhound; a short, squat Launce a bull terrier. (Or, as in the ASF tour, breed is incidental because the role is played by an actor.) The relationship between Launce and Crab is intimate; in Launce's first scene Crab's lack of response to their leavetaking is the subject of his narrative—everyone at home is sobbing, but not "cruel-hearted" Crab. Crab's real usefulness to the play, in addition to stealing every scene in which he appears, is manifest later in the action when Launce tells us that Crab has misbehaved. Here is the essential parallel, for the only other misbehaving character is Proteus, who is apparently behaving like a dog—in modern slang, like a "hound." Crab has grabbed a piece of meat off someone's plate and then urinated under the table; he is also said to have urinated on Silvia's dress. All of those actions are suggestive in terms of how Proteus behaves. Proteus tries to grab Valentine's girlfriend and then tries to molest her in the forest. The parallels are unmistakable. Panthino : Launce, away, away, aboard.… you'll lose the tide, if you tarry any longer. Launce : It is no matter if the tied were lost, for it is the unkindest tied that ever any man tied. Panthino : What's the unkindest tide? Launce : Why, he that's tied here, Crab my dog. (2.3) In 2.2, Proteus has just "tied" himself with oaths to Julia, but proves "unkind" himself in that regard once he arrives in Milan— he quickly "unties" himself and gets "lost." L a u n c e ' s h o m o n y m i c punning is standard clown technique in Shakespeare; Launce is also given a number of malapropisms—he likes words, if he only knew what they all meant. Rodney Clark (Launce) with Pebbles Ann (Crab) in ASF's 2003 Two Gentlemen of Verona ASF Productions' Dog Tales
Two Gents and Romeo and Juliet share a source, a city, and also many of the same patterns in building their action. The parallels to the more familiar play can illuminate the relationships and issues in Two Gents. Those parallels are more noticeable since the first half of Romeo and Juliet is essentially a comic, bawdy commentary on love. Only with the outbreak of deadly violence does the action turn toward tragedy. Two Gents, while comic, has its serious turns, for whatever Proteus intends for Silvia in the forest seems neither tender nor consensual but an act of desperation. Young Lovers
Both young women have balconies/windows, so both plays have balcony scenes. In Two Gents , Valentine, like Romeo, has a cord ladder, but never gets to use it. Proteus stands below Silvia's balcony, wooing in song while being observed by Julia. (Above: Zeffirelli's 1968 film; below, Walter Crane, 1857) The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare
R&J and T wo Gents — Points to Compare/Consider:
