1:38 The Two Gentlemen of Verona

Day 1 of 38:38
The Two Gentlemen of Verona

I have read and seen this play before. In fact my friends were in an all-female production. And frankly, Two Gents, like Measure for Measure, is a play that screams for you to comment on the gender politics. So much so that I get annoyed when I see productions that try to ignore them. I'm a big believer in embracing the "problems" of the "problem plays" rather than trying to smooth them over.

What I find remarkable is the number of famous moments contained in this text, despite it's WTF ending. Let's recount in brief: Proteus and Valentine are best friends. Proteus loves Julia. Valentine loves Silvia. Proteus meets Silvia and falls in love with her. When she resists his wooing, he attempts to rape her. He is stopped by Valentine. Proteus apologizes. Valentine says, "Hey, no problem. We're best friends!" The women say nothing. And we have our first of many examples of male douche-bagery and female silence in Shakespeare.

And yet there are memorable, beautiful moments:

Julia's "O hateful hands, to tear such loving words" speech

Valentine's "What light is light, if Silvia be not seen?" speech

I love the spirit of Silvia's "I would have been a breakfast to the beast / Rather than have false Proteus rescue me" speech.

------------------------------------------------

The play is definitely problematic when you stage it. What do you do with that ending? How sincere is Proteus? How sorry is Proteus? How sincere is Valentine? Here are some thoughts I've copied from an email I wrote to a friend about ideas for staging this play:

Perhaps Julia could be played as very chaste? This could add to Proteus's frustrations. He's not getting any and then he encounters a vivacious woman that isn't shy at all and bandies about with men. That could be very exciting to him. Then at the end when he realizes that Julia has dressed up like a man and traveled to find him, it could be like he's realized he's misjudged her, and she's not weak or boring or whatever.

Proteus is not without a struggle, it is short, but it is still there. Not cutting this speech will help make him more sympathetic. Also, it would be interesting if he heard the conversation between the Duke and Valentine where the Duke is asking Valentine for advice on how to woo a woman and Valentine says:

A woman sometime scorns what best contents her.
Send her another; never give her o'er,
For scorn at first makes after-love the more.
If she do frown, 'tis not in hate of you,
But rather to beget more love in you;
If she do chide, 'tis not to have you gone;
For why the fools are mad if left alone.
Take no repulse, whatever she doth say;
For, 'get you gone,' she doth not mean, 'away!'
Flatter and praise, commend, extol their graces;
Though ne'er so black, say they have angels' faces.
That man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man,
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.

The script states that Proteus leaves before this, but it would be an interesting choice if he was hidden or overheard it somehow. And it would make sense for Proteus to stay to hear what happens because he has set Valentine up to be caught by the Duke, and he might want to eavesdrop to make sure it goes according to plan. Plus, Proteus re-enters immediately when Valentine leaves.

So if Proteus heard this speech and decided that Valentine was always more successful with women or something so for whatever reason decided that Valentine's advice was great advice – it might explain some of how he treats Silvia.

And Proteus seems to be a bit of a hothead that just gets carried away in the moment. People always say what they mean in Shakespeare (unless they've just told the audience to watch them dissemble), so when he gets caught, to me it reads like he's just been slapped back into reality, and "Oh my god, what am I doing?" moment.

Additionally, it would be yours and the actors' decision on how sure Julia is when she takes him back. This could be an awkward, uncomfortable moment, much like the end of Alls Well.

And of course, the other problem is the whole Man Code thing. Valentine is so quick to forgive Proteus after he almost rapes Silvia. This is the aspect that is most troubling to me, and the one I am least able to fathom. Could it only work if Proteus is so incredibly sorry and shocked by his own behavior?

And it doesn't really seem that there is any unsureness with Valentine. I mean, you could try to play it like his forgiving Proteus is just one of those things you say, like a band-aid over a wound that is still there, EXCEPT that he says

And, that my love may appear plain and free,
All that was mine in Silvia I give thee.

There's just no getting around that.

So maybe the point is how a woman's life is controlled by the men around her. The two women try as they might to make their own life and get what they want, but they ultimately don't get it until the men decide that it is so, from the suitors to the fathers. There is a sense of powerlessness. Not just the last line, but the last 54 lines are spoken by the men.

Hmm – interesting – what if you did something with that final speech of Valentines:

Please you, I'll tell you as we pass along,
That you will wonder what hath fortuned
Come, Proteus; 'tis your penance, but to hear
The story of your loves discovered:
That done, our day of marriage shall be yours;
One feast, one house, one mutual happiness.

Where Valentine sort of takes the Duke and Proteus arm and arm and they all go off together pleased as punch, because it's been sorted out among them, but Julia and Silvia are left behind onstage alone, because they are expected to just follow whatever the men do?

---------------------------------------------------------

Favorite Female Character:
I have to give it to Silvia, but mostly because she's the one female Shakespeare specifically endows with "auburn" hair.
Favorite Male Character:
As an actor, Proteus, cause he's an ass, and that's more fun.
Laugh out loud:
Proteus Beshrew me, but you have a quick wit.
Speed And yet it cannot overtake your slow purse.
Oh, misogyny:
Launce To be slow in words is a woman's only virtue.
Down with the Patriarchy:
Julia It is the lesser blot, modesty finds, / Women to change their shapes than men their minds.
Hamlet has Pirates:
Two Gents has Outlaws

Favorite Moment/Line:
The speech where Proteus decides to woo Silvia. He starts off tormented because he knows it's wrong, and that he would be betraying both Julia and Valentine. But 30 lines later he's absolutely resolved without any qualms. I just think it's fascinating. And clearly Shakespeare knew that it is a remarkable moment, because he places this soliloquy in a scene by itself. I wonder how often he does something like that? (EDIT: My bad -- most scene and act delineations are editors' doings, so it's pretty impossible to tell whether Shakespeare was making this a "scene" by itself).

To leave my Julia, shall I be forsworn;
To love fair Silvia, shall I be forsworn;
To wrong my friend, I shall be much forsworn;
And even that power which gave me first my oath
Provokes me to this threefold perjury:
Love bade me swear, and Love bids me forswear.
O sweet-suggesting Love! if thou hast sinn’d,
Teach me, thy tempted subject, to excuse it.
At first I did adore a twinkling star,
But now I worship a celestial sun.
Unheedful vows may heedfully be broken;
And he wants wit that wants resolved will
To learn his wit to exchange the bad for better.
Fie, fie, unreverend tongue! to call her bad,
Whose sovereignty so oft thou hast preferr’d
With twenty thousand soul-confirming oaths.
I cannot leave to love, and yet I do;
But there I leave to love where I should love.
Julia I lose and Valentine I lose:
If I keep them, I needs must lose myself;
If I lose them, thus find I by their loss,
For Valentine, myself; for Julia, Silvia.
I to myself am dearer than a friend,
For love is still most precious in itself;
And Silvia—witness heaven that made her fair!—
Shows Julia but a swarthy Ethiope.
I will forget that Julia is alive,
Remembering that my love to her is dead;
And Valentine I’ll hold an enemy,
Aiming at Silvia as a sweeter friend.
I cannot now prove constant to myself
Without some treachery us’d to Valentine:
This night he meaneth with a corded ladder
To climb celestial Silvia’s chamber-window,
Myself in counsel, his competitor.
Now presently, I’ll give her father notice
Of their disguising and pretended flight;
Who, all enrag’d, will banish Valentine;
For Thurio, he intends, shall wed his daughter;
But, Valentine being gone, I’ll quickly cross,
By some sly trick blunt Thurio’s dull proceeding.
Love, lend me wings to make my purpose swift,
As thou hast lent me wit to plot this drift!