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Dylan Humenik
Mr. Randolph
Classical Literature
23 March 2012
Accuracies in Shakespeare in Love
The great age of Shakespeare, the Elizabethan Era, has seen many attempts of portrayal
by today’s society. Among these, John Madden’s Shakespeare in Love has shown audiences one
of the most accurate portrayals to date. A few historical inaccuracies exist, but that is expected
of any historical film. The historical inaccuracies that show up do not interfere with the plot line
of the film and are trivial in nature. Moreover, Madden has gone above and beyond the plot and
included many historical accuracies in the film to further paint the picture of Elizabethan times.
The following reasons illustrate how Shakespeare in Love leaves viewers with a good idea of life
in this society, as compared to the all-too-common skewed view that most historical films
impress upon viewers.
To start, one instance where John Madden accurately portrays an aspect of Shakespeare’s
life is with the portrayal of theatre in London. The theatre that housed the plays that scholars
commonly attribute to Shakespeare would have been the Rose Theatre in 1593, managed by
entrepreneur Philip Henslowe. Henslowe is portrayed in Shakespeare in Love. Ribner confirms
this by writing, “In 1587 Philip Henslowe, who had long been involved in money lending, boat
renting, and other enterprises, built the Rose Theatre on the Bankside in Southwark…” (Ribner
144). Around those years, before the Globe Theatre became the prominent theatre, many smaller
theatres tried to gain mainstream support. The theatre that Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet
occurred in during 1593 was the Rose Theatre. Shakespeare in Love demonstrates consistency in
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this regard. Henslowe appears as a prominent character in Shakespeare in Love as the owner of
the Rose Theatre, completely accurate with the history that Ribner provides.
Moving on, another instance of accuracy in Shakespeare in Love occurs in the character
of John Webster. Near the end of the movie, the Queen asks a young, poor Webster if he liked
the play Romeo and Juliet. He responded by saying that he liked it when Juliet stabbed herself.
This suggests that the young Webster liked the violence aspect of the play. Indeed, John
Webster felt very in favor of violence, as he would go on to write plays that included much
violence and gore, later on in the Jacobean Era of English Drama. Geoffrey Alexander Booth
writes of John Webster’s violence in The White Devil in his essay on violence in Elizabethan and
Jacobean drama: “Webster's The White Devil offers a representation of duelling within a
Jacobean revenge tragedy. The fatal quarrel between Flamineo and Marcello, like that between
Montagues and Capulets, invokes the duelling code and its associated ritual practices in order to
violate them. The significance of this dramatic episode is enhanced when that frame of reference
is considered” (Booth 180). Scholars remember John Webster for his violence in his plays and
attribute a big part of the role of violence in the playhouse to him. Madden adding in the line
that Webster says at the end of the movie clearly depicts the young John Webster’s interest in
violence: a clever way to portray a historical accuracy.
Lastly, a final historical accuracy occurred in how Shakespeare in Love portrayed
Elizabethan playhouse censorship. More specifically, the movie accurately portrays Edmund
Tilney, and the fact that actors could only be male. When Viola de Lesseps wants to be an actor,
she must dress as a man in order to remain in the theatre. Tilney finds out at the end of the
movie and orders the playhouse closed. Although this specific event did not happen specifically,
the way that Tilney reacted was consistent with the way he would have reacted in real
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Elizabethan theatre. Ribner explains who Tilney was: “the duty of censoring plays [was] to the
Master of the Revels, an official of the queen’s household who was responsible for the
supervision of court entertainments. … In 1607 the Master of the Revels was given the additional
authority to license all plays before they could be printed. During Shakespeare’s career the
position of Master of the Revels was held by only two persons, Sir Edmund Tilney, who was
appointed to the post in 1579 and held it until his death in 1610, …” (Ribner 164). Furthermore,
Ribner also explains that only men can perform as actors during the time period: “Since all
female roles were played by boys, talented boy actors were especially prized, and since they
could no longer act after their voices began to change at about the age of fourteen, they must
have developed extraordinary skill in the space of very few years so as to perform credibly such
roles as Ophelia and Cleopatra” (Ribner 158). Indeed, if there were a woman on stage during the
time period, Sir Tilney surely would have done what he did in the movie: close the theatre
immediately. Again, in Shakespeare in Love there also appears a young boy whose, as the time
for Romeo and Juliet soon approached, voice began to change. This, along with Tilney’s
actions, show yet another accuracy in Shakespeare in Love.
To reiterate and conclude, three prominent historical accuracies occur in John Madden’s
Shakespeare in Love: Philip Henslowe and the Rose Theatre, John Webster and his obsession
with violence, and Sir Edmund Tilney and the law that only men can act. These historical
accuracies show Madden’s cleverness and skill as a director, as only those knowledgeable on
Elizabethan theatre could have recognized them. Of course, historical inaccuracies also exist, as
with any historical film, but Madden makes up for it with brilliant attention to detail and
portrayal of these aspect of Elizabethan theatre. All in all though, the historical accuracies in
Shakespeare in Love give more to the movie than do the inaccuracies take away from it.
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Works Cited
Booth, Geoffrey Alexander. Violent Performance: A Cultural Analysis of The Intersection of
Violence and Embedded Performance in Elizabethan and Jacobean Tragedy. MA thesis.
University of Toronto, 1996. Web.
<http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/webster/webessay.htm>.
Ribner, Irving. William Shakespeare: An Introduction to his Life, Times, and Theatre. Hoboken:
John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1975. Print.