Post-Show Classroom Activity
Invite students to explore the different elements that go into creating an adaptation of a classic text, and then devise their own.
As always, please note that some steps of the activity may be condensed, eliminated, or extended based on the needs of your classroom.
You’re the Director: Make Your Own Shrew!
Activity Preparation
- Supplies:
- Link to 10 Things I Hate About You trailer (1999 movie)
- Link to Kiss Me, Kate trailer (Barbican 2024)
- Link to 2024 production at Shakespeare’s Globe trailer
- Link to 2019 production at Royal Shakespeare Company clip of Act II, Scene I
- Set-Up:
- Consider whether to provide students with a paper on which to brainstorm the plot points of The Taming of the Shrew (Step 1) or on which to draft their ideas for their adaptation (Step 5).
This activity will take approximately 60 minutes.
Learning Sequence
- Ask small groups or the whole class to brainstorm a brief summary of The Taming of the Shrew together. Encourage them to identify major themes, characters, and plot points. Then, have students discuss the elements they believe were unique to Court Theatre’s version of The Taming of the Shrew. Prompt students to consider the addition of the immersive experience, as well as the BDSM/kink through-line. Ask: What did these choices add to the story overall? (~10 minutes)
- Read students the definition of adaptation: a composition rewritten into a new form (Merriam-Webster). List elements that a creator/director can shift to create an adaptation. These include time, place, gender, race, character POV, etc. Ask: What movies, books, or plays that you enjoy have been adapted from a different source material? Generate a list as a class. (~5 minutes)
- Explore some or all of the linked Shrew adaptations with students: a movie, a musical, and two theatrical interpretations. Ask students to identify the elements added or changed from the original Taming of the Shrew (listed for guidance here). (10 minutes)
- 10 Things I Hate About You: 1999 romantic comedy film. Changed the time and place to the 1990s America, along with many of the names and circumstances. Maintains that the youngest sister can’t date until the oldest sister does. Names have many cheeky Shakespeare references.
- Kiss Me, Kate: 1948 musical by Cole Porter. A fictional theatre troupe puts on a musical adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew, while the producers and actors play out many of the same themes of the show.
- The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare’s Globe: 2024 production set in a carnival with giant and hand-held puppets and doll-like makeup.
- The Taming of the Shrew by the Royal Shakespeare Company: 2019 production in which genders are reversed. It’s still set in 1590 Italy, but set in a matriarchy instead of a patriarchy, with all the genders inverted.
- Ask: What does each adaptation highlight through the ways it changed the original script? Sample answers might include the following: (~10 minutes)
- 10 Things I Hate About You: Power dynamics as they play out in a high school setting.
- Kiss Me, Kate: Power dynamics as shown in the relationship between actor and producer (the actress who plays Kate attempts to leave the play but is forced to stay by gunpoint).
- The Taming of the Shrew by Shakespeare’s Globe: The heightened nature of the play, leaning on caricature of gender roles as played out in Punch and Judy shows.
- The Taming of the Shrew by the Royal Shakespeare Company: Power dynamics and how imbalanced they truly are, highlighted by the experience of seeing women in roles often inhabited by men.
- Divide students into small groups. Have each group create a pitch for their own version of The Taming of the Shrew. They must change at least two elements, and offer an explanation of what those changes would do to enhance and/or provide a new perspective to the story. Encourage them to use this adaptation as a way to show their understanding of the characters, their arcs, and what Shrew can communicate to its audiences. (~15 minutes)
- Invite students to share their pitches with the group, leaving an opportunity for questions and further discussion after each share. (~10 minutes)
- This activity aligns with the following standards:
- Illinois Arts Learning Standards
- Anchor Standard 1: Generate and conceptualize artistic ideas and work.
- Anchor Standard 7: Perceive and analyze artistic work.
- Anchor Standard 8: Construct meaningful interpretations of artistic work.
- Common Core State Standards
- CCSS.ELA.R.2 Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.
- CCSS.ELA.R.3 Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a text.
- CCSS.ELA.R.9 Analyze how two or more texts address similar themes or topics in order to build knowledge or to compare the approaches the authors take.
- CCSS.ELA.W.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.
- Illinois Arts Learning Standards