MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING –The One With Shakespeare’s Stupidest Character

Much Ado About Nothing is many people’s favourite Shakespeare comedy, and it certainly has great potential to sparkle on stage given the right actors and energy, but for my part it has not been a play I particularly have cared for or list among my favourite comedies, though I have never really been able to pin down why –perhaps it is just that I like some of the others so much better, or identify with characters in them more than in this play where I struggle to find a sympathetic ”guide” to drag me along into this particular world and milieu.

However, upon reading it afresh I have come to appreciate it more, not least for its fine balance of comedy and drama, though I find it hard with this play in particular to get certain performances I have seen out of my mind. And this is probably because Much Ado About Nothing, more than many other Shakespeare plays (and that’s including other comedies) cries out to be performed and really only works and blooms when it does. The playfulness of the comedy, and in particular the fast exchanges between Beatrice and Benedick need to be staged to be fully enjoyed. And yet and close reading reveals the skill with which Shakespeare constructs their ripostes and allows us to appreciate more of the many puns and twists of language that he employs –which in performance frequently hurtle past us so fast that we can only just take them in before the next one whizzes towards us. And the comic dexterity here is sharp and delicious –less ornate and ”showy-offy” than in Love’s Labour’s Lost, and in no way as trite as in for instance The Merry Wives of Windsor. The comedy (and here I refer to the scenes and story between Beatrice and Benedick) is modern, instantly grasped and delightful not only to the audience/reader, but also to the other characters of the play, some of whom delight in matching these two supposed ”opposites” together.

But, and it is sometimes hard to remember, the play is not essentially about Beatrice and Benedick, even though they are the characters who everyone remembers. They are actually ”supporting characters” –but, just like in so many Hollywood romantic comedies– it is the supporting characters who steal the show. The ”main” love story of Much Ado About Nothing is between Hero and Claudio –the young sweethearts– and their path to love has to pass through far darker woods than those of Beatrice and Benedick. At times we are almost in Romeo and Juliet territory, and there are certainly strong thematic links between the two plays. And there is even more darkness here –the fascinating and hard-to-grasp character of Don John; a man who is one of Shakespeare’s absolute darkest creations –there is an unwritten play in his life story. And though he supposedly comes good in the end, I wonder…

And then we come to Dogberry…

Well, Dogberry is the stupidest character in all of Shakespeare. That’s pretty much without a doubt as far as I am concerned. I have carefully considered possible other contenders for that title and no one comes close. There are all manner of FOOLISH people in Shakespeare (and none of the ”fools” are at all stupid) –Sir Andrew Aguecheek, for instance, and plenty of gullible, clownish, naive and feeble-minded poor dears, but there are all relatively few plain STUPID characters. And what makes Dogberry particularly stupid is that he flaunts his stupidity in the guise of believing himself to be much more intelligent than he is –and primarily because as constable he has been given a position of (small) power. Stick a moron in a uniform or give them a badge and they think they’re God Almighty! One feels sure Shakespeare must have encountered such characters in his daily life, for the portrayal is wickedly funny, but one does so want to slap/smack him (Dogberry, that is, not Shakespeare). I rate it as another sign of Shakespeare’s supreme gift of universality –he fills his plays with all kinds of people, and, with a very, very few exceptions he is always fair to his characters in that he presents them honestly, no matter how important, grand, slight, flawed or, in this case, plain stupid they may be. But Dogberry’s stupidity and petty bureaucratic power-trip and failure to act almost causes tragic consequences in the central ”love plot” of the two young main characters. Without his stupidity there would be no drama, so he is thus an important character in the unfolding of the story.

Yet Dogberry is the kind of character who would puff and peacock himself precisely because I have just called him the stupidest character in all of Shakespeare. He would consider that a great honour! And Dogberry, dastardly, thick and annoying as he is is not a caricature –he just happens to be that way, poor sod! And there are such people in the world; believe me, I’ve met them!

Favourite Line:

Beatrice:
I am gone, though I am here.
(Act 4, Sc.1)
(and add most of Benedick’s speeches)

Character I would most like to play: Benedick