Fuzzy Pathetic Loving "Ass"

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Fuzzy Pathetic Loving “Ass”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare, is a classic play that has been retold in many ways. The most recent version of this romantic comedy was done by Michael Hoffman in 1999. This portrayal follows very closely to the original play. Very few lines are taken out, and the characters stay very true to the assumed original idea. The one main difference in the original play and this movie is the depiction of the character Nick Bottom the weaver. The original play shows Bottom as the “…overconfident weaver…hilariously overt…has extraordinary belief in his own ability…totally unaware of his ridiculousness…” (Sparknotes.com). These types of characteristics would normally make readers see Bottom as a cocky, egotistical, center of attention, “ass”. In the play, this is the case. However, in the 1999 movie version, with Kevin Kline as Bottom, the audience gets a different idea of Bottom without changing his basic character traits. Hoffman achieved changing the overall perception of the character of Bottom from to a “…warm fuzzy man, a dreamer for whom we can root”, and pathetic lover, while still keeping the “ass” quality, by only changing a few small, very subtle things (Jones, 127).
In what would be Act I Scene II of the original play, Bottom is shown sitting alone at a café. As he is making his way to leave, a rough looking woman walking around in a very hurried and determined manner become the focus of the screen. The audience soon realizes this is Bottoms wife. Bottom seems to become frightened of her on sight, so he hides behind a wall. You also learn that his wife thinks his dreams of being an actor are simply unrealistic and stupid. The original Shakespearian play does not include a wife for Nick Bottom. The adding of a wife to a movie is not normally of great importance; however, the type of wife she is makes all the difference.
Later in the scene, when Bottom goes home, the audience sees more of what type of a wife this is. As Bottom enters his house he is shown looking around to see where she might be; he is very quite and slips into a room quickly. Almost instantly, his wife realizes he is home, and she rushes into the room with a very ugly, stern expression on her face. There is no speaking in this scene (Hoffman).

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