A Dallas production of All’s Well That Ends Well is receiving strong reviews, particularly for its leading lady. One of the key points of praise is that it downplays Bertram’s dark side and adopts a tone that the critic likens to Jane Austen. In short, like all productions of this problem play, this version is being judged by how well it deals with the central problem.

And what a problem it is. In what may be the Elizabethan version of He’s Just Not That Into You, plucky Helena spends the entire play trying to get the reluctant Bertram to fall in love with her. Once she tricks him into impregnating her while in disguise, he does. Yay!!! Or should I say, “Yay?” This one could actually be called a Problems Play because its issues are myriad. First, it asks us to invest in a heroine who would degrade herself repeatedly for the love of a man. Feminists, start your engines, please. Next, when she actually succeeds, we’re supposed to be thrilled that this (expletive) finally came around.

As this reviewer noted, the trend lately has been to emphasize the unhealthiness of this relationship, so that the play becomes a story about Helena’s misguided need to win Bertram. While I’m sure that’s all edgy and deep, it gives the actor playing Bertram the most impossible dramatic feat requested of an actor. Part of the reason this production seems to work is that allows Bertram to grow and change throughout the play, not just in the last scene.

If you have never heard of Two Geezas of Verona, fear not. Likewise, if All’s Sweet That Ends Sweet does not ring any bells, you are not alone. The two titles are part of a larger trend of rewriting Shakespeare. In this case, a playwright (and self-described satirist) has rewritten several of Shakespeare’s texts using British “yoof speak,” a combination of British street slang and text-message phrasing.

Text messaging definitely marks a generational divide. For the tech-savvy youth, it’s a no-brainer as they have never known a world without the variety of media at their fingertips. For older generations, it’s one more gizmo to shake their heads at in exasperation and vow never to learn. For those of us in between, it’s a little of both. I have definitely texted, but it is far from being a way of life. I also do not use the OMG’s and other acronyms so associated with it. I see it as a useful tool, yet there’s a part of me that just wants to tell those fast-fingered kids to get the heck off my lawn before I call the police.

Perhaps the same could be said about reinterpretations of Shakespeare. There are those of us in the “Shakespeare has to be hip and reinvented” camp, while others reside in the “stop trying to dumb it down, it’s brilliant as it is” district. In a way the battle itself is good for both sides. Perhaps when I get the urge to shake my cane at Two Geezas of Verona, I should instead give it a chance. I just might LMAO.

A new production of All’s Well That Ends Well received a middling-to-low review. The review notes that the play is one of Shakespeare’s “problem plays” and cites the play’s varying tones and characters. Furthermore, the reviewer finds fault with the tone of the production itself, calling the serious parts too bland and humorous parts occasionally too garish. What struck me most about this review is the almost seamless way it mixed criticism of the production with criticism of the play itself. Essentially, for this writer, the play is full of traps and the actors and director fell into many of them.

Since he is near-deified to many, isn’t this reviewer’s complaints about the play kind of, well, blasphemous? Conversely, does Shakespeare have a few clunkers in his repertoire? If so, why perform them? Are we seeing productions of plays like All’s Well That Ends Well simply because of concern over audience fatigue? If Shakespeare aficionados have had more than their fill of indecisive Danish princes or kings who disinherit their daughters, it makes sense that other plays might be explored to show a different side to his writing. Still, are we attempting to make all thirty-something plays into classics?

These questions probably cannot be answered, but they bear asking. Also, what if we look at it from a different perspective? Would a reviewer be quite so hard on a play like All’s Well That Ends Well if he didn’t know who wrote it? In other words, are Shakespeare’s “great” plays and his reputation being used to punish his more idiosyncratic works?

Shakespeare’s gone country. Nashville staple Cowboy Jack Clement’s new DVD is dubbed Shakespeare was a George Jones Fan. While this title could provoke numerous follow-up questions (”What, no Porter Wagoner?”), presumably it seeks to link the poetry of Shakespeare with that of country music. Truthfully, I’m just glad it’s not called Shakespeare was a Billy Ray Cyrus Fan.

An even more relevant example of the Shakespeare-Country connection is the new musical Lone Star Love, which is loosely based on The Merry Wives of Windsor. Currently finishing up its out-of-town tryouts (and revisions), the show is looking to bow on Broadway in November. While adapting Shakespeare to musical theatre is nothing new (see West Side Story and The Boys from Syracuse as examples), the milieu of Lone Star Love is decidedly different. It’s set in the post-Civil War South and its Falstaff is none other than Cousin Eddie himself, Randy Quaid. We’ll have to wait a few months to find out if Shakespearean hootenanny is a smash or flop. If it’s the former, brace yourselves for The Winter’s Yarn and Y’Alls Well That Ends Well.

A new Idaho production of Measure for Measure is taking a modern-dress approach to the text to bring out the sociopolitical issues raised by this “problem play.” As with any high-concept interpretation, the purpose is to underscore the play’s contemporary relevance, yet the approach takes on added meaning when dealing with one of Shakespeare’s “problematic” scripts.

“Problem play” is one of those terms that’s acquired a wide variety of meanings through popular usage (and misusage). Today, it is usually invoked to describe one of Shakespeare’s plays that doesn’t easily fit into the comedy-tragedy-history triumvirate. In essence, the problem is ours, not Shakespeare’s, as mixed-genre plays are harder to categorize. Originally coined at the turn of the twentieth century, “problem play” did not mean the tonal shifts in the script were difficult to navigate in production. Instead, it referred to plays that deal with a specific social or political issue (much like the early realistic and naturalistic plays of that period). The three original problem plays were Measure, Troilus and Cressida, and All’s Well That Ends Well. Today, it might include plays like Cymbeline (whose oft-questioned authorship may account for its tonal and structural shifts), The Tempest, or even Hamlet. Given that mixed-genre forms are so prevalent nowadays (see television shows like Desperate Housewives or Six Feet Under), maybe we should reconsider what is so problematic about any of these plays.