The father and daughter relationship in Much Ado About Nothing between Hero and Leonato has several interesting similarities to the relationship between Juliet and her father Lord Capulet in Romeo and Juliet, in spite of the former being a comedy and the latter being a tragedy. Of course, there are also several differences. Hero is quite a subservient daughter. She has some spunk, but she lives alone with her father; her mother is dead. Juliet has two mother figures, her nurse and Lady Capulet, so her father does not figure into her life as much as Hero’s father.

Lord Capulet comes across as a more willful and dominating figure than Leonato. Lord Capulet perpetuates a feud with the Montagues, while Leonato welcomes his friends into his house. The men’s similarities arise when they believe their daughters have crossed them. When Juliet refuses to marry Paris, Lord Capulet rails against her, and both the nurse and his wife attempt to calm him down. He says that if Juliet does not obey him, he will entirely disenfranchise her:

… hang, beg, starve, die in the streets,
For, by my soul, I'll ne'er acknowledge thee,
Nor what is mine shall never do thee good:

When Leonato thinks that the innocent Hero has been unfaithful to her fiancée, he actually wishes death upon her, claiming that if he didn’t think she would die of shame, he would “strike at [her] life.” He asks, “Why ever wast thou lovely in my eyes?” Both Lord Capulet and Leonato seem to love their daughters, but their very harsh reactions towards their disobedience demonstrate the powerlessness of women at the time.