Measure for Measure / YMMV

Alternative Character Interpretation: Like every other Shakespearean play, there's a lot of ways to read the characters.
- Is the Duke a benign (but lazy) Magnificent Bastard, or is he just doing it for the lulz? Consider that he poses as a friar and consoles men condemned to death (whom he plans to ultimately pardon, of course). In the time the play was written, the eternal damnation of the soul and the right of priests, and priests alone, to grant absolution were taken very, very seriously. In modern terms, the Duke's deception would be like some unqualified meddler pretending to be a surgeon and performing life-or-death surgery. Unless, considering this play was written and performed in Protestant England, the faith that Catholics put in priests and friars is meant to be a big joke, and the audience should laugh along with the Duke as he merrily dupes one schmuck after another.
- Is Angelo a Knight Templar who Jumped Off the Slippery Slope and then got horny, or was he always an asshole who finally accepted his ugly nature?
- Is Isabella a shy but sweet Chaste Heroine who learns about chaste love in the end, or the play's other Knight Templar who's so obsessed with her saintly image that she'd sacrifice her brother to maintain it?
- And does Isabella's silence at the Duke's proposal mean that she modestly accepted him because they were meant to be? Does she reject him? Or does she silently acknowledge that she actually had no choice at all, and must, like before, break her vow of chastity either way?
Audience-Alienating Premise: It's one of the less performed plays from Shakespeare's mature period, and the premise is a big reason. On the one hand, a plot centred on a sympathetic man awaiting execution, and his sister being given a Sadistic Choice between being raped or letting him die, makes for sobering viewing, and Isabella can come off as cold and unsympathetic for valuing her own sexual integrity over her brother's life. On the other hand, those who come into the play expecting a grim but satisfying tragedy about rape and abuse of authority may be put off by the fact that the attempted rapist Angelo is Easily Forgiven, and the Duke's (unresolved) marriage proposal to Isabella in the end (which, if played as being accepted, would nullify the value she placed on her chastity in the first place).
Ensemble Dark Horse:
- Mariana has had a great deal of Romantic art composed for her, including a famous poem by Tennyson.
- Barnardine has just seven lines, but some critics, notably Harold Bloom, consider him one of Shakespeare's greatest comic characters.
Esoteric Happy Ending: Thanks in large part to Strangled by the Red String.
Heartwarming Moments: Mariana is pleading for her new husband Angelo's life, and asks Isabella to get on her knees before the Duke to help her. Angelo tried to rape Isabella, broke his promise to spare her brother in exchange for sex, and has been Isabella's enemy for the whole play. Increasingly hysterical, Mariana begs Isabella to get on her knees, and none of the bystanders think she will...And then Isabella gets on her knees beside Mariana and begs for Angelo's life despite all he tried to do. A beautiful example of the Christian mercy that as a future nun (maybe), Isabella should be practicing. What makes this doubly heartwarming is that she now shows genuine mercy, not the cold, distant mercy she showed her brother earlier.
Strangled by the Red String: Some see the Duke's proposal to Isabella as this, seeing as how their interactions up to that point have no romantic chemistry whatsoever, and it almost seems like Shakespeare addressing the awkwardness of a Pair the Spares happy ending.
Values Dissonance:
- At the time the play was first performed, even though all the nunneries in England had been dissolved decades before in the Reformation and people had been encouraged to dismiss the traditions of the Catholic Church, audiences would still understand the importance of Isabella's desire to become a nun and her refusal to give up her virginity in order to save her brother. To modern eyes, though, she can come off as rather cold-blooded and callous. Although, see Values Resonance...
- The Duke's offer of marriage at the end would be more acceptable to an Elizabethan audience, since 'comedy' plays usually ended in marriages and an illustrious union with the Duke is explicitly Isabella's 'reward', plus Fourth-Date Marriage was hardly a rare trope in Elizabethan theatre. Modern audiences are often put off by the Strangled by the Red String problems, to say nothing of the way he's manipulated her throughout the play.
- Due to the changes in slang and culture over the centuries, a lot of the jokes in the play haven't aged well and it can be tricky for a modern viewer to understand what the characters are even talking about or why they're supposed to find it funny; particularly the Hurricane of Puns about haemorrhoids and syphillis in Act I Scene II/Act IV Scene III and the many sexual innuendos in Act II Scene I. Plus there's the whole character of Constable Elbow; the babbling constable was a fairly common device in plays of the time, commenting on the fact that it was difficult to get competent people to fill law enforcement positions due to the low pay, but to viewers who aren't familiar with the trope he's often seen as redundant and irritating. ^note Directors and actors often have to work quite hard to get the humour across to a present day audience, assuming they don't just cut these jokes altogether.
Values Resonance:
- Many performances, and public opinion, actually seem to have swung back around on Isabella's refusal to submit to Angelo, even to save her brother's life. Lucy Phelps, who played Isabella in the 2019 Royal Shakespeare Production, says as much:
  "It’s about bodily autonomy. It’s setting a precedent – what are we saying? That it’s OK for women to give up their bodies, for men to take their bodies, to save lives? She’s made a decision about her life: these are my principles… She’s not torn but she desperately wants bodily autonomy. Let’s not confuse what’s going on: it’s not lovemaking, Angelo wants to rape her. Her brother is saying ‘will you be raped to save my life?’"
- Angelo's sexual harassment (and in some stagings actual assault) of Isabella, and the agony of her being unable to complain for fear of not being believed, rings very true in the modern day; particularly after the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the flurry of revelations about other celebrities that followed.
- While Sex Is Evil, and I Am Horny messes up Angelo's mind so much that he almost instantly descends into Then Let Me Be Evil, he does recognise that Isabella wasn't tempting him in any way and and doesn't blame her for inflaming the desire that is entirely his own — but unfortunately, he decides to run with it.

YMMV / Measure for Measure

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