‘Kiss Me, Kate' Review: Playing With Cole Porter on PBS
Located at the intersection of Cole Porter and William Shakespeare, 'Kiss Me, Kate' has become a bit problematic in recent decades, given the purportedly misogynistic nature of its source material ('The Taming of the Shrew') and a few of the Porter songs (among them 'I Am Ashamed That Women Are So Simple,' a lyric changed in the glorious 2019 Broadway revival to read 'people' instead of 'women'). But changes have always been made to Porter's 1948 original, with the book by the married-but-separated Samuel and Bella Spewak. Call it tampering. Call it evolution.
During the 2024 London production being presented on the PBS series 'Great Performances,' the alleged woman problem is addressed directly: Shortly after the opening of act II, Adrian Dunbar steps to the front of the stage—he is playing the actor-director-producer Fred Graham, who is also playing Petruchio in the 'Shrew' being performed behind him—says 'Gimme a minute' to conductor Stephen Ridley, and basically apologizes to the audience: 'Some,' he says, 'may find the idea of Petruchio 'taming' Kate difficult.' It is, after all, 1948. 'Women are fully emancipated' (which gets a chuckle out of the Barbican audience). Nevertheless, Shakespeare's time was different. And in any event, the show must go on.
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