Eugene Kusterer

The Comedy of Errors Eugene Kusterer

Comedy of Errors is possibly Shakespeare's first comedy. We should not be bothered by the fact that the Bard borrows plots from other sources, for once injected with his genius, the source is another creature. In this case it is the "Menaechmi," a Roman farce by Plautus. Farce does not find it necessary to flesh out its characters. That's where Shakespeare goes to work, adding the inner life of an emotional and moral dimension to his two sets of identical twins. But all the ridiculous fun is still there. Each of the twins in the sets wonders what happened to his counterpart many years ago in the aftermath of a ship wreck. One of the twins is now married. Imagine the complications of mistaken identity that could come out of that! The Broadway musical based on this play is titled "The Boys from Syracuse." Syracuse is, indeed, the other city that has an ax to grind with Ephesus. One each from the two sets of twins has now ended up in Syracuse and Ephesus. But Ephesus is Comedy's setting, a place that is described in Scripture as a haven for withcraft; so throw that into the mix as well. The play is a romp of rhyme as well - which seems to whip the pace along to it's surprise ending in front of a convent. Who would you suspect the Abbess is?