All's Well That Ends Well (2006)

I grew up with more aphorisms than conversation (or at least only the aphorisms stuck with me). The idea is to make pithy statements, preferably out of context, for comic effect. One thing my dad likes to say is "All's well that ends well -- I suppose."

Now that I have actually seen All's Well That Ends Well (at The Duke on 42nd Street), my dad's aphorism turns out to be a sensible statement about Shakespeare's play.

Helena, a doctor's orphaned daughter, is smitten with Bertram, the son of the Countess who has charitably taken Helena in and raised her. Using her father's medical arts, Helena saves the life of the French king, and asks for Bertram's hand in marriage as her reward. The callow and disdainful youth refuses, humiliating her publicly and risking the king's wrath. Under intense pressure from the king, Bertram relents and marries Helena. In order to avoid consummating the marriage, however, he immediately dispatches himself off to Italy for war. There, he soon meets and starts chasing after a young woman named Diana. He will say and do anything to have sex with her. Helena takes advantage of Bertram's inordinate desire for Diana to obtain things from Bertram by trick that he never would have given Helena voluntarily (specifically, his sperm and his most treasured family heirloom). Thinking that he has successfully seduced Diana and that Helena is dead, Bertram returns to France, his lust sated and his affection for Diana depleted. Helena confronts Bertram before the king and proves that she has met the "impossible" conditions he set for her (Bertram made the mistake of not refusing her outright, but instead setting conditions he believed she could never meet). Bertram finally admits defeat and accepts that Helena will be his wife.

The production is an interesting one. It ends with Bertram admitting defeat and Helena recognizing victory -- but both apparently aware that Bertram still does not love her. It is duty, not love, that has triumphed.