Shakespeare Magazine 01

Interview: James Shapiro
An acclaimed
performance by
Saskia Rosendahl
in Lore.
but I’ve never seen a work that captured so
powerfully what happens when ideology and
reality collide.
“Lore’s struggle to reconcile what she
feels with what she has been taught to believe
– perfectly rendered by Saskia Rosendahl –
continues to haunt me.”
Man on Fire
“For sheer visceral pleasure, my all-time
favourite film is Man on Fire, starring Denzel
Washington. Some films hit you in the gut,
some in the heart, some in the head. This
thriller gets you in the gut.
“I’ve probably watched it 20 times since
it first came out in 2004 and never tire of
viewing it. As someone who teaches and
writes about Hamlet and revenge plays,
Still burning:
Denzel
Washington in
Man on Fire.
I’m fascinated by what makes for a perfect
revenge story. The best revenge is both
mimetic and belated – in other words, an
avenger needs to take his time and inflict
just the right punishment on those who have
done wrong.
“The director of Man on Fire, Tony Scott,
understands the mechanics of the revenge
plot perfectly. Denzel Washington has done
a lot of good work, but his performance as
Creasy, a burned-out former CIA agentturned-bodyguard,
is just amazing.
“I also love Christopher Walken’s cameo.
Just thinking about this film makes me want
to watch it again.”
Paisan
“Flipping through the movie channels the
other night I came upon a film I had never
heard of but will now return to: Roberto
Rosselli’s 1946 black-and-white masterpiece
Paisan, the closest thing to a great short-story
collection on film.
“I wondered how I had gone through life
without having heard of, let alone seen, such
a brilliant work, one that made me feel, as
no other art form ever has, what it was like
to have lived through the final and terrifying
months of the Second World War in Italy.”
A Columbia University professor,
James Shapiro is the author of 1599: A Year
in the Life of William Shakespeare and
Contested Will: who wrote Shakespeare?
and editor of Shakespeare in America.
More from: www.jamesshapiro.net
Parts of this interview originally appeared in
Cineworld Magazine.
40 SHAKESPEARE magazine