The first thing that comes to mind when you read a story or watch a movie is the plot. Even though both of them were written and set in two completely different times, both of these stories have a very similar plot. In both, a girl gets kicked out of some place, the court for Rosalind and the soccer team for Viola, both for different reasons. Then, in both stories, they go somewhere else, the Forest of Arden and Illyria, while being disguised as a man. On their way to accomplishing their own goals, they both help out other people with their love problems. At the end, both Rosalind and Viola end up getting their true loves and everyone is happy at the end, other than the Cornwall team in She’s the man.
The main characters in both of the stories, Viola in She’s the Man and Rosalind in As You Like It, are girls that end up getting kicked out of someplace. They both then dress up as a man, both for their own reason’s, and do some matchmaking on their way of getting to their goals. Two other characters that are similar from the two stories are Duke Senior and the coach of the Cornwall soccer team. The duke kicks Rosalind and her father out of the court and banishes them from it. Cornwall’s coach cut the school’s girls’ soccer team and ‘banished’ Viola from the school, since she wanted to play soccer so badly. A third pair of characters that are similar is Pheobe and Silvius and Olivia and Duke. Duke likes Olivia, but Olivia likes Sebastian, who is actually Viola dressed up like a girl. In the same way, Silvius likes Pheobe who likes Ganymede who is Rosalind disguised as a man.
Another similarity in these two stories are the settings. In As You Like It, Rosalind and her father get kicked out of the court. This is like the soccer pitch at Cornwall for Viola. After the girls’ team is cut, Cornwall’s coach says she can’t be on the boys team, even though she’s better than most of the boys there. This was essentially like getting banished from the court. Also, Rosalind goes to the Forest of Arden after she is banished. In She’s the Man, Viola’s ‘Forest’ is Illyria, Sebastian’s school that she goes to disguised as him.
As you can see, even modern day movies that teenagers can somewhat relate to can be somehow connected to an old Shakespearean play. In She’s the Man, and As You Like It, some aspects that are similar are the characters, the plot, and the settings, though these aren’t the only things that are similar. So, next time you are watching a movie, think about it a little bit and you might find out that William Shakespeare might have inspired it with his work. Maybe Shakespeare isn’t that boring after all!
