The Tricking of Beatrice and Benedick
Act 2 Scene 3 and Act 3 Scene 1 are the two scenes in which Benedick and Beatrice are tricked into falling for one another. The trick on Benedick is preformed by Claudio, Don Pedro and Leonato with a musical interval from Balthazar. Beatrice on the other hand is tricked by Hero and Ursula. The tricks plaid on these two ‘star cross’d lovers’ differ slightly but also share certain similarities, one of these being they contain certain comical aspects.
Another similarity between the two tricks is that the two victims are hidden from the sight of those tricking them. This allows Shakespeare to have one group in a dialogue whilst the victim of the trick has his/her own monologue, so two conversations are occurring simultaneously, giving a complexity to the scene and leaving room for comedy. This is well in the film version of the film by Kenneth Branagh. Although some of the dialogue is lost in the transfer from novel to film the setting is well planned and the actors capture the tone of language and created an atmosphere that personally helped me understand the scene better than when I was reading it. The advantage the film has is the dramatic expression, be it in the faces, body language or speech of a character. The film shows that the characters are blatantly poorly acting to convince Benedick and you can tell they did not prepare well by the hesitation, but this is also shown in the stage directions of the text.
