SOURCE: Bruckner, D. J. R. Review of The Taming of the Shrew. New York Times (23 June 2001): B8.

In the following review of Liz Shipman's 2001 staging of The Taming of the Shrew, Bruckner finds nearly all of Shipman's directorial interpretations beneficial to the drama and approves of the ensemble performance.

In the Kings County Shakespeare Company's Taming of the Shrew under Liz Shipman's direction, it is the play that is disciplined into civility, with only a slight misstep. Ms. Shipman uses part of Shakespeare's opening scene that is routinely ignored in modern productions. But instead of making the play a stunt by amateur performers to confuse an addled sot, she has a lush reel from the street into the theater where the actors talk him into taking the role of Petruchio. It seems to me this diminishes the distancing effect Shakespeare intended by making Shrew a play within a...