Source: "Maturity: Much Ado About Nothing," in Shakespeare's Comic Sequence, Barnes & Noble Books,
1979, pp. 68-81.
[In the following excerpt, Muir offers a general historical and literary assessment of Much Ado.]
The date of Much Ado about Nothing can be fixed with unusual accuracy. It was performed while Kemp (who played Dogberry) was still a member of Shakespeare's company, but too late for Francis Meres to know of its existence when he listed Shakespeare's plays in Palladis Tamia. So 1598 was the date of its first performance; and it was printed, probably from Shakespeare's manuscript, two years later.
It is hardly anyone's favourite comedy and it is not so frequently performed as As You Like It or Twelfth Night, doubtless because the main plot is so much less interesting than the underplot. The Hero-Claudio plot,.....
