SOURCE: Isherwood, Charles. Review of Measure for Measure. Variety 383, no. 6 (25 June 2001): 29.

In the following review of Mary Zimmerman's 2001 production of Measure for Measure at the Delacorte Theater in New York's Central Park, Isherwood praises the talented cast, but laments the loss of the play's more disturbing and thought-provoking qualities in this comic interpretation.

The comedy easily trumps the darkness in Mary Zimmerman's production of Shakespeare's dark comedy Measure for Measure, the first summer entry from the Public Theater at the Delacorte in Central Park. Zimmerman, whose inventive stage adaptations of various literary classics have not been seen much in New York, takes a sunny and lucid approach to the Bard's “problem” play, seeming to find nothing particularly problematic about it.

The cast is handsome and generally able; the laughs peal brightly; the convoluted plot is communicated with impressive simplicity, economy and grace. Played on an airy set by...