Love THE BIG LEBOWSKI. Love Shakespeare. There, bonafides out of the way.
The concept for this book is really great. And some of the execution in it is absolutely laugh out loud funny. The best parts of the book are seeing the best exchanges from the film translated into Shakespeare's verse. Since language really is the strength of the film it really translates well into the Shakespearean construct. It is similar to a more recent entry into this sort of project, Ian Doescher's transforming of STAR WARS eps 4-6 into Shakespearean plays.
Doescher's pieces are superior pieces of work for a few reasons. First, Doescher's pieces are licensed through LucasFilm, meaning that there was money involved and distribution lines. So there was probably more time to be able to flesh the whole thing out. Bertocci's work is clearly a labor of love. So some of TWO GENTLEMEN's failings are likely it being a victim of circumstance.
But what hurts TWO GENTLEMEN most is that Bertocci chose to set the entire thing in Shakespearean times, instead of keeping the settings the same and simply putting a Shakespeare filter over the film as it is. The reason this hamstrings the book is because certain technologies play key parts in the film, phones, pagers, cars, guns. Even though they refer to a "car" several times in the play, there's no indication that anyone is actually driving a car. Example: Because we lose these technologies, the scene where Dude and Walter throw the ringer has been re-worked. No cell phone means no Walter shouting in the background. No car and guns mean no Walter jumping from the car with a bouncing uzi, one of the funniest scenes in the movie. Now, Walter just throws the ringer and they leave while the "kidnappers" wait in the dark. Gone is Walter's plan of grabbing and beating one of the kidnappers.
Plus, scenes are run together in ways that are a bit jolting for fans of the film. The doctor shows up at Maude Lebowski's place to examine Dude. Walter shows up to go with Dude to drop off the ransom because he intuited something is wrong, taking away the wonderful opportunities for the various phone conversations that Dude and Walter had in the film. Some scenes are gone entirely. The scene where Dude is interviewed by the police and the answering machine kicks in is missing. The scene where Dude gets his car at the impound lot is referenced, but there's no "we got 'em working in shifts!" anywhere to be found. Walter paying tribute to Arthur Digby Sellers is gone (And a good day to you, sir!).
Where Doescher's works really take the Shakespearean experience to a new level is when he applies "asides" to many of the Star Wars characters. From R2 to Vader, they'll all linger after a scene and deliver a great monologue that intuits something that may not have been in the films, but is consistent with the character. In TWO MEN, there's none of that. It's more of just a "direct translation" of the dialogue. Updating is always easier than retrodating. Personally, I think he made the wrong creative choice. Baz Luhrman updaing R&J worked because the technology could be updated easily. But going backwards is far more difficult, and in this instance did a disservice to the work.
Bertocci clearly has a great grasp of Shakespearean language and verse. the iambs and rhymes are all there. The equivalents he chooses for many of the names and objects work well. And his usage of some of Shakespeare's most classic and beloved lines work very well in this context. Personally, I would love to see him re-work it in its modern context using the classic language and adding asides like Doescher does. This is a strong foundation, but there's far more to be mined here. Still worthy to bear the Lebowski name.
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Top reviews from other countries
Doug
I purchased the book based on reviews and was very disappointed in the book
Reviewed in Canada on June 3, 2016
Marcus Horatius
This befalleth when thou firk'st a stranger 'twixt the buttocks
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 20, 2017
