Measure for Measure March 6, 2010

William Shakespeare's dark comedy,'Measure for Measure' presents a society out of balance. Government leaders are helpless or hypocritical, and passions are relegated to the whorehouses and the prisons. When the Duke of Vienna departs on a mysterious trip, he delegates power to Angelo, a man of spotless reputation. Puritanical Angelo decides to clamp down on the city's rampant vice by enforcing an antiquated law punishing fornication with death. He makes an example of young Claudio for impregnating his beloved fiance, and listens to no pleas for mercy. But Angelo's moral fiber is strained to the breaking point when Claudio's beautiful sister Isabella, about to take holy vows, arrives to plead for his life and prompts stirrings in Angelo that confuse and rattle him. Corrupt power confronts ruthless justice, the letter of the law obscures the quality of mercy, and the noblest of spirits must reflect on the basest of appetites in this sly, bawdy, provocative and extraordinarily modern play.