ABSTRACT
In a letter to Ellen Terry on 3 June 1903 George Bernard Shaw wrote, 'I went to see Much Adoodle-do yesterday evening. It is a shocking bad play'. 1 He went on to express his belief that the play can only be saved by Dogberry 'picking it up at the end' but, 'Dogberry cannot pick it up unless he has his scene before the wedding'.2 In an later review (11 February 1905) of another production Shaw developed his concern about the way in which Shakespeare's play is too often adapted, shaped and mutilated. Beerbohm Tree had
erased Verges from the book of life ... The really exasperating stupidity of cutting out the scene of the visit of Dogberry and Verges has been made traditional on the London stage ever since Sir Henry Irving . . . ingeniously discovered that means of reducing Dogberry to a minor part. 3
Shaw's sharp ear was always attentive to Shakespeare's language and his reviews frequently comment upon the nature of the performed text. Crucially he was commenting upon what he judged to be inappropriate cutting which denies the play's structure and cripples its theatrical shape.
