Riverside Shakespeare Company within the company, not unlike Shakespeare's company 400 years before. Early in 1979 the company produced "Much Ado About Nothing" directed by Gloria Skurski with original music by Deborah Awner, with Margo Gruber and Gannon McHale, and Timothy Oman, Jim Brewster, Robert Boyle, Ronald Lew Harris, David Florek, Arland Russell, Daniel Tam and Leigh Podgorski, at Manhattan Theatre Club's Stage 73. The production was set in the roaring 20's, as if F. Scott Fitzgerald had imagined the meeting of Beatrice and Benedict at a festive garden party on Cape Cod. The production of "Much Ado About Nothing" was staged as
Much Ado About Nothing (2012 film) just sort of dark". Whedon's idea to adapt the play for the screen originated from having "Shakespeare readings" at his house with several of his friends, years prior. Whedon and his director of photography Jay Hunter took advantage of natural lighting in order to make it feel "very found", noting, "Our lighting package rose in the east and set in the west". Using mirrors, glass and windows to shoot through, he explains, "[It’s] something I’d like to do all the time, but particularly in a movie that’s all about lies, and manipulation and misunderstandings. The more you can warp the