Branagh became interested in the play during his 1984 season with the Royal Shakespeare Company, when he had played the King of Navarre. From that period, he was familiar with Harley Granville-Barker's famous essay arguing that "Love's Labour's Lost" could be treated as highly stylised, with the dialogue and action treated with an almost musical sense of rhythm. Branagh took this insight a step further and turned the play into a musical, going much further in his adaptation of the play than he had ever done in his Shakespeare films, and risking the alienation of both audiences and serious critics. This decision also allowed him to revisit the Hollywood film musicals he had loved in his youth.