Larissa+Pahomov

Conquest Comes in All Shapes, Sizes and Genders
Comparing "Taming of the Shrew" to "My Best Friend's Wedding"

As "The Taming of the Shrew" proves, the idea of romance as conquest has been around for centuries. In "Shrew," the wild and demanding Petruchio swears he will have Katherine as his wife, no matter the cost. In the 1997 movie "My Best Friend's Wedding," the main character sets out to do the same--only this time it's a woman seeking to win her close friend, who is about to marry someone else.

Though Petruchio and Julianne share some emotions and motivations in their stories, their situations--and the tactics they use--are quite different. Petruchio's only roadblock is Katherine's resistance, so he can be unabashedly forward in his attempts to win her, and has the full support of his friends. By contrast, Julianne faces an already-existing romance, so she has to be more covert, and faces criticism from the one friend who knows of her plan.

These two situations make for different kinds of humor, and also show how society's attitudes towards courtship have changed over the centuries. **Women have more power and agency than they once did, but because of this, a match can't be made by brute force. Both parties must be won over by romance.**

=**Quote 1 from play**=

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In this early scene from "My Best Friend's Wedding," Julianne anxiously declares to her friend George that "I'm a busy girl. I've got four days to break up a wedding and steal the bride's fellow." Unlike Petruchio, she remains on edge during the entire film--she is either ranting to George about the next phase in her plan, or nervously putting her deceits into action. This fuels the humor in the movie, but it also reminds the audience that what she's doing is wrong.

=**Quote 2 from Play**=

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Julianne's friend George, however, is not so supportive of her idea.

After her first attempts to break up the wedding fail, George comes to visit her and asks: "Do you really love him? Or is this just about winning?" When she says that she does in fact love him, George gives her a piece of advice that he repeats for the rest of the movie: the only chance she's got is to be honest and tell her friend the truth. Interestingly, George doesn't even believe this will get Julianne what she wants, but he still thinks it's the only worthwhile path.

That Julianne doesn't win her man in the end only reinforces that a modern audience wants to see true love above all else. Petruchio finishes off "Shrew" with a wife, twenty thousand crowns, and a sense of accomplishment. All Julianne has at the end of "My Best Friend's Wedding" is a deeper understanding of love and commitment, but we're left with the feeling that this will help her later in life, even though we don't get to see that. Plus, she's smiling again before the credits roll: she has her gay friend George to spin her around the wedding dance floor as a consolation.