I fail to understand why someone who clearly doesn't respect women would write a play about one of history's most impressive women. Cleopatra, in Dryden's rendering, is a simpering, pathetic excuse for a person. Antony isn't much better, and any mention of their mutual affection violates the old writing rule of "show, don't tell."

Octavia, too, falls short of the paragon history tells us she was. She's instead a harridan. No wonder Antony choose to leave her, although why he'd go to such a lackluster Cleopatra remains a mystery.

I loathed this play. Two stars instead of one only because he does take Shakespeare's unwieldy cast of 50+ down to a manageable dozen or so. But maybe Shakespeare had so many characters to give his play scale, a quality Dryden's weak imitation hasn't considered.