these plays—Much Ado about Nothing, included—feature cleverly constructed scenarios, witty dialogue and an exploration of the sexes.
Like many movies do today, a comedy of manners is often written to include stock characters. A formula as such, just as one experiences when they watch a formulaic horror feature film—you know, a movie that has one or two hero types, either a guy or girl (or both) that will actually survive through the end of the movie, or the one character who seems to have inside knowledge about what’s going on and how to stop it.
Within a comedy of manners play there’s often five stock character types that the viewer expects to see: the schemer, the fool, the hypocrite, the jealous husband and the interfering parents. In