The Twelfth Night and She’s the Man

Andy Fickman, director of She’s the Man, an adaptation of the Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare, recreated the play using many similarities as well as differences. Fickman turned the play into a modern version of a different central theme, but he used the same characters and ideas performing the same, yet different tasks. Some differences only occur in the play and not in the movie, for example, in the play there was a shipwreck, and that was when Viola and Sebastian were initially separated. Unlike in She’s the Man, where Sebastian and Viola separated voluntarily as Sebastian was “running away” to preform with his band in London. Just as Sebastian was leaving, he asked Viola to cover for him as he was supposed to start at a new school in a few days. Instead of covering for him, Viola decided to “become” Sebastian to go to his new school to play on the soccer team, as her team was just cut from her school. So in She’s the Man, Viola becomes Sebastian to play on a soccer team, and in Twelfth Night, Viola becomes Cesario, instead of Sebastian. In the play, Viola becomes Cesario to become a boy servant for both protection and financial help, and also to give her additional time to figure things out in the new world she has wrecked onto.

Also, to the siblings separating, in the Twelfth Night, both Viola and Sebastian think each other is dead, but in She’s the Man Violet and Sebastian know each other is alive, but Sebastian does not know that Viola has taken his place at the school discussed as him.

As there are things only in Twelfth Night, there are also aspects in She’s the Man that is not in the original play. The central theme of the movie is soccer; this makes the film/play more modern and gives Viola a reason to turn into her brother Sebastian. Also, in the movie, Viola has a boyfriend who turns into an ex-boyfriend. Viola uses the theme soccer to get back at her boyfriend, who also plays soccer, and to show him that she is better than most of the boys on his soccer team. Viola does not have a boyfriend in the play; I think Andy Fickman added a boyfriend to Violas life in the movie because it gives her more of a reason to turn into her brother and play with him in a rivalry soccer game. Also, I think with Viola having a boyfriend it makes the play more modern and more relatable to the present day teen.

With things being different, there are also things that are the same in both the play and the movie. In both, there is a present “love triangle” between Olivia, Viola, and Duke. This part of the play seems very much the same in both the play and movie; it is one of the main aspects, so I think it was a good move on Fickman’s side to keep this in She’s the Man. Also, all the characters that are present in Twelfth Night are present in She’s the Man, they may have different roles, but they are present. For example, Malvolio is Olivia’s steward in the play, but in the movie, Malvolio is the name of Malcolm’s tarantula.

Further, as my last similarity, in both Twelfth Night and She’s the Man, the quote “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them” is stated in both the play and the movie. In the play, Malvolio says this when he is reading the letter that is supposedly from Olivia, but we know some of the men are playing a joke on him. In She’s the Man, Duke uses this quote, and he uses this quote as an example of a view of his teammates. He is restating that it is something their coach says before every game, again relating the movie to soccer.