10 Things I Hate About You is a cult classic and a beloved movie that contains all the essential elements of a romantic comedy. Like many others, I have watched this movie numerous times yet, it was only three years ago that I learned it was a modern adaptation of a Shakespeare play. Other classic William Shakespeare plays have been re-told and adapted to better fit a modern and contemporary cultural setting, such as Romeo and Juliet. Released in 1999, 10 Things I Hate About You is a retelling of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew and uses the same plot, character qualities, and comedic constructs to create a film catered to the desires of a contemporary teenage audience. The Taming aspires to answer “What happens when a woman fails to conform to socially constituted roles for feminine identity?” (Pittman 145) and other questions regarding gender roles and how femininity is defined. In addition to being a commercially successful film, 10 Things I Hate About You succeeded in updating the 400-year-old The Taming of the Shrew’s portrayal of gender and feminism. Furthermore, the film remixes and adapts Shakespeare’s story as it illustrates an important cultural shift from second-wave feminism to third-wave feminism which took place during the 1990s.
The film immediately introduces Shakespeare’s character Katherina, called Kat in the film, as a shrew, an ill-tempered and argumentative woman. In 10 Things I Hate About You, Kat is portrayed “as an outspoken, antagonistic young woman out of step with her popularity-conscious peers” (Friedman 51). Kat’s outspoken nature alienates her from her peers and sister, they view her as a “heinous bitch”, which is an updated way of calling her a shrew (Friedman 51). This is just one of several instances where it is extremely apparent that the film remixes The Taming. In this example, Kat’s rejection of cultural norms, more specifically her rejection of teenagers’ obsession with their popularity and social and romantic relationships is the retold version of Katherina isolating herself from her potential suitors. Michael Friedman describes how “Shakespeare’s play characterizes the shrew as a female who expresses her resistance to male dominance with her scolding tongue, which alienates potential suitors. 10 Things I Hate About You refigures this verbally aggressive woman as a modern feminist” (Friedman 46). Throughout the film, numerous moments exemplify Kat as verbally aggressive particularly when she expresses her disdain for the patriarchal order. One of those moments is when Kat, without explicitly saying so, asserts herself as a feminist when questioning and criticizing why she and her classmates must read Ernest Hemingway rather than Sylvia Plath or Charlotte Brontë (Bertucci 418). Kat’s frank attitude, willingness to speak her mind, and nonconformist behavior are the essential characteristics of a shrew and are the reason behind her being shunned by many of her peers. Kat’s ostracism by her classmates is the ultimate act of social rejection, which is analogous to Katherina being unwanted by suitors and being seen as a failure of a woman to society.
In 10 Things I Hate About You Kat is not the only character who shifts towards third-wave feminism, her sister Bianca, because of their close sisterly bond, adopts Kat’s feminist attitude which has begun to influence her. Bertucci argues that “major screen adaptations of Shrew show a sisterly bond between Kat and Bianca that, even if strained at times, helps create a space for feminist resistance”(Bertucci 414). Despite the sometimes-tense relationship between the sisters, Kat and Bianca do have moments of connection throughout the film, such as when Kat explains why she so strongly dislikes a boy named Joey and why she thinks dating is pointless. After this conversation, Bianca is shown adopting a similar disposition to Joey as her sister and becoming angry at him for how he treats women – a moment of feminist resistance. Furthermore, Bianca having been deeply affected by this conversation with her sister exacts her own revenge against Joey: “Like Kat at the beginning of the movie, Bianca has become “castrating,” taking her revenge upon the genitals of her male oppressor” (Friedman 61). In this scene, Bianca repeatedly hits and kicks Joey, each time emphasizing “who the blow is for” (Bertucci 422). The sisterly bond transcends beyond empathizing for her sister, Bianca exacts revenge on the person who wronged both her sister and her. 10 Things I Hate About You “show[s] moments of female dissent and solidarity that register the plays complexity more fully than has often been recognized” (Bertucci 414). Mutual support of other women is one of the key tenets of feminism, by having scenes that convey the sense of unity created by sisterhood and feminism the film expands upon the content of The Taming.
One of the main reasons this film is successful in updating The Taming of the Shrew is due to the portrayal of feminism as a nuanced entity that manifests differently in each individual. By the end of the film, the audience has witnessed the evolution of Kat from a “second-wave feminist a follower of the old-school feminism of the 1970s, to a third-wave feminist, one who embraces … contradictions and personal empowerment.” The most apparent example of this evolution is Kat’s change in attitude towards prom. In the film’s opening moments, Kat is seen tearing down a poster for the prom much to the dismay of the girl who is putting up the posters. Near the end of the film, Kat has transformed, she eagerly rushes out of her house to the prom, where she is shown dancing and having fun., “Thus, the “taming” of the shrew in 10 Things I Hate About You involves, not an enforced submission to male authority, but a rounding off of the sharp edges that makes the stereotyped version of the second-wave feminist an anti-social force within the popularity-obsessed world of teen comedy” (Friedman 46-47). Kat’s realization that she can enjoy and participate in activities and events that she had previously deemed as anti-feminist is the “rounding” of her sharp edges, and her transition to embracing third-wave feminism. The film expresses that Kat can still believe in feminist ideals while also partaking in activities that conform to social norms, “In such a manner, the feminist as shrew is “tamed” of her anti-social ways by her Petruchio without losing her feminist identity” (Friedman 59). Kat breaks free of the binary option of having to either be a feminist or not, throughout the film she navigates and negotiates her understanding of feminism. Kat does exactly this when she attends the prom and starts dating Patrick Verona (the figure of Petruchio), all while staying true to herself and her sense of feminism. She exemplifies a foundational principle of third-wave feminism: that women should be allowed to define their version of feminism and to choose what activities and beliefs are true to their version of feminism. Scenes that welcome and accept third-wave feminism and determining self-identity are noticeably not present in The Taming. By including these changes in the film, The Taming is successfully remixed, updated, and adapted to serve a modern audience.
A preponderance of academic criticism states that 10 Things I Hate About You is an unsuccessful and shameful remix of The Taming of the Shrew for a variety of reasons. Focusing on how feminism and gender roles are represented in the film, there is a consensus that those topics are poorly represented. Furthermore, it is argued that the film itself is harmful to society as it “glosses over the complex gender and power dynamics that the rougher edges of Shakespeare’s drama leave exposed (Pittman 145). Although this argument has merit, it is only applicable when one understands gender roles and feminism as binary concepts, where you either conform to gender roles and abandon feminism or reject gender roles and fully embrace feminism. In truth, feminism is more than a binary construct, more flexible than an all or nothing belief system. Pittman laments this argument in her closing statement “The film manipulates its audience to embrace longstanding stereotypes of gender …. Ultimately, by treating the gender question and the broader question of identity in ways that promote laughter and discourage thoughtful questions, the film fails to achieve the status of its Renaissance source” (Pittman 150). While it is true that the film utilizes comedic relief, one could argue that the inclusion of those comedic moments is a result of the film being created to serve a teenage audience and for commercial success rather than trying to promote harmful stereotypes of feminism. By including comedic relief, the film created the opportunity to more widely share a story that is centered around serious themes. Across streaming services there is access to an enormous number of films, within that vast collection there are numerous films that are adaptions of plays, musicals, and books and even more that are remakes of a film. It is difficult to find a film that successfully remixes and updates a piece of media, yet 10 Things I Hate About You does just that. 10 Things I Hate About You expands on the themes and questions present in William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. The film successfully modernizes the 16th century play and its portrayal of feminism and gender roles to tell the powerful journey of Kat defining her version of feminism. Feminism and gender roles have long been poorly represented in media, often exacerbating stereotypes of feminist people such as the “feminazi”. However, it is extremely important to accurately and positively portray feminism in film to be a driving force of positive change. If films continue to be negligent with the portrayal of feminism, it will only continue to compound a negative outlook on the feminist movement and women. In the case of remixing and updating older stories, directors and writers must be mindful of how gender roles and feminism were portrayed in the original work and how they plan to retell the story without poorly representing or entirely misrepresenting those themes.