AN AMERICAN FAMILY SHAKESPEARE ENTERTAINMENT, VOL. 1

Whenever a publisher adds yet another Shakespeare recording to the already enormous catalog, it's worth asking whether it offers anything fresh. This audiobook, the first of two volumes, does not. It starts with Charles and Mary Lamb's early-nineteenth-century text and adds a number of American actors who largely sound awkward reading Shakespeare. Robert Forester's western New York accent, for example, just doesn't suit THE TAMING OF THE SHREW, and most of the other tales are just as grating, even in the hands of narrators who are first-rate in other contexts, such as Scott Brick. John Rubenstein's dynamic reading of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM is one of the few bright spots in this otherwise-forgettable collection. D.B. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2009]