More Details On Joss Whedon’s Secret Shakespeare Project

Yesterday, Avengers director Joss Whedon revealed that instead of going on vacation with his wife last month he was actually shooting a film at his home.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Whedon had been wanting to make the film, an adaption of Shakespeare‘s Much Ado About Nothing, for years.

Whedon alums make up the central cast, though that’s no surprise. Some of the cast actually did readings of the play in Whedon’s home a few years ago. Alexis Denisof (Buffy, Angel) and Amy Acker (Angel, Dollhouse) star as Benedick and Beatrice, literature’s sharpest couple, while the very handsome Sean Maher (Firefly) plays the villainous Don John. Fan-favorite Nathan Fillion also stars.

“When I started pouring over it, I got a very strong sense of how a little bit dark and twisted it is. The movie’s in black-and-white partially because it’s kind of a noir comedy. I realized that everybody in it behaves like such a dolt — an articulate dolt, but a dolt. I fixated on this notion that our ideas of romantic love are created for us by the society around us, and then escape from that is grown-up love, is marriage, is mature love, to escape the ideals of love that we’re supposed to follow. So that clicked for me when I realized, oh, I get why it matters everybody goes through the weird machinations we go through,” Whedon told Entertainment Weekly.

I’ve been a Joss Whedon mega-fan since I first saw Buffy the Vampire Slayer kick some serious ass so I cannot even describe how excited I am to see this film. I’m highly anticipating the perfect blend of Shakespeare and Whedon’s legendary wit.

Entertainment Weekly got their hands on a few stills, which you can check out below. Make sure you let us know what you think in the comments.