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Shakespeare in Love, directed by John Madden and written by Marc Norman and playwright Tom Stoppard, is a romantic-comedy drama that depicts a lustrous affair between the privileged Viola de Lesseps (Gwyneth Paltrow) and the upcoming commoner playwright William Shakespeare (Joseph Fiennes) which transpires during the fictional development of the play Romeo & Juliet. The set of Shakespeare in Love is a clever conception of London in the 1500's and convincingly reveals to the audience the possible conditions of how Shakespeare may have lived (Fitzsimmons, 2012). The film begins with Shakespeare experiencing 'writers block', his apparent desperation is concealed only when faced by theatre owner's terrorising him for a copy of his proposed new play: 'Romeo & the Pirate's Daughter Ethel'. Once the play begins to take shape, he soon drops the proposed title and begins development of what we now know as Romeo and Juliet and it is within the casting of this play that he meets Viola. Accurate to the time, women were not permitted to act in the theatre, so Viola dresses as a man and auditions for the part of 'Romeo' where she solidifies her identity as 'Thomas Kent' and by virtue, her love of William in secret. Her identity is soon discovered by Will and thus, the illustrious and forbidden affair begins. As their relationship takes shape, as does the play. Many of the actions of Will and Viola are then taken onto the stage to which develop the play before the audience's eyes.
Although the plot in Shakespeare in Love is fictional, the portrayal of 'patriarchal oppression' is accurate. The claim made by Queen Elizabeth (played by Judi Dench) in the film: "I know what it is to be a woman in a man's profession" speaks volumes of the time. By insinuation, it appears that within a patriarchal society the essence of power is non-existent without the presence of masculinity, so much so, that women in Shakespeare's plays had to adopt a 'male facade' to obtain power.