This is a play that I grew up watching with my dad. We loved the Kenneth Branagh adaptation (bare butts at the start and all) and I watched it many times with him. My dad's love of Shakespeare was definitely a big reason that I love it so much, and it has been literature we've bonded over. Since becoming an English teacher, this is my favorite play to teach, and I love sharing it, with its complicated but funny plot, with my students over the years, who have reported liking it more than they thought they would. Much Ado About Nothing begins on the heels of some sort of short war. The prince, Don Pedro, and his brother, Don John, have just returned from fighting each other. In a gracious move, Pedro has forgiven his brother, and has taken him back into his company. It is from this conflict that the armies arrive in Messina to stay at the house of the governor, Leonato. As the soldiers stay in Leonato's house, Claudio, Pedro's right hand man, falls in love with Leonato...