So much depends on the performance. Some of the comedies make great productions, suitably edited and with the right amount of physical comedy.

Right on the page they are nearly all a slog. The tragedies make better reading.

There have been some really good productions of the comedies, e.g. Emma Thompson's Much Ado About Nothing. But often as I have seen some of them over the years, the mistaken identities/gender swapping/etc. all sort of blend together for me past some point. (Case in point, when I looked up my example, I originally typed in As You Like It.) I definitely remember the tragedies as more distinct entities.

Laurence Olivier is a great actor. I've enjoyed several of his films, including his Hamlet adaptation (which he also directed). I have yet to watch Richard III though.

I thought he overacted that role. I feel it requires a much lighter touch than most actors give it.

It was my first encounter with Hamlet so I didn't have another frame of reference to judge the performance.

And I had already watched him in other movies such as Rebecca (I didn't like the movie except for the (some of the) end) so maybe I was used to his acting.

...or maybe my own taste sucks. Most movie historians adore the guy.

Falstaff. Ah Falstaff.

I would recommend Orson Welles "Chimes at Midnight" as a wonderful setting of Henry IV, Parts 1 & 2.

He’s just wrong about Titus Andronicus. It’s far and away the worst.

I mean it has this very modern sounding dialogue:

CHIRON

Thou hast undone our mother.

AARON

Villain, I have done thy mother.

Two Gentlemen of Verona is pretty cringe.

Somehow, Julie Taymor managed to make a masterpiece out of Titus. She embraces the fact that it's a horror story, and treats that horror in a fashion akin to Tarantino: awful and beautiful.

I would have sworn it was impossible, but she did it. And having done it, I don't feel like it ever needs to be done again.

That said, I've seen moderately successful attempts at other horror-inspired approaches: grand guignol, horror fun-house, even "Titus! The Musical".

Agreed, the comedies are the least enjoyable. Like today, much of the comedy needs a context and without it, it doesn't hit as hard.

Yeah, I also liked the idea but apparently have pretty different tastes. I was pretty surprised to see Pericles and Othello almost next to each other in the rankings. Pericles is... not at all good. There's this whole build-up of dramatic tension and then in a sudden, bizarre deus ex machina moment, the plot takes a hard turn when pirates appear out of nowhere and kidnap one of the main characters for no clear reason. One production I saw at least try to lampshade the absurdity by giving the pirates eyepatches and parrots, which almost made it tolerable.

Also, maybe unpopular, but I don't love the Branagh Hamlet. It feels pretty overwrought to me, and I like Helena Bonham Carter's Ophelia better than Kate Winslet's.

I guess the immortal Bard himself was on tenderhooks to find out this overly subjective ranking of his work.

The author left out one final work, the most excellent comedie "Two Gentlemen of Lewbowski".

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Two-Gentlemen-Lebowski-Excellent-Tr...

Sorry, this is unnecessarily pedantic, but as it's a discussion on literature I couldn't help mentioning that it's 'tenterhooks' not 'tenderhooks'

If we're going to start discussing fan fiction, we should mention the best:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ROSENCRANTZ-GUILDENSTERN-ARE-DEAD-S...