A Short Summary of The Tempest and Tempest by Chelsea Benson

Alonzo, Ferdinand, Antonio, Gonzalo, Stephano, and Trinculo are sailing back from a wedding when a violent storm strikes. The royal party is thrown overboard and they wash up on a remote island ruled by Prospero, the brother of Antonio, who lives there with no one else except for his daughter, Miranda, and his slave Caliban. About twelve years earlier, Prospero used to be the Duke of Milan, but his brother, Antonio, and the King, Alonzo, conspired against him to take his title from him and banish him to the island. Capable of using magic, Prospero summoned the tempest to bring the ships passengers to the island so that he could have his revenge.

First, Ferdinand meets Miranda, with whom he falls deeply in love. Then Sebastian and Antonio hatch a plot to murder the king so that Sebastian could take the throne. Third, Stephano and Trinculo discover Caliban. The slave convinces the two of them to help him murder Prospero, but Ariel prevents them from doing it by distracting them with song.

At the end of the play, Prospero gathers them all in front of him and tells them why they were brought to the island. He verbally reprimands them, and then turns around and instantly forgives them. Finally, they are all sent back home and Prospero sets Ariel free. The end.

The movie Tempest follows a very similar plot. Phillip Dimitrius is a successful business man, but when his mid-life crisis hits and his wife begins cheating on him with his boss, he decides it's time to leave it all behind for the remote and peaceful islands of Greece with his daughter, Miranda, and new girlfriend, Aretha. After a year of toiling on the primitive island, the girls are ready to pack up and return to civilization, but Phillip insists that staying is the best thing for all of them.

One day, Kalibanos, a primitive co-inhabitant of the island, spots a boat approaching the island. On further inspection, Phillip discovers that his ex-wife, boss, and many of his co-workers were on the boat. A storm shipwrecks them, so he and Aretha have to save them from drowning. While Phillip is attempting to come to grips with his past, his daughter has found her first romance with the boss’s son, Freddy. Eventually, Phillip reaches forgiveness and they all leave the island and part ways.

Forgiveness is an important theme in both the play and the movie. Prospero and Phillip both were holding grudges against the people who did them wrong. The difference is that Prospero admitted that it was revenge and Phillip pretended that he didn't care about what had happened. He tells Antonia, his cheating wife, that he hasn't given her a lot of thought, but judging from his behavior on the island and his celibacy we can assume that it had more of an impact on him than he is admitting. Both Prospero and Phillip forgive everyone in the end, but first each does their best to make the offending parties feels as guilty as he can make them feel. Considering Phillip did not have as much control of the situation as Prospero did, it is understandable that he did not evoke as much guilt as the magician, but in the end both of them reached the same sense of peace. In order for them to have reached this peaceful state, they had to forgive and let go of their grudges.