Measure for Measure

The duke, Vincentio, deputizing Angelo to act in his place, leaves Vienna, purportedly to make a journey but in fact to disguise himself as a friar and return to Vienna to watch events transpire. Moral corruption is general in the city where the duke has been lax in enforcing laws governing such matters. Angelo, eager to make the hand of justice felt, arrests Claudio, a young gentleman who has gotten his beloved Juliet with child. He sentences him to death, although Escalus, an aged advisor of the duke, urges leniency.