Get Married On Juliet’s Balcony

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7943729.stm Now, see, I think this idea is great.  One of the big tourist attractions in Verona is “Casa Di Giulietta (Juliet’s House)” where everybody’s favorite romantic tragedy (tragic romance?) supposedly took place.  Yes yes, it’s a fictional story and all that, but the local argument is that this was once the home of the Capello family, who might have been the model for the Capulets. Either way, it’s quite the tourist attraction.  Although I’ve never been, my inlaws were – and they brought me back a nice painting of the balcony.  I’m told that there’s a statue of Juliet there as well whose chest has gone all lopsided because it’s good luck to cop a feel – but only the right side.  I didn’t get a painting of that, though.  Oh, well. 🙂 Anyway, on that romantic note.  Apparently you’ll soon be able to book a wedding at the balcony, which I think is just great.  It’s a small balcony, so I’m sure that it’ll be little more than a photo opportunity, but still.  Some people get engaged or married at the Eiffel Tower.  A Shakespeare geek would certainly love the idea of getting married in the middle of Romeo and Juliet.  [Let’s not go all cynical and talk about the tragedy bits, eh?  We know.]

Ripped From Elizabethan Headlines

http://www.executedtoday.com/2009/03/14/1551-alice-arden/ We last wrote about Alice Arden back in 2006, in reference to a possibly-Shakespeare worked called “Arden of Faversham”. The article linked here, in “Executed Today.com” no less, details the murder of Thomas Arden by his wife, Alice, and her lover, Richard Mosby.  Apparently they did him Rasputin-style :  poisoned, strangled with a towel, smash with a 14pound pressing iron, and stabbed 7 or 8 times. Every time I hear “Arden” I can’t help but think they are related to Shakespeare.  Remember that Shakespeare’s mom was Mary Arden. 

I Don’t Know Him, But His Face Rings A Bell

http://www.rose-rosetree.com/blog/2009/03/13/face-reading-shakespeare-villains/ With the new(?) portrait of Shakespeare(??) getting all the buzz this week, it only makes sense for the “face readers” to come out of the woodwork and tell us some things about the man based entirely on the science of judging the book by its cover.  Or, in this case, judging the book by someone else’s interpretation of what the cover looks like.  Know what I’m thinking?  Surely this has been done, but I think that we should take all known or assumed portraits of Shakespeare, throw in a bunch of other folks of the same period, and then use one of the face recognizing software packages (like Google’s Picasa, for instance) to see if it groups all the Shakespeares together. (*) The subject, by the way, is the punch line to an old and rather bad joke.  I thought it appropriate.

Shakespeare In Time : Gielgud as Hamlet

http://bardfilm.blogspot.com/2009/03/gielgud-as-hamlet-in-1944.html I find stuff like this interesting for its place in history.  Anybody my age knows Sir John Gielgud as…well, ancient.  My first memory of him is the butler in Arthur, 1981, when he would have been 77. So it’s a rare treat indeed to find such a clip as Bardfilm has uncovered, showing a 1944 Gielgud performing Hamlet. I’m particularly intrigued by the delivery, a pretty straightforward “Hold skull up and deliver lines” recitation.  I went looking for an example of how the interpretation has become a bit more animated over the years, and surprisingly when I turned to Brannagh I found this, which while perhaps a little heavier on the “acting” and less on the “recitation”, is still the exact same “hold skull up and deliver lines” recitation from 60 years ago.  

Essential Things In Heaven And Earth

http://artofmanliness.com/2009/03/16/the-hard-way/ Linked entirely for the opening quote:
“The essential thing “in heaven and earth” is…that there should be a long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living.”  – Friedrich Nietzche, Beyond Good and Evil Nietzsche not just quoting Hamlet but extending it to make his point?  Love it.  I don’t even know what the article is about, I stopped at the Shakespeare reference. 🙂