Month: April 2016

There is Always A Performance of Shakespeare Under Way

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I love a good Shakespeare By The Numbers. Everybody wants to talk about which play is longest and shortest and who has the most lines and which are the juiciest roles for women … but there’s always a gem hiding in there somewhere.

For example, did any of us appreciate that for the last fifty or so years, there’s been an average of 410 productions of Shakespeare per year?  In theory that would literally mean that every day of the year you could find some Shakespeare (given a fast enough airplane, I suppose :)) Makes me think I should see more plays!

My Kids Have Never Read The Plays. Surprised?

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As my oldest daughter starts “officially” learning Romeo and Juliet this month at school, it’s been a fascinating adventure in seeing just how prepared she is. We own a version with gnomes, and a version with seals. Whenever the Leo DiCaprio version is on tv I tend to put it on and proclaim, “This is the best part!” and let the kids watch until my wife comes in, sees how violent it is, and suggests that it’s maybe not appropriate. I’ve got graphic novels and pop-up Globe Theatres and finger puppets and action figures and if you’ve been a long time reader of the blog you know that my kids have grown up, by design, surrounded by Shakespeare.

All she needs do now is actually open up the text and read the thing, because she’s never done that. Also, by design.

I am a huge, huge proponent of reading the plays.  Every time the subject comes up and people rush to the “The plays were meant to be performed, not read!” side of the room I stand squarely on the opposite side to defend the value of the text.  You can see a dozen or a hundred performances of Romeo and Juliet and all you’ll ever have at the end of the day is someone else’s interpretation. But don’t get me started.

I’m aware that the text can be intimidating.  It’s easy to say “The Capulets and Montagues hate each other, and the play opens with a big fight scene.”  Then you turn the page and see

SAMPSON 

Gregory, o’ my word, we’ll not carry coals.

GREGORY 

No, for then we should be colliers.

SAMPSON 

I mean, an we be in choler, we’ll draw.

GREGORY 

Ay, while you live, draw your neck out o’ the collar.

SAMPSON 

I strike quickly, being moved.

GREGORY 

But thou art not quickly moved to strike.

And if you’re a typical middle school student you’re going to be lost already.  As was my daughter. In preparation I’d given her the Spark Notes version of the play, because it’s the kind of thing I happen to have lying around the house.  I chose that one because it would have glossary information right there on the page. But she was already doing that thing I worry about, where every individual word became a hunt through the glossary.  Trees, forest.  The big picture is quickly lost.

My theory has always been that if you learn everything else about the play except the text, that the text will come easily. I think that perhaps I’ve been mistaken.  I have expected it to come easily because it comes easily to me.  I no longer remember what it’s like to see the text for the first time. It’s impossible to get “The play opens with a fight” from the clip above.  Sure, eventually you get to “I will bite my thumb at them, which is a disgrace to them that bear it.”  You can start to figure out what’s going on by then – but that’s a dozen or so lines in.  How do you tell a student “Skip that part and get to the good stuff?” How do they know which parts to fast forward?

To be continued …

THAT’S What I’m TALKING About, Lego!

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I have Brick Shakespeare in my collection, but I guess I’m not really sure what I expected.  Somebody tells you about a book of Lego Shakespeare and you think … what?  About the toys themselves? About a game, or a video?  It’s none of those things.

But this is.

For Shakespeare Day, Lego went ahead and actually animated some of the more famous scenes from Shakespeare:

I would watch Lego Shakespeare all day.  Make full versions of this and play it for the kids in school. More more more.

I’m Always for More Shakespeare, but … Horror Shakespeare?

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There’s lots of Shakespeare coming to television it seems. I’ve written in the past that there’s no less than three separate Romeo and Juliet adaptations in the works.

But what shall we make of Lifetime Channel’s A Midsummer’s Nightmare? I tagged it thinking that it’d be some zany spin on the mistaken identities and love potions, you know, the usual stuff.

Nah. Looks like a direct competitor to Grimm or Once Upon A Time in that it’s going to be “horror” versions of Shakespeare plays, instead of fairy tales:

“A Midsummer’s Nightmare,” from A+E Studios, is described as an adaptation of Shakespeare plays that are turned into contemporary horror mysteries. Each season would take on a different play, starting with “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Screenwriter Anthony Jaswinski is adapting “Midsummer” as a story that finds two young lovers on a getaway in the woods who wind up in a struggle to survive as friends arrive to lure them home.

This sound interesting to anybody? I suppose if you told me they’re going to work in the original text I might be curious, but otherwise it sounds like it’s got the potential to have about as much Shakespeare as the Lion King. I don’t think I’ll be setting my DVR.

Happy 400th Shakespeare Day!

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Is it that time again?  Why didn’t anybody tell me?

🙂

I was sorely tempted this year to practice restraint and just let Shakespeare Day come and go, and let the rest of the world climb on the bandwagon for the day. Then I could wait them all to get off tomorrow and I could get back on and enjoy the elbow room.

But I can’t do that, who am I kidding? Shakespeare Day is on a weekend this year, and I always hate that because I like having that live connection to you all, playing hashtag games and retweeting each other and basically throwing one big Shakespeare party.  Up until a couple of days ago I really didn’t know what I was going to do.

Then inspiration hit me, as it often does.  I started writing.  I started looking for ideas, and I found them, everywhere. Each night this week after my kids have gone to bed I stay up for another hour or two (or more) knocking out post after post until I’d queued up dozens of them.  Sure, some of them are going for quantity more than quality, I won’t deny that.  But I think there’s some gems coming up.  I hope you all like the final product.

With that, I’m going to go ahead and cut and paste something from past years because I think I said it the right way once and I don’t want to pretend to keep plagiarizing myself:

I like tradition. It’s a quote that comes from Ben Jonson, to the memory of his (and our) beloved. I’ve been looking forward to posting it here for days. It’s a simple line from a larger work, but I don’t know, to me it feels like more. It’s more of an incantation, a plea for the Master to return to us if just for a single day. I say it over and over again in my mind, and I imagine myself as Prospero on his island, opening one particular grave, waking one particular sleeper and letting him forth, by my most humble art. Thank you, Shakespeare, and Happy Birthday.


Here we go, and I’ll see you on the other side. I therefore will begin.

Soul of the age!
The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage!
My Shakespeare, RISE!