I thought of this question while watching a collection of great movie monologues.  I thought, “Shakespeare fans may  not flock to classic literature in general, but they’ve probably got a higher appreciation for the classics than average.” So here’s my question : Not Shakespeare, what’s your favorite “classic”?  Book, or movie.  Or both.  Tis the season so I’ll put up some props for A Christmas Carol – you simply *must* hear Patrick Stewart (a Shakespeare Geek fav in his own right!) perform his one-man show.  Brilliance.  I love the way Dickens manages to create characters so vivid that the story has been retold over and over and over again, in every flavor from the Muppets to Mr. Magoo.  Another shout out to Dickens for A Tale Of Two Cities, one of my favorite “epic novels” in this category.  It certainly screams “high school English”, and I’m not sure that I’d ever sit down and reread it for pleasure, but it might be one of the great “martyr hero” stories of all time.  It is a far far better thing that I do, than I have ever done.  Gives Shakespeare a run for his money.   Lastly, getting back to what originally triggered this post, comes To Kill a Mockingbird, easily one of the top American novels ever, and surely a contender for best book-to-movie translation ever.  When flipping randomly through the channels late on a Sunday night, I stumbled across this movie and immediately froze in my tracks, transfixed.  20+ years out of high school and I sat and explained to my wife just how good this story was, and the whole significance of the “Hi Boo!” scene that we’d just spotted.  Ok, that’s my list.  Who else?

Hi everybody, It seems like I’ve been neglecting the blog a bit lately, and for that I apologize.  The day job got busy, and then my whole went and got sick (although technically I was the only one to test positive for flu) simultaneously, taking us out of action for over a week.  Between getting back ahead of the game, and the upcoming holidays, I’m finding very little time to get things posted. I do have some stuff, most notably a book review (Actors Talk About Shakespeare) and a movie review (Teller’s Macbeth).  I just have to finish both so I can get them posted! Sorry I haven’t been around.  I hope to get back on track soon.   Duane

Everybody knows it’s the anniversary of Sesame Street this week, and I’d be late to the game if I broke out a bunch of “Shakespeare on Sesame Street” moments. Mostly since we’ve been down those roads before. Instead I’ll link to this story by Stefanie C. Peters (my Twitter pal) about the actual timeline of Shakespeare references across the lifetime of the muppets.  We all know about Patrick Stewart doing the B thing, and Cookie’s Monsterpiece Theatre bits.  But what about *before* that?  How about Rowlf the Dog on the Jimmy Dean show?  Shakespeare there, too.  How about before *that*?  I admit, I’ve seen the Rowlf stuff but anything before that was new to me. Worth the read just for the description of hypothetical(??) musical “Kermit, Prince of Denmark.” Anybody that knows me and this blog at all knows I would so be standing in line for that, with three little geeklets in tow.

www.quartos.org It’s funny when you say it over and over like that :).  The Folger this week announced their interactive online version to 32 rare, early editions of Hamlet.  Very cool.  I don’t think they are the first to do this, but I’m intrigued by the idea of an annotations layer.  Looking forward to what sorts of notes people make in the virtual margins, to so speak.

Ok, I’ve only got a couple left (2, to be specific), but I’d like to make sure some Shakespeare geeks get a shot. I’m not going to bother explaining what Google Wave is, because either you saw “invite” in the title and jumped at the chance, or you have no idea. If you’re interested, send me an email telling me how you’d use this new collaboration tool for a Shakespeare-related project.  (Whether you follow through or not is up to you). I’m out of commission with the something strongly resembling the flu right now, but in a couple days I’ll pick some random responses and send out the invites. UPDATE Invites sent!  Enjoy, and invite more Shakespeare geeks! Pay it forward!