Ok, this Shortlist link tells us about upcoming Shakespeare movies to ‘get excited about’ in 2014. At first I was because I didn’t realize there were 4.  But let’s look more closely.

1) Cymbeline

Ok, we’ve talked about this enough already. I think “cautiously hopeful” would be the best we can say, especially after the trailer came out.  You know, the one with the flamethrowers?

2) Macbeth

This one should be good, although maybe I’m just out of the loop that I don’t recognize any of the names they’re dropping.  Michael Fassbender?  Marion Cotillard (who we’ve previously discussed)?  Fine.  But then they’re all “Ooo! It’s being directed by the guy that did Snowtown!” and I’m all, “What the heck is Snowtown?”

What I think is really funny is that they’re *still* saying “…who replaced Natalie Portman.” We first learned that back in August 2013. I think that lends evidence to my theory that name recognition is everything.  Even though she’s not in it, they still want the buzz that her name generates.  (Trivia – Natalie Portman auditioned for Juliet in Baz Luhrman’s movie but didn’t get it because she was way too small compared to DiCaprio and it looked too pedophilish.)

3) Enemy of Man


I’ll just leave this here, from the summary:  “stripping back the dialogue and cranking up the action.”  Yeah, because that’s why we go see Shakespeare. For the action.  Maybe they could tackle Hemingway next?   (“Dude, did you see that guy just gut that other guy from his stomach all the way up to his face?” / “I know!  That’s some straight up Macbeth action right there!”)

4) Rosaline


I started out optimistic about this one when I first heard about it back in 2011, pondering whether it could be another Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Then I got a look at the source material, which proudly describes itself thusly:

“Rosie knows that she and Rob are destined to be together. They are best friends, next door neighbors, and the soon-to-be cutest couple in their senior class. Rosie has been waiting for years for Rob to kiss her–and when he finally does, it’s perfect. But just before their relationship becomes completely official, Rosie’s cousin Juliet moves back into town. Juliet, who used to be Rosie’s best friend. Juliet, who now inexplicably hates her. Juliet, who is gorgeous, vindictive, and a little bit crazy…and who has set her sights on Rob. He doesn’t even stand a chance. 

Rosie is devastated over losing Rob to Juliet. This is not how the story was supposed to go. And when rumors start swirling about Juliet’s instability, her neediness, and her threats of suicide, Rosie starts to fear not only for Rob’s heart, but also for his life. Because Shakespeare may have gotten the story wrong, but we all still know how it ends.”

The scariest thing about this project is that it really makes you say “Who the f%& is deciding what movies get made these days?”

My favorite part of the summary, I think, is that it’s going to be in “modern language.”  Because, well, you know, Rosaline doesn’t actually HAVE ANY LINES IN SHAKESPEARE’S PLAY!  At least the villains making this one didn’t go all Julian Fellowes and just start adding in random crap that sounds like Shakespeare to them.

So maybe I’m “excited” for just the Macbeth?  Maybe the Cymbeline.  Technically it sounds like two of them aren’t even Shakespeare. I’d like to hear more about Enemy of Man and just how much original text it uses.

[Spotted in Reddit this morning on the “Boy Meets World” forum because I track all things Shakespeare.]

Was there a single television sitcom that involved high school kids that didn’t do a Shakespeare episode? The Brady Bunch, Cosby, Head of the Class, Welcome Back Kotter and those are just the ones I specifically remember.  Even Sanford and Son did one with their all adult cast.

Boy Meets World was just a little after my time, starting in 1993 when I was already out of college. So I think I missed this episode they did on Much Ado About Nothing:

[Video removed because it was defaulting to autoplay and driving me crazy!]

[Link here in case the embedding causes trouble, I’m not familiar with the particular service on which I found this clip.]

I always appreciate when a show branched out and did something other than what we’ll call the “high school staples.”  It’s almost always Romeo & Juliet or Hamlet for easy name recognition.  Or, if you go for the “character has Shakespeare homework” storyline you’d often get Julius Caesar or Macbeth (thank you Dr. Cosby!)

On that note, here’s a clip of Boy Meets World doing Hamlet, because I think the accent is funny.

While the most hardcore of Shakespeare geeks debates the merits of another Ethan Hawke version of Shakespeare (and whether the flame throwers were a good idea), I thought it might be a good opportunity to play catch up with the rest of the world who are scratching their heads and asking, “Cymbeline? Wotzat?” Well, brace yourself. This is not your Mama’s Shakespeare. (Your mother was a high school English teacher, right?)

1) Unless you study these things, you’ve almost certainly never heard of Cymbeline. IMDB shows only 5 filmed productions dating back all the way to 1913 (and counting this yet to be released one). In comparison, I stopped counting Hamlet productions at 30+, and that wasn’t even counting all the variations (Hamlet 2, Zombie Hamlet, and so on). Romeo and Juliet has even more. Many Shakespeare plays have become ingrained in our cultural subconscious to the point where we all recognize various Shakespeare references before we ever sit down to watch the show. You’ve almost certainly seen a balcony scene reference, or Hamlet talking to his skull, or Macbeth’s witches around their cauldron. You’ve almost certainly never seen any Cymbeline.

2) The only quote you’re likely to recognize will also probably make you cry. There’s no “To be or not to be” here, no light through yonder window breaking, no witches chanting around a bubbling cauldron. If you recognize anything that comes out of this play, chances are it is this funeral dirge:

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun,
Nor the furious winter’s rages;
Thou thy worldly task hast done,
Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages;
Golden lads and girls all must,
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

Fear no more the frown o’ the great;
Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke:
Care no more to clothe and eat;
To thee the reed is as the oak:
The sceptre, learning, physic, must
All follow this, and come to dust. 

Fear no more the lightning-flash,
Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone;
Fear not slander, censure rash;
Thou hast finished joy and moan;
All lovers young, all lovers must
Consign to thee, and come to dust. 

No exorciser harm thee!
Nor no witchcraft charm thee!
Ghost unlaid forbear thee!
Nothing ill come near thee!
Quiet consummation have;
And renownéd be thy grave!

3) It’s not a tragedy, or a comedy, or a history. It’s true that Shakespeare plays had a certain formula you could rely on. Comedies end with a wedding (or, well, the promise of one), and the joke is that tragedies always end with everybody dead. Ok, fine it’s more complicated than that, but you get the idea. Cymbeline breaks all the rules. It’s listed in the First Folio as a tragedy, but hardly anybody dies, and rumor has it that the editors of the Folio may have never actually seen a performance of this one. There’s not really a single central “tragic hero” like you might expect to find. It has a happy ending, but everybody was already married. It’s arguably something of a history, because Cymbeline was a real king who ruled at the same time as another of Shakespeare’s favorites, Julius Caesar. And, like watching a production of Julius Caesar, you’re likely to come away from Cymbeline wondering, “Ok, now, wait, how much of that was actual history and how much did Shakespeare just make up?” In short it’s a little bit of everything, which leads us to …

4) Lazy sitcoms did not invent the “clip show” or “greatest hits,” lazy Elizabethan playwrights did. (Credit to Shakespeare geeks MagpieAndWhale and TheRoaringGirl for those expressions.) Shakespeare had his favorite characters and plot devices, and threw them all into the stew for this one. To borrow from theroaringgirl’s useful summary, “It has star-crossed lovers, missing princes, a manipulative wife, an aging king, a trusty servant, a villainous liar (whose name literally means “little Iago”), a “breeches part,” an idealized pastoral setting, war with Rome, getting lost in wales, a visit from the Gods, a soothsayer, songs, mistaken identity, a death-like sleep, and the most convoluted 5th act reveal ever written.” Orson Welles is credited with the quote, “Now we sit through Shakespeare to recognize the quotations.” If point #2 told us that there’s not going to be many quotations to recognize, the good news is that there’s probably going to be a whole lot of plot you’ll recognize from other plays.

5) Most critics over the centuries have hated it. Samuel Johnson did not want to “waste criticism” on its “unresisting imbecility”. George Bernard shaw called it “stagey trash of the lowest melodramatic order.” Henry James offers, “The thing is a florid fairy-tale, of a construction so loose and unpropped that it can scarce be said to stand upright at all.” I bet Ethan Hawke and friends can’t wait for the latest crop of reviews to come out! (Credit to blog Ten Pages or More for these and more similar quotes.) None of this stops them from calling it “Shakespeare’s undiscovered masterpiece” in the trailer however.

6) It’s a pastoral comedy with a happy ending, done in the style of a flamethrower-wielding motorcycle gang. You did watch the trailer, right? I’m not making that up. As someone else noted, it’s like doing Midsummer Night’s Dream or As You Like It with a motorcycle gang. And flamethrowers.

There’s your lesson in Cymbeline for the day. So – if you weren’t already planning to go see it (because hey, Shakespeare movie!), did I convince you?

P.S. – What do you think of the new font?  Too big?  I’m trying it out.

Thanks to my wife for pointing this commercial out when I missed it!  Google tells us that the Nexus 7
is as good at reading the classics as it is at reading the best sellers, and uses Romeo and Juliet to prove it:

What’s unusual is that a father appears to be reading Romeo & Juliet to his daughter as a bedtime story.  I’m not sure if I love that or find that bizarre.  Maybe he’s going to skip all the dead people.

Is it wrong that I totally want one now, just because of this commercial? I have no need for it, there’s Kindle Fires all over my house and I develop software for the iPad at work.  But still.  Seems like the kind of advertising I’d want to support :).

UPDATE : Found the whole 30second spot! Apologies, I’d grabbed the first one I saw and didn’t realize that one I posted wasn’t the whole thing.