For Those Looking For The Light by Victoria Pen, From Emoji to Empathy: Mastering Customer Service in The Digital Era by Susan Williamson, and The Corsico Conspiracy by Raphael Sone

 For Those Looking For The Light by Victoria Pen, From Emoji to Empathy: Mastering Customer Service in The Digital Era by Susan Williamson, and The Corsico Conspiracy by Raphael Sone

For Those Looking For The Light by Victoria Pen

Victoria Pen’s concrete poetry is filled with deep emotions like depression, grief, nostalgia, worry, but also joy, hope and peace. It dares Readers to empathize and feel what the Speakers are feeling and listen to their voices.

The best poems are: 

“My Dear Child”-A poem in which the Speaker mourns the death or separation of their child. The constant repetition of “I wish I could” recognizes the regret of things that the child could have learned and felt with their parents like warmth and protection but now cannot. It is melancholic and sadness not only for what was lost but what can never be.

“Learning What Home Feels Like”-A poem in which the Speaker weighs many negative feelings towards themselves such as “ugly,” “dim witted,” “awkward,” and “embarrassing.” The twist is that the Speaker accepts those words and takes pride in them. They and their strange interests are what makes them who they are. Anyone who has ever felt self-conscious because of their personality traits, occupation, study path, or interests will understand and even relate.

“I Aspire To Be a Writer”- A poem in which the Speaker addresses their desire to be a writer. Even though they have the drive (and assuming this was Pen’s point of view herself, she also has the talent.), they constantly worry about how to get started, their subject, and publishers. This poem addresses the insecurities and anxieties that creative people have when they work on something. They worry about how their message will be projected,  what will people think of it, or if anyone bothers reading it at all. The important thing in creation is not the doubts but being able to move past them and exploring talent and the process to the fullest.

“The Colorful Leaves”-A nature poem in which the Speaker illustrates their love of autumn. It is filled with visual imagery like the orange, purple, and red leaves and the anxious people worried about snow. The poem talks about the season’s transitional function as not yet cold for winter, not hot for summer, and not thought of as beautiful like spring. It is an in between season but this Speaker recognizes autumn’s own individual beauty and uniqueness.

“Drifting At Sea”-An extended metaphor in which the Speaker compares their life to a sea in which they are just drifting along. The Speaker feels like they are not in control of their life and things are just happening around them. Sometimes they feel that they are deliberately being set up to fail and all that they can do is just wait. It is very similar to Depression and how people who have it often feel disconnected from their lives. Even when they try to improve, they are still met with failure, rejection, and disappointment. They want to move but can't so they remain stuck and floating.

“The Four Walls”-A poem in which the Speaker thinks of their room as a sanctuary by protecting them from abuse but also a prison keeping them from facing that fear and getting away. The Speaker’s room protected them from the monsters, implying that they were abused as a child. As an adult, they realized that remaining hidden in their room was only a temporary reprieve. It took leaving and finding a safe place away from the abuse to really find inner peace.

“If I Were a Flower”-An extended metaphor in which The Speaker compares themselves to a flower. The Speaker asks their lover some difficult questions whether they would take away their beauty or rather their view of themselves, would they leave them, if they would forget about them, or would they leave them for other lovers. The Speaker is very insecure and even though is looked upon as someone of great beauty and emotion, is concerned whether their Lover’s feelings will change.

“The Importance of Boundaries”-A poem that addresses boundaries and The Speaker’s changing feelings towards them. They realized that boundaries aren't the signs of a bad person. They are a sign of limits, that someone can only take so much. There is a metaphor of animals that instinctively run from danger. The Speaker compares themselves to those animals who know to run and they do the same.

“Cultural Cash Out”-This poem addresses the problems of the “greedy culture” where people are cruel, ignorant, care only about making money, and step on those under them. Pen’s poems rarely get political but this one does. It addresses health care denial, the work grind, low pay, and the desire but not the opportunity of moving up. It's a cry of anger at a culture that not only doesn't care if people live or die but profit off of their death and destruction.

“Hope Has A Name of Ivory”-This poem addresses the Speaker’s Faith. The poem personifies Hope in human terms that it has beautiful eyes and gentle hands. Hope’s name is compared to ivory and gold, precious bones and metals that hold great value. It almost reads like a Medieval riddle poem in which Pen drops hints about who Hope’s human form is. The answer becomes obvious by the final stanza and shows the depths of the Speaker’s spiritual devotion and faith.

 From Emoji to Empathy: Mastering Customer Service in The Digital Era by Susan Williamson

In this Digital Age of virtual assistance, self checkout, prepayment, shopping online, and AI Interface, the human element is still important particularly in customer service. Like many other professions, customer service is adapting to modern technology. However, the human element is still a factor. Susan Williamson’s book From Emoji to Empathy: Mastering Customer Service in The Digital Era explores how customer service representatives still need to maintain empathy and interpersonal skills to give customers quality assistance.

One of the key factors in good customer service is emotional intelligence. That includes behaving with empathy and implementing active listening. Empathy allows one to understand what the customer needs and using the right probing questions to fully comprehend the situation and provide for their needs. Active listening is the process in which one summarizes, uses open ended questions, and allows the other person to verbalize their situation and make their own decisions. Emotional Intelligence can be used to pick up emotional cues like active observation, feedback analysis, and validating emotions.

It's important for customer service representatives to design memorable customer experiences and that involves identifying customer personas, mapping their journey, implementing feedback mechanisms, and analyzing trends. These procedures help representatives learn about the different types of people that they need to help, how the customer retains information, when the representative needs to probe and when to leave off, and individual personalities and needs of the various customers. In doing this, they can create  individual personalized experiences for different people and build variety into their busy days. Even personal creative touches like extra services, sales for regulars, or representatives remembering details such as regular customer’s names or birthdays add to a personalized experience that makes customers feel unique and individual.

Of course difficult customers are frequent and can make the customer service job extremely stressful. Williams's book peers into conflicts between representatives and customers. The step-by-step approach includes identifying the root cause, using “I” statements to communicate understanding, brainstorming solutions together, implementing and following through, and seeking feedback for continuous improvement. Things like tone variation, body language, mirroring positive customer behavior, cultural sensitivity regarding nonverbal cues, body language, and paying attention to communication barriers goes a long way to improve interaction. 

The book includes various examples of challenging interactions and describes how a representative should handle them. For example aggressive customers raise their voices, demand action, and use harsh language. The representative must stay calm. A simple phrase like “I understand that this is a frustrating situation. Let's work together to fix it” is helpful. Customers want to be heard so that approach makes them feel heard and validated. They can go from being combative to collaborative.

Technology presents its own issues with representatives integrating it in their work but also maintaining the human connection. Williamson suggests that workers can select the right tools, prioritize user friendliness, ensure integration capabilities, and conduct a cost-benefit analyses. Personal connection can be integrated with technology by making tech work with employees and not replace them, making human oversight an easy seamless process, using feedback loops to stay ahead of customer needs, and creating an emotional impact. 

This book tells customer service representatives that the best way to show good customer service is to increase the human connection while integrating and adapting to modern technology.

The Corsico Conspiracy by Raphael Sone 

While William Shakespeare’s name is practically synonymous with Dramatic Theater, English Literature, and The Elizabethan Era, there is still much about his life that remains a complete mystery. Between his marriage and career as a school teacher in Stratford Upon Avon to the time he began to establish himself as a playwright and actor with Lord Chamberlain’s Men, there is a ten year period in which he was undocumented. What happened during those ten years and what was he doing? He was married though frequently separated from his wife, Anne Hathaway and fathered three children, Susannah, Judith, and Hamnet by her (adding to their tempestuous marriage was that Susannah was born a mere five to six months after their marriage suggesting that Anne’s pregnancy was the reason for it.)

However some of his romantic sonnets are addressed to a Dark Lady,which the pale and fair haired Anne was not. Who was this Dark Lady and what was her and William's relationship really like? For that matter, Shakespeare was a country lad with a limited education mostly attributed to reading books and watching plays yet his plays suggest a vast intellect, creative talent, high education, traveling experience. Is it entirely possible that Shakespeare was only given the title of author and someone else actually wrote the plays, but who? Just what was Shakespeare’s relationship with Queen Elizabeth and King James really like? Many of his History plays trace back their family lineage and the lines in the plays often speak of deep respect for the Royals but during a time when religious schisms between the Protestants and Catholics, many of the plays show a more than passing acquaintance with Catholic rituals and beliefs. Also, the plays feature various conspiracies and uprisings against the people in charge. Was Shakespeare vilifying or encouraging the protests?

Historians, scholars and authors have addressed these questions in different ways. One of my favorite series, The Shakespearean Fantasy Series by Sarah A. Hoyt, gives a magical fantastic interpretation to these questions in which Bill encountered fairies on his path to literary immortality. Another possibility is the more realistic but still fascinating Historical Fiction novella, The Corsico Conspiracy by Raphael Sone. 

This interpretation suggests that Shakespeare was a closet Catholic in a predominantly Protestant country and spent time abroad in Southern Europe and Africa where he became involved in political conspiracy, espionage missions where he learned how to be a master of disguise, and had a romance with Amina Safuwa, a former apprentice nun who was the Dark Lady. Oh yes and his plays were written mostly by Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford who did not want authorship credit. Shakespeare as a Lord Chamberlain's performer and later head was given sole credit. Though Shakespeare was no slouch in writing himself as he composed his own sonnets, the epic poems Venus and Adonis and Rape of Lucrece, and some of the plays himself by combining various sources that he read.

This is a brilliant book that drops some tantalizing theories that fill in the blanks of Shakespeare’s life. It fills them by Sone paying tribute to what would later be known about his life and work while dropping some interesting speculation about the parts that needed filling. His time in Rome, Spain, and particularly Corsico become fruitful in his education both as a spy and the head of an acting company.

 His training consists of adopting disguises and being in character through voice, mannerisms, and body language. One of his colleagues, Victoria is an example of a seasoned actor using their skills in the espionage game. She acts as a courier and go between while taking various forms, most notably as a hunchbacked old woman. Another character, Dr. Lopez has a variety of aliases and identities that he goes by including a final one which no doubt inspired many of Shakespeare's Comedy plays that involve mistaken identity and characters disguising themselves. 

Shakespeare is also given literary works to study that would later be instrumental in his theatrical work such as Hollingshead's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (where the sources for his History plays and many of his tragedies like Macbeth began) and Plutarch’s Lives (where works like Julius Caesar and Anthony and Cleopatra originated). We see that many of the survival tools that later made him famous were based on research and observation.

Sone writes Shakespeare as compelling, complex, and contradictory as well the protagonist in a Shakespeare play. He does this by playing various roles to the public, his intimate circle, and to himself. He is a devout Catholic who is appalled by the treatment that his fellow practitioners receive at the hands of Queen Elizabeth, particularly his father who was arrested. He is involved in some pretty daring plots to restore the monarchy to Catholicism. Most notably late in the book he works behind the scenes during the infamous Gunpowder Plot headed by Guy Fawkes but he does not openly defy the monarchy.

 In fact he works so well behind the scenes that while he is under suspicion of conspiratorial ties, he is never arrested for them. There are some pretty tense moments where he comes close such as a performance of Richard II which escalates into a sting operation against conspirators. 

Shakespeare takes a pragmatic approach to rebellion. As the figurehead leader of his company of Players and a central figure in the rebellious espionage ring, he can't afford to give himself away by being openly defiant. If a spy goes down, that's terrible but results in the loss of one person. If he goes down, the whole network and acting company goes down with him.

 He knows when to restrain himself in the presence of superiors especially royalty. In fact, he develops such a good rapport with the Queen that after she is amused by Falstaff, the supporting character from Henry IV and V, she commands that Shakespeare write a Comedy about Falstaff in love resulting in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

As for the other Shakespeare mysteries, they lead to some interesting analysis to Shakespeare’s character. He shows that he is able to write effectively through his poems and sonnets. He also has some creative planning and thinking skills as he comes up with the idea of combining multiple sources to create a new work as he does with Romeo and Juliet combining one story about feuding families with another about separated lovers.

 However, the book suggests that the dubious authorship is born because of mutual insecurities. Shakespeare needs to be seen as the head of Lord Chamberlain's Men but is concerned that his lack of formal education and rural background would be barriers in his writing. De Vere is a nobleman with tremendous talent but is concerned that his acknowledged authorship would be a threat to his status. Plus they are both involved within the Catholic community so they work out a deal. De Vere writes and sends the plays, Shakespeare accepts credit and his troupe produces and performs them. Also their plays contained coded messages and inside references to the Catholic community.

Amina is also compelling even if her appearances shorten as the book continues. She is strong willed and devoted to her causes as much as Shakespeare is but because of her physical appearance in Renaissance England, she doesn't have the luxury of hiding in public the way her lover does. As a result, they spend a large part of the book separated by distance and authority. However, the time that they spend is seen as a meeting between two strong feisty individuals who stand equally to one another. Amina and Shakespeare's relationship in the book results in some intriguing plot twists that add to the speculation that the book conveys.

The Corsico Conspiracy shows that like his characters Shakespeare knew that the world was a stage so he was ready to play many parts.

Weekly Reader Thursday Next Edition: Something Rotten (The Thursday Next Series Vol. IV) by Jasper Fforde; Return to Swindon Brims With Shakespearean Jokes and Comedy

Weekly Reader Thursday Next Edition: Something Rotten (The Thursday Next Series Vol. IV) by Jasper Fforde; Average Return to Swindon Brims With Shakespearean References and Comedy




By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews




Spoilers: On Jasper Fforde's website, he stated that when he wrote The Well of Lost Plots, that he missed writing about Swindon and Thursday Next’s eccentric family, so he had Thursday immediately leave Book World to return in the next book, Something Rotten.

Unfortunately, I am just the opposite. Swindon is nice and it's good to see some characters returning like Thursday's time-hopping father and her well-meaning but intrusive mum. As before with the books there are plenty of humorous moments, literary references, and strange situations. But darn it all, I miss Book World!

Anybody could write about a place like Swindon, anybody. It takes a true creative spirit like Fforde to take his and other literary characters and build an entire world around them with its creatures, rules, technology, and events. It's like coming down from the ultimate Imagination Trip or a high. You have been to this exciting colorful place that afterward seems like a let down.
It's not that Something Rotten is a bad book. It's great, but the Swindon setting is dull in comparison to the bright, imaginative, colorful Book World.


Anyway, Thursday misses her normal life in Swindon so after two years as the Bellman (leader in Book World), she returns to Swindon with her two-year-old son, Friday and memories of her still-eradicated husband, Landen. No sooner does she return to her hometown and her LiteraTec job in Spec Ops, than she as usual is hit with problems.

First, she has to bring Hamlet along so he can study how the various Outlander play productions and movies portray him. In his absence, the other characters in Hamlet revolt and write their own play called The Tragedy of the Not-At-All Boring Polonious, Father of the Noble Laertes, Who Avenged His Fair Sister Ophelia, Who Was Driven Mad by the Callousness of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Catchy title aside, the characters need a master copy and since one no longer exists Thursday has to find a clone of Shakespeare's to break up their revolution and set things straight with the characters.

St. Zvlkx, a friar from the 11th century has returned to Swindon and his prophecies are spot on including that something bad will happen after Swindon wins the Super Hoop Croquet Tournament. So Thursday and co. have to dust out their mallets and do some footwork on the croquet field.

The Goliath Corporation is suddenly declaring itself a religion and Yorrik Kaine, who had been a disgraced politician and a fictional escapee from Book World, now suddenly has gained a cult-like following and goes on a rampage against all things Danish (Don't ask.) including burning books by Danish authors. Not to mention that Landen is still eradicated and Thursday is the target of an assassin who kills by slapstick (No, really don't ask.)

Let's get the good stuff out of the way first. The way Fforde draws in Hamlet is pretty clever. According to Thursday, he is concerned that he is portrayed as a “ditherer” and he would worry even if he had nothing to worry about so he makes the most out of his trip to the Outland. He compares notes on various productions with his favorite being the Zeffirelli Film where he is played by Mel Gibson (“Horatio is played by Danny Glover, yes?”) He also spends some time flirting with Lady Emma Hamilton, the mistress of Lord Horatio Nelson who is staying in the Next home after a time traveling expedition gone awry.
Thursday also reveals a secret shared among book, author, and Reader. Everyone brings a little of themselves into what they read so each time they read a book, they experience it differently. “To each their own Hamlet,” she says.

Thursday deals with the various adventures with her usual cunning and resourcefulness, particularly when she is assigned to locate and destroy Danish books. She sends SpecOps agents in the wrong places (“The Danish Embassy is the first place they think we’ll look! Check the Singaporean Embassy instead!”) while gathering up all the Danish books by truck loads and sneaking them into the Socialist Republic of Wales. (By a stroke of luck, there also happens to be a Shakespeare clone in Wales so two of her problems are resolved.)

There is some great attempts at political satire with the character of Yorrik Kaine. A political figure with no previous experience suddenly luring followers against a select group and creating legions of fans who are mesmerized by his every word and swayed by his “off-the-cuff-he-tells-it-like-it-is” shtick may sound awfully familiar until you realize this book was published in 2004! Still, the parallels are so uncanny that this Reader wondered if Kaine’s followers wore hats that said “Make Swindon Great Again,” before they were considered cool.

There are parts that don't work so well. After the nuances and cleverness that Fforde gave to the various literary characters, the Swindon characters just aren't as interesting.

After three books, Thursday finally gets Landen back. But his return is so anticlimactic and his presence in the book is so minor that he may as well have stayed gone. 

There are a couple of new characters like St. Zvlkx and an assassin called the Windowmaker (a typo on the business card) that seem very Pythonesque in their characterizations. They have some interesting clever moments, but they are more set up as jokes, jokes that run thin after awhile. 

Many of the various plots and characters don't jell as well as they had in the first three books. They make a hodgepodge of ideas that don't go anywhere and aren't tied together very well. The less said about the croquet and Goliath-as-religion plots, the better.

Something Rotten was intended to be the final book in this tier of the Thursday Next series and it shows. Certain storylines are wrapped up and character's identities are revealed. One revelation appears odd at first, but it makes sense the more one thinks about it and answers several questions.
The other character revelation doesn't work quite so well because it leaves a large gaping plot hole about how another character didn't know about that person’s identity. Not only that but another possibility would have made a lot more sense.

Something Rotten is okay for a normal book series but when the previous three Thursday Next books were so creative, so clever, and so bursting with literariness and imagination, it becomes even more of a shame than it should be.

Shakespeare in Popular Culture: 20 Best Reimaginings Of the Bard of Avon

Shakespeare in Popular Culture: 20 Best Reimaginings of the Bard

By Julie Sara Porter, Bookworm

 

April 23 is the anniversary of William Shakespeare’s birth and death dates and he and his works are still as well-known today as when he first stepped onto the Globe Theater. I have compiled a list of the best representations of Shakespeare and his plays.

Like my previous list for “20 Favorite Poets and Lyricists”, I have decided to do things a little differently. Instead of limiting myself to only books and short stories, I included visual representations including movies, tv episodes, musicals, and comedy sketches. When possible, I embedded videos, but some because of the poor quality  and rights issues of Youtube, will not be shown.

The selections have to feature Shakespearean plays and characters or Shakespeare himself in a prominent role to qualify. They also have to reinterpret the material in one way or another, in some cases even updating the setting to modern day with modern dialogue.

However, no straight interpretations of the Bard’s plays are permitted because they are deserving of their own list. There is one exception to that rule, and that is because the version is from Mystery Science Theater 3000 where characters make comments throughout the film. If you have a favorite on this list or know of one that I have missed, please let me know in the comments below or on my Facebook page.
I should let you know: HERE BE SPOILERS!!

20. Shakespeare in Love (1998)

Film; Director: John Madden, Screenplay: Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard, Cast: Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Colin Firth, Ben Affleck, Judi Dench, Simon Callow, Martin Clunes, Rupert Everett

Connections to Shakespeare: Shakespeare himself, Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night

This romantic period piece starring Joseph Fiennes and Gwyneth Paltrow has received many criticisms over the years on whether the movie and Paltrow deserved their Oscars for Best Picture and Best Actress. (Many felt that Saving Private Ryan deserved the Best Picture and Cate Blanchett deserved Best Actress for her role as Queen Elizabeth I in Elizabeth.) But what can’t be denied is that Shakespeare in Love presents a very beautiful, funny, and imagining of who inspired Shakespeare’s works.

In the movie, Shakespeare (Fiennes) is a struggling playwright laboring through his latest work Romeo and Ethel, the Pirate’s Daughter when he falls in love with Viola (Paltrow)

a young wealthy woman posing as a boy actor. The movie is filled with clever inside references about Shakespeare’s life and work such as his rivalry with fellow playwright, Christopher Marlowe (Rupert Everett), including in one memorable scene a possible motive for Marlowe’s mysterious death in a tavern brawl.

While Viola ends up being a muse for Shakespeare to write the famous Romeo and Juliet, her fate at the end of the film when she sails to America becomes another inspiration.

Queen Elizabeth (Judi Dench) tells Shakespeare to write something cheerful “for Twelfth Night.”

19. Kiss Me Kate (1948)

Theatre Musical; Music and Lyrics: Cole Porter, Book: Samuel and Bella Spewack, Original Production- Director: John C. Wilson, Choreography: Hanya Holm, Cast: Alfred Drake, Patricia Morrison, Lisa Kirk, Harold Lang, Charles Wood, Harry Clark

Connection to Shakespeare: Taming of the Shrew

For his Tony winning 1948 musical adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew, Cole Porter and Samuel and Bella Spewack took Shakespeare’s concept of a “play-within-a-play” and ran with it. Instead of doing a straight musical adaptation of Shakespeare’s tale of feuding lovers, Porter and the Spewacks made the story about a group of actors performing the roles in Shrew while dealing with their own difficult love affairs.

The troubled marriage between the show’s director/producer/star, Fred Graham and his ex-wife/leading lady, Lili Vanessi is mirrored in Shakespeare’s characters, Petruchio and Katherine. The actors’ behavior constantly overlaps with their Taming of the Shrew characters giving the musical two brilliant clever stories both on-stage and off.

Porter’s music also provides witty commentary such as “Another Openin’ Another Show” which discusses the problems of being part of an acting troupe and the memorably hilarious “Brush Up Your Shakespeare” in which two mobsters convince Graham that all he needs to woo women is to memorize a few of the Bard’s lines.  (“Just declaim a few lines from Othella/And they think you’re one hell of a fella/If your blonde won’t respond when you flatter ‘er/Tell her what Tony told Cleopaterer/If she complains that your clothes she is mussing/What are clothes? Much Ado About Nussing…”)

18. “Hamlet Trailer” Last Action Hero (1993)

Film; Director: John McTiernan, Screenplay: Shane Black, David Arnott, William Goldman (uncredited), Based on a story by Shane Black, Adam Leff; Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Austin O’Brien, Joan Plowright, Don LaFontaine ( voice uncredited)

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet (well sort of…)

For anyone who ever wanted Hamlet to stop talking and just kill Claudius, this scene is for you. In The Last Action Hero, a  send-up of action films, movie buff, Danny Madigan

(Austin O’Brien) daydreams in class while his teacher (Joan Plowright) shows the Sir Laurence Olivier film version of Hamlet. Based on his teacher’s insistence that many consider Hamlet “the first action hero,” Danny imagines Hamlet being played by his favorite actor: Arnold Schwarzenegger in the style of Danny’s favorite character, Jack Slater, the titular last action hero of the movie.

This scene will make any Shakespeare lover or action film buff laugh even if they see it many times. Though brief, it is filled with numerous references such as the fact that Plowright, who plays Danny’s teacher, was the widow of Olivier who directed and starred in the film version of Hamlet she shows in class.

The trailer is littered with great bits such as when Schwarzenegger/Hamlet contemplates “To be or not to be” while lighting a cigar. Instead of continuing with the monologue, the Future Former Governator simply says “Not to be” while Elsinore explodes behind him.

The icing on this Shakespearean parody cake is the voice-over narration provided by the late Don LaFontaine (AKA “The Movie Trailer Guy”). He gives Danny’s trailer/daydream tag lines like “There’s something rotten in the state of Denmark and Hamlet is taking out the trash!” and “No one’s going to tell this sweet prince good-night!”

17. “Shakespearean Therapy,” Studio C (2013)

TV Comedy Sketch; Director: Michael Hunter, Jared Shores, Matt Meese, et al;

Teleplay: Adam Berg, Whitney Call, Mallory Everton et al. Cast: Whitney Call, Mallory Everton, Matt Meese

Connection to Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet

Studio C is a hilarious sketch comedy TV series from Brigham Young University in Utah. Because of the university background of the principal writers and cast members, the show is filled with references to geek pop culture, literary works, and historic figures. Naturally, these Merry Mormons would tackle the Bard of Avon.

In this sketch a love-lorn Juliet (Mallory Everton) seeks help from her therapist (Whitney Call) for her romantic troubles. Everton and Call play off each other rather well as Everton’s Juliet quotes the play’s plot in Shakespearean dialogue to a bemused Call as the therapist.  

Call’s character speaks for many people who have questioned Romeo and Juliet’s rash behavior wondering how Juliet could be willing to run off with a man she only met three days prior and who had killed her kinsman. At one point the therapist inquires, “Doest thou hear thyself?” When Juliet decides to take sleeping potion to be reunited with the banished Romeo (who seems “to be a player-and not the one on stage” to the therapist), the therapist “thinks this plan has many holes.”

The sketch has a terrific punchline as the exasperated therapist believes that the departed Juliet is her strangest patient yet. Then Prince Hamlet (Matt Meese) walks in. And speaking of Hamlet seeking therapy……

 

16. “Hamlet/Bogus Psychiatrists” Monty Python’s Flying Circus  (1974)

TV Comedy Sketch; Director: Ian McNaughton, Teleplay: Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, et al, Cast: Terry Jones, Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, Michael Palin, Carol Cleaveland, Connie Booth

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet

Apparently Shakespearean characters seeking therapy is comic gold, because Monty Python’s Flying Circus featured Hamlet on the psychiatrist’s couch as well. This sketch parodies Hamlet’s constant portrayal as an indecisive talker as the Melancholy Dane (Terry Jones) is bored with that and everyone quoting “To be or not to be” at him. He tells the psychiatrist that he wants to “be a private dick” for “Fame, money, glamor, and sex.”

The Python sketch not only pokes fun at Hamlet but at psychiatry as well as a line of therapists (played by Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, and Michael Palin) want Hamlet to confess whether his problem is sexual in nature. They each try to convince Hamlet that they are the real psychiatrist and the other two are “bogus psychiatrists.” (Idle's character claims it’s a “lesson in disorientation.” ) To prove his psychiatric credentials, Palin’s character even goes so far as to bring his diploma from the University of Oxford, his card from the British Psychiatric Association, a letter from another psychiatrist, his Psychiatrist Club tie and matching cufflinks, a copy of Psychiatry Today magazine, and a letter from his mother asking how the psychiatry is going.

Each psychiatrist wants to hear about Hamlet’s sexual problems with a girl on (his) bed “got her stretched out and her legs on the mantelpiece,” and leave as the other psychiatrist and a nurse (Carole Cleaveland) throw them out. The running gag continues into the episode as a computer and Ophelia (Connie Booth) get in on the joke asking Hamlet about the girl with her feet on the mantelpiece.

15, Kill Shakespeare (2010-2014)

12 Issue Graphic novel; Writers: Anthony Del Col, Connor McCreery, Artists: Andy Belanger, Ian Herring, Kagan McLeod, Publisher: IDW Publishing

Connection to Shakespeare: Various particularly Shakespeare himself, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Henry V,  Othello, Richard III, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and others.

The graphic novel series, Kill Shakespeare is to Shakespeare’s plays what Fables is to fairy tales or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is to 19^th century literature: a multi-crossover of Shakespeare’s best and worst characters that take on each other in an epic adventure.

The graphic novel series is beautifully illustrated and brilliantly written as Hamlet is hired by Richard III to kill William Shakespeare and steal his quill. Along the way Hamlet encounters Falstaff, Juliet, Othello, and Puck who make him question his allegiance to Richard.

The characters’ encounters lead to some interesting reinterpretations from the plays and allows them to interact with each other freely changing their fate from the plays. In this story, Juliet survives her suicide attempt in Verona and is exiled. While leading a Resistance against Richard III, she and Hamlet fall in love sharing mutual tragedies: for Juliet, Romeo’s death and for Hamlet, his accidental killing of Polonius. Richard III’s strongest aide is none other than Lady Macbeth, who also is involved in a conspiracy with Othello’s Iago, who switches allegiances keeping his allies, enemies, and the readers guessing.

 The series is also filled with cameos and references to Shakespeare’s other works. At one point the Resistance encounters Titus Andronicus’ Tamora, and Midsummer’s Lysander. Falstaff’s Merry Wives of Windsor co-horts, Mistress Page and Mistress Ford run a brothel and are eagerly awaiting their favorite client: Falstaff. At one point a group of Players perform The Murder of Gonzango which is achingly familiar to Hamlet.

.

 

14. The Lion King (1994)

Animated Film; Directors: Roger Allers, Rob Minkoff, Screenplay: Irene Mecchi, Jonathan Roberts, Linda Woolverton, Cast: Matthew Broderick, Jeremy Irons, James Earl Jones, Nathan Lane, Ernie Sabella, Moira Kelly, Madge Sinclair, Rowan Atkinson, Robert Guillaume, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Nikki Calame, Whoppi Goldberg, Cheech Marin, Jim Cummings

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet

For many children, this was their first taste of Shakespeare. Disney’s 32^nd Animated Feature is a portrayal of Hamlet set in the African Pride Lands with an-all animal cast. It is a wonderful film with gorgeous animation of the African environment and tuneful music provided by composer, Elton John and lyricist, Tim Rice.

The film tells the story of Simba (Jonathan Taylor Thomas), a young lion cub who is destined to succeed his father as king of the lion pride. His greedy uncle, Scar (Jeremy Irons) has other ideas: He kills his brother and Simba’s father, Mufasa (James Earl Jones), then exiles Simba. While in the jungle, Simba (Matthew Broderick) befriends Timon, a wily meerkat (Nathan Lane), and Pumbaa, a dim warthog (Ernie Sabella), who teach him about “Hakuna matata” (a Swahili term that means “no worries.”). Simba lives a peaceful existence with his friends until his childhood lioness friend, Nala (Moira Kelly), and Mufasa’s ghost remind Simba that he has a duty to perform and that he has to take his place “in the circle of life.”

Besides being a memorable movie on its own right, The Lion King’s Shakespearean influences are clearly evident. In his self-imposed exile, Simba is about as grief-stricken and questioning as his Shakespearean counterpart while Scar’s lust for power to murder his brother especially in his Villain Song “Be Prepared,” would make King Claudius blush. Shakespearean themes are prominent throughout such as when disorder threatens the political order (The murder of Mufasa) it also brings chaos in the social order (the arrival of hyenas to the Pride Lands), and the natural order (drought and the departure of food and water).

13. “The Play’s The Thing” Boy Meets World (1993)

TV Series Episode; Director: David Trainer, Teleplay: Ed Decter & John J. Strauss,

 Cast: Ben Savage, William Daniels, Rider Strong, Lee Norris, Will Friedle, Betsy Randall, William Russ, Lily Nicksay, and Danielle Fishel

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet

This episode of the ‘90s sitcom demonstrates the difficulties of presenting Shakespeare to a group of sixth graders. Mr. George Feeny (William Daniels) tells his class to perform scenes from Hamlet. He selects the show’s protagonist, Cory Matthews (Ben Savage) to play Hamlet because like Cory “(Hamlet) gets on a lot of people’s nerves, makes one stupid mistake after another, and for five acts never shuts up.” When Cory wants to change the script to be more action-oriented and walks off in protest towards the traditional Renaissance wardrobe, Feeny gives the role of Hamlet to class nerd Stuart Minkus (Lee Norris).

The series is a long-favorite among Children of the ‘90s and beyond and this episode is a good example why. It is filled with hilarious bits such as when Minkus weighs different possibilities to the character such as quoting Hamlet’s lines in an American Southern accent because he read “that the Elizabethan English accent was similar to the contemporary southern accent.” (“Great it’s Ernest Goes to Denmark,” Cory quips.)

The best scene however is after Cory suggests performing a “Steven Segal soliloquy.”

Daniels goes into an effective and dramatic version of Hamlet’s Father’s monologue complete with dim lights and spooky music. “Of course I’m no Steven Segal,” Feeny cheekily says afterwards.

12. “Hamlet,” Mystery Science Theater 30000 (1999)

TV Series Episode; MST3K Credits Director: Michael J. Nelson, Teleplay: Bill Corbett, Bridget Jones, Kevin Murphy et al, Cast: Michael J. Nelson, Mary Jo Pehl, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

Hamlet Credits Director: Franz Peter Wirth, Screenplay: William Shakespeare,          

Cast: Maximilian Schell, Hans Canineberg, Wanda Rotha, Dunja Movar

John Banner (voice uncredited), Ricardo Montalban(voice uncredited)

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet

Even the classics deserve to be riffed once in a while. The cult comedy series in which Mike Nelson (Michael J. Nelson), an average human man and two robots, Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot (Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett) make comments at bad movies takes on a 1960 TV version of Hamlet made for German television.

Many MST3K fans consider this one of the weakest episodes of the series because they feel the movie is too plodding, slow, and intellectual for the Mystery Science Theater treatment. However, it is a very witty and humorous take on Shakespeare’s classic. Many of the riffs that Nelson and the robots make are based on comments many have made over the years about Hamlet’s character and the play.

When Hamlet (Maximillian Schell) says the immortal line “To be or not to be,” Mike counters with “the verbal equivalent of Dum-Dum-Da-Da-Dum” (Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony). Mike helpfully summarizes the famous monologue as “so I’m a chicken for not stabbing myself, that’s all you needed to say!” Many times the trio yell for Hamlet to “Sum up!” or wonder “is there a word in the English language that he hasn’t said?”

The host segments during the episode are pretty clever as well. In one, the robots impersonate the ghost of Mike's father (who's very much alive). In another Tom and Crow reveal various alternate versions of Hamlet such as using percussion instruments to represent the characters. Another is “Alas Poor Who?” in which Mike encourages the robots to recognize careerly dead celebrities by their bones (a take on the “alas poor Yorick” soliloquy). The best segment is the final one in which the robots present a Hamlet action figure which doesn’t do very much but has the world’s longest pull cord. Meanwhile, an irate Fortinbras (Murphy) is furious that once again he has been cut out of the film version, parodying the many times when filmmakers cut out his subplot for time. (This time though the fault lies with the MST3K team, who cut the Fortinbras subplot from the German production to fit the series’ 90 minute time frame.)

11. The Shakespeare Stealer Series (The Shakespeare Stealer, Shakespeare’s Scribe, and Shakespeare’s Spy) (1998-2003)

YA book series; Author: Gary J. Blackwood, Publisher: E. P. Dutton

Connection to Shakespeare: Various including Shakespeare himself, Hamlet, All’s Well That Ends Well, and Pericles: Prince of Tyre et al

This is an excellent book series about the lives of Shakespeare and his fellow players in the Lord Chamberlain’s Men. In the first book, The Shakespeare Stealer, Widge, a young orphan is hired as a scribe for a sinister character, Simon Falconer. Noting the boy’s ability to copy words rather quickly, Falconer orders young Widge to transcribe and steal a copy of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Widge ingratiates himself onto the Players and accepts

being a part of them and finding a family that he never had.

The books present a very fascinating insider’s look at the Players’ world. Many details are dwelt on such as young boys, like Widge, are recruited to play the female roles. Many fascinating tid-bits are sprinkled throughout the series such as the scripts that only exist

 in parts for each actor to avoid theft (which presents a problem for Widge) and the expensive beautiful costumes that cost more than an average player’s salary.

Blackwood also wrote Shakespeare and his Players rather well. Shakespeare is written as a loving fatherly head of the group, but sometimes insecure in his talents, constantly questioning his works. The other Players are memorable as well such as Richard Burbage, the highly talented but emotionally cold lead actor, Ned Shakespeare, Will’s charming and immature younger brother, and Robert Armin, a comic actor who takes a fatherly interest in Widge.

 

10. Shakespearean Whodunnits: Murders and Mysteries Based on Shakespeare’s Plays (2000)

Book Anthology; Editor: Mike Ashley, Publisher: Barnes & Noble

Connection to Shakespeare: Various including Shakespeare himself, Richard III, Cymbeline, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Henry V et al

I mentioned this anthology before in my review of “Other Sides of the Stories: Favorite Alternate Points of View,” and the short story “Macbeth: Toil and Trouble”  but it gets a second mention in this list because of how the authors frame the works of Shakespeare over the concepts of murder mysteries.

Like many anthologies, the stories run the gamut in quality. They include the very bizarre “Richard III: The Shadow That Dies” by Mary Reed & Eric Mayer and “Cymbeline: Imogen” by Paul Barnett in which characters receive unusual assistance to commit crimes.

Like in Shakespeare’s plays, the supernatural comes into focus in many stories intending to interfere with the characters’ lives beyond the final act. In “A Midsummer Night’s Dream: A Midsummer Eclipse” by Stephen Baxter, Puck is invited to solve the murder of Lysander at the behest of Queen Hippolyta. Using his abilities of shape shifting and verbal by-play, the wily sprite not only solves the murder but discovers a closer connection between himself and the human world which Shakespeare did not dream.

The short stories allow the writers and the characters to address issues that were lacking in the original plays. For example the moving, “Henry V: The Death of Falstaff” by Darrell Schweitzer provides some long-awaited closure in the friendship between Falstaff and Prince Hal AKA Henry V.

Shakespeare himself takes center stage in the final two stories, particularly the clever “The Collaborators” by Rosemary Aitken in which two family members of Anne Boleyn, the mother of Queen Elizabeth, detect similarities between Shakespeare’s body of work and the death of their relation. This story presents interesting and symbolic parallels between Shakespeare’s fantasy world and the real political world of Renaissance England.

9. Othello (2001)

TV Movie; Director: Geoffrey Sax, Teleplay: Andrew Davies, William Shakespeare, Cast: Eammon Walker, Christopher Ecclestone, Keeley Hawes, Richard Coyle, Rachael Stirling, Joss Ackland, Bill Paterson, Christopher Fox, Allen Cutts, Patrick Meyers

Connection to Shakespeare: Othello

Many prefer the high school drama, O but, for me, the ultimate modern version of Shakespeare’s Othello is this version made for British television and aired on Masterpiece Theatre. It is a winning variation of Shakespeare’s play that uncomfortably reminds us that the themes Shakespeare wrote about like racism, domestic violence, scandal, and infidelity are all too real today.

In an attempt to promote racial solidarity amongst London minorities and the police force, the Home Secretary and Prime Minister choose John Othello (Eammon Walker) to be the next police Commissioner over the former Commissioner’s second-in-command, Ben Jago (Christopher Ecclestone). Jago vows to ruin Othello’s career on the police force by interfering with cases and Othello’s marriage to the wealthy and white, Dessie Barbant (Keeley Hawes) by implying that she is having an affair with Michael Cass, their colleague (Richard Coyle).

The script follows Shakespeare’s original play with a vengeance including all of the highlights such as Jago’s verbal manipulations of Othello (including Othello’s various claims that Jago is “the only friend (he) can trust.”). However, it uses modern technology to move the plot forward. Jago anonymously posts messages on a Neo-Nazi website to bash Othello’s promotion and his marriage to Dessie and also to create a stalker incident in which Dessie will need bodyguard protection from (and lots of alone time with) Cass. The modern version of the circumstantial evidence to reveal Dessie and Cass’ alleged affair involves Jago’s lying about DNA tests. The modern setting gives a wider avenue for Shakespeare’s themes to be explored and more tools at Jago’s disposal against Othello.

The performances are excellent particularly Ecclestone’s Jago. When he breaks the fourth wall,  Jago reveals his real motives for ruining Othello’s life wasn’t about race or politics, but love “simple as that” (giving a possible motive for Iago’s “motiveless malignancy.”)

8. Something Rotten: A Thursday Next Novel (2004)

Novel; Author: Jasper Fforde, Publisher: Viking Press

Connection to Shakespeare: Hamlet

Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series is filled with Shakespearean references. In the first book, The Eyre Affair, Thursday Next and her then-boyfriend, Landen Park-Laine go to a performance of Richard III that seems more like the Rocky Horror Picture Show. In the books, Lost in A Good Book and the Well of Lost Plots, Shakespearean characters like Falstaff inhabit Fforde’s Book World and interact with Next and various other literary characters such as Lewis Carroll’s The Red Queen, Charles Dickens’ Miss Havisham, and Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Simon Legree. But by far the volume in the series with the most Shakespearean allusions is Something Rotten, the fourth book in the series.

When Thursday decides to leave the insane Book World to return to her home in Swindon and to find her missing husband, Landen, she takes Hamlet with her. The princes’ motives for leaving his book are over concerns that he was being misrepresented as “a ditherer.”  Thursday narrates, “Hamlet would worry about having nothing to worry about and since he was the indisputable star of the Shakespeare canon and had lost the Most Troubled Romantic Lead to Heathcliff once again at this year’s BookWorld awards, the Council of Genres thought they should do something to appease him.”

Like the rest of the series, Something Rotten is a buffet for bookworms and is filled with clever allusions and references. While in the real world (or the Outland as the fictional characters refer to our world), Hamlet reads and observes various versions of his story. He confesses to being a big fan of Mel Gibson (“Horatio is played by Danny Glover yes?”) and weighs which ones portray him as more of a man of action. Meanwhile back in BookWorld, Hamlet’s colleagues, still furious that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had their own play, want to rewrite the story to reflect their own bias. (Polonius’ version is called “The Tragedy of the Very Witty and Not Remotely Boring Polonius, Father of the Noble Laertes, Who Avenges His Fair Sister, Ophelia Driven Mad the Callous, Murderous, and Outrageously Disrespectful Hamlet, Prince of Denmark”)

Above all Something Rotten, like the rest of the Thursday Next series pays tribute to interaction between the creator and the reader of a work. This is particularly important in the dialogue between Hamlet and Thursday in which Thursday remarks that every character the reader reads is an amalgam of people they’ve met, read, or seen before. “Because every reader’s experiences are different, each book is unique for each reader,” she said and says that the reason why people like Hamlet is “because to each their own Hamlet.”

7. “Judith Shakespeare” A Room of One’s Own (1929)

Essay; Author: Virginia Woolf, Publisher: Forum Magazine

Connection to Shakespeare: Shakespeare himself

In her series of lectures at Newnham and Girton Colleges, Virginia Woolf stated “that a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.” She wondered if women were free to produce works the quality of Shakespeare’s and addressed the limitations women faced such as societal responsibilities or restrictions towards education.

To illustrate her example, Woolf created a fictional sister of Shakespeare’s, Judith. In Woolf’s narration, Judith Shakespeare was as equally talented as her brother and had developed a gift of language. But because she was female, Judith was denied the same opportunities to go to school and to develop her craft for writing. “She was as adventurous, as imaginative, as agog to see the world as he was. But she was not sent to school,” Woolf said. Judith is often chastised by her parents for reading books when she should be at home doing the mending. Judith is then betrothed and objects by running away to join a theatre company but is rejected because of her sex. While Shakespeare becomes a legend, Judith is abandoned by a lover, becomes pregnant which makes a life of writing impossible, and kills herself in despair, becoming unrecognized.

In her fictional portrayal, Woolf illustrated how difficult it was for many female artists and authors to be accepted and encouraged and why so few were well-known by the time Woolf was being educated. Woolf explained why it was important to encourage women to explore creative talents so the next generation of Judith Shakespeares would not go unnoticed.

The concept and theme of Shakespeare’s imaginary sister has itself achieved popular and academic culture recognition. In her book Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History, historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich compares the fictional Judith Shakespeare with the real-life Renaissance female artists like Artemisia Gentileschi to show that some of the lucky ones achieved recognition. The title “Shakespeare’s Sister” has been used for various means such as a song by The Smiths and (minus the second “e” in Shakespeare) the pop/rock duo of Siobhan Fahey and Marcella Detroit.

Incidentally, Shakespeare did have a sister named Joan and a daughter named Judith, but there is no evidence that either had his gift of language and neither of them killed themselves. In fact they married and had many children before dying of natural causes.

6. “Once Upon A Time” The Prisoner (1968)

TV Series Episode;  Director: Patrick McGoohan, Teleplay: Patrick McGoohan, Cast: Patrick McGoohan, Leo McKern, Angelo Muscat, Peter Swanwick, John Cazabon

Connection to Shakespeare: As You Like It

Patrick McGoohan’s 1960’s TV series, The Prisoner is one of the most unique series ever. The protagonist (McGoohan), known only as Number Six, is sent to a Village where various leaders, called Number Two, try means of breaking him using different methods like mind control, hallucinogenic drugs, rigged elections, and rote education. The Numbers Two wants to know why Six resigned his job as a secret agent and Six wants to know who is controlling the Village (who is the Number One pulling the strings). In its 14 episodes, The Prisoner is filled with allusions, symbolism, and references so it's no surprise that the penultimate episode, “Once Upon A Time” is a tribute to one of Shakespeare’s most famous monologues: “The Sevan Ages of Man” (AKA “All the world is a stage…”) from As You Like It.

Number Two (Leo McKern) uses the seven ages in a series of psychotherapy/role playing to learn Six’s secrets. In this bizarre technique, called “Degree Absolute,” the two are locked in one room for one week and replay various scenarios throughout Six’s life.

In each scenario, Two takes the form of an authority figure such as Six’s father, headmaster, judge, or employer and questions Six taking the form of himself as a small child, schoolboy, reckless driver, and employee. All are used for the intention of learning

why Six resigned. This episode gives great visuals to the famous monologue such as McGoohan literally becoming the “whining schoolboy with his satchel/And shining morning face, creeping like snail/unwillingly to school.”

The interrogation techniques becomes more dramatic as Two becomes a military jailer to Six’s prisoner of war. The two men exchange a battle of wits that gets more frantic as Two collapses from the strain while quoting the final age: "second childishness and mere oblivion/Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.” He later concedes victory to Six and collapses from exhaustion while a screechy voice counts down and yells “Die, Six die!”

Six’s “reward” for surviving “Degree Absolute” is the arrival of a smug Supervisor (Peter Swanwick) who asks Six what he wants. Six’s answer is a short “Number One.”

“I’ll take you to him,” the Supervisor replies leading The Prisoner to its memorable and ambiguous finale, “Fall Out.”

 

5. “The Bard” The Twilight Zone (1963)

TV Series Episode; Director: David Butler, Teleplay: Rod Serling

Cast: Rod Serling, Jack Weston, John Williams, Burt Reynolds, Henry Lascoe, John McGiver, Howard McNear, Judy Strangis, Marge Redmond, Doro Merande, William Lanteau, Clegg Hoyt, Paul Dobov, John Newton, Diane Sayer, Jason Wingreen

Connection to Shakespeare: Shakespeare himself

This episode is one of the funniest ones in Twilight Zones’ repertoire. A hack screenwriter, Julius K. Moomer (Jack Weston) needs to find a good script. Moomer finds a book of black magic and uses it to summon William Shakespeare (John Williams) from the dead to write a screenplay for television with Moomer writing additional dialogue.

The episode is memorably hilarious as Shakespeare peppers his dialogue with quotes from his own plays, complete with trumpet fanfare. Williams’ portrayal of the playwright is also clever and sarcastic particularly in his scenes with Weston’s bombastic Moomer. When Moomer begs Shakespeare to continue writing with him insisting that he will be a household name again, the famous playwright dryly counters, “With all due modesty, Mr. Moomer the name ‘William Shakespeare’ has survived the test of time without the assistance of Julius K. Moomer.”

Aside from the Shakespearean references, the episode is also a not-too-subtle jab at television based on Serling’s own issues writing for the medium. When Shakespeare attends a rehearsal of his script, he is furious at the changes that the sponsor wants to make, such as deleting a suicide, omitting much of the dialogue, and limiting

the script to an hour. (In reference to Zone’s fourth season episodes moving from 30 minutes to a 60 minutes time slot much to Serling’s chagrin.)  Serling’s script also tore

into Method actors in the character of Rocky Rhodes, humorously played by Burt Reynolds, an obvious parody of Marlon Brando complete with  previous experience starring in Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire, mumbling speech, and constant asking what his motivation is.

Furious, at the changes and the attitudes of the sponsors, Moomer, and Rhodes, Shakespeare punches Rhodes and walks off declaring “to you Julius Moomer….lots a’ luck!” Undaunted, Moomer receives a request to write a screenplay on American History and once again uses the book of black magic, this time to call on Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Boone, Pocahontas, Benjamin Franklin, and Theodore Roosevelt.

4. West Side Story (1960)

Theatre/Film Musical; Director: Robert Wise, Jerome Robbins, Music and Lyrics: Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim, Book: Arthur Laruents

Cast: Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, Rita Moreno, George Chakiris, Russ Tamblyn,

Connection to Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet

While Romeo and Juliet has never been a favorite Shakespeare play of mine, this classic  Leonard Bernstein-Stephen Sondheim musical based on Shakespeare’s play of star crossed lovers is one of the best. The musical transplants the play to 1950’s New York in which Romeo is replaced by Tony (Richard Beymer), a former leader of the Jets, a street gang of second-generation European immigrants and Juliet is replaced by Maria (Natalie Wood), the sister of the leader of the Sharks, a gang of Puerto Rican immigrants.

West Side Story copies many of Shakespeare’s motifs and builds on them. By portraying the feuding Montague and Capulet families as rival street gangs, the musical gives the play more immediate connotations that touch on bigger issues such as racism, immigration, street violence, and the problems and ambitions of the American Dream.

Many of the scenes and characters from the play are mirrored in the musical such as the events of the musical beginning with two minor members of the Jets getting beaten echoing how the events of Shakespeare’s play begin with two Montague servants getting beaten. The comical scene in which Romeo and his friends harass Juliet’s Nurse becomes darker and more sinister when the Jets attempt to rape Maria’s sister-in-law, Anita (Rita Moreno) who declares that if any of the Jets were bleeding, she would spit on them.

The balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet becomes instead a song on a fire escape in which Tony and Maria declare their love in the stirring duet, “Tonight.” Instead of a real wedding, the two lovers stage a mock wedding with mannequins in the song, “One Hand, One Heart” which starts out playful as Tony and Maria pretend the mannequins are their parents, friends, and family members. The scene becomes serious when the two lovers contemplate their love and the violence and hatred around them which leads to an unhappy conclusion for all involved.

3. House of Cards Series (UK) (House of Cards, To Play the King, The Final Cut) (1990-1995)

TV Series; Director: Paul Seed, Teleplay: Andrew Davies, Michael Dobbs

Cast: Ian Richardson, Diane Fletcher, Susannah Harker, David Lyon, Miles Anderson, Alphonsia Emmanuel, Malcolm Tierny, Nicholas Selby, Damien Thomas, Colin Jeavons, William Chubb, Michael Kitchen, Kitty Aldridge, Nicholas Farrell, Rowena King, Jack Fortune, Bernice Stegers, Erika Hoffman, Nick Brimble, Isla Blair, Paul Freeman, Nickolas Grace, Yolanda Vazquez

Connection to Shakespeare: Richard III, Macbeth

Instead of Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright, go with the original. The  American House of Cards pales in comparison to the original UK version based on Michael Dobbs’ novel, starring Ian Richardson as Prime Minister Francis Urquhart and was inspired by Shakespeare’s Richard III and Macbeth.

When Urquhart, Parliament’s Chief Whip, is passed over for a key position, he schemes to take the place of the current Prime Minister Hal Collingridge (David Lyon). Urquhart then uses a scandal involving Collingridge’s alcoholic brother and some stock shares as well as Urquhart’s affair with a bright but unstable journalist, Mattie Storin (Susannah Harker) to force Collingridge’s removal.

As shown with his modern adaptation of Othello, screenwriter Andrew Davies knows how to move Shakespeare to modern day and he does it brilliantly. In the three episodes of the series, Urquhart gets rid of political rivals, the King of England (Michael Kitchen),

and various former lovers and colleagues that stand in his way. Urquhart uses scandals, wiretapping, computer files, blackmail and murder to achieve his means. He addresses the sinister rumors to his character by using the catchphrase that has taken on a life of its own in British politics: “You may think that if you like, I can’t possibly comment.”

Urquhart is assisted in his ambitions by his scheming wife, Elizabeth (Diane Fletcher), who creates gossip, sets her husband up with different lovers, and arranges assassinations just as surely as her husband does. It is sort of like what would have happened if Richard III and Lady Macbeth combined their forces to fight their common enemies.

In a clever touch worthy of Shakespeare himself, Davies allows Urquhart to  break the fourth wall and address the audience proving that the soliloquy is alive and well. During a confrontation with the kind-hearted, King, Urquhart asks the viewer “I think it’s gloves off time at the Palace don’t you?” These monologues not only allows Urquhart to draw the viewer in to his confidence but makes them complicit even an ally in his schemes. When he throws Storin off the Parliament roof to her death in the first series, Urquhart dares the camera and the viewer to judge him by repeating his catchphrase sharply that we may think what we like, “(he) can’t possibly comment.”

2. The Shakespearean Fantasy Series (Ill Met by Moonlight, All Night Awake, Any Man So Daring) (2001-2003)

Book Series; Author: Sarah A. Hoyt, Publisher: Berkley Press

Connection to Shakespeare: Shakespeare himself and various plays including A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, King Lear et al

Shakespeare and fairies make a perfect union and no one explores that union better than fantasy author, Sarah A. Hoyt in her Shakespearean Fantasy series beginning with Ill Met by Moonlight. In the first book in the series, Shakespeare’s wife, Anne and daughter, Susannah are kidnapped by the Fairy King, Sylvanus. The future playwright, then a petty schoolteacher, joins forces with Prince Quicksilver, seeking vengeance against Sylvanus for the murder of their parents and his dethroning.

The series is beautifully written as Hoyt creates a lovely world that the fairies inhabit.

There are beautiful details to the Fairy culture such as when noble fairies watch the behavior of mortals through dew drops. The Faerie World is filled with unique characters such as The Hunter, a creepy character of fairy legends which gains prominence in the final book.

The characters are winning as well, particularly Shakespeare, who is not yet the literary legend. Instead, he is a self-doubting insecure character who is concerned about his talent and his family. Quicksilver is also fascinating as he can transform from a male to a female form (and seduces many like Shakespeare in those forms).

Above all, the books are filled with references and allusions to Shakespeare’s works. After his parents’ deaths, Quicksilver is accused of wearing black and moping (like a certain melancholy Dane). There is a character named Ariel, bearing more than a passing resemblance to the character in The Tempest. As a character is dying, he chants “A plague on both of your houses,” a line that is later echoed in Romeo and Juliet. In his female persona, Quicksilver gives a potential identity to the unknown mysterious Dark Lady of Shakespeare’s sonnets.

 
1.”The Mirror”/“City of Stone” Gargoyles (1995)

TV Animated Series Episodes; Director: (“The Mirror”) Frank Paur, (“City of Stone”) Michael Reaves, Teleplay: (“The Mirror”) Lydia Marano, (“City of Stone”) Brynne Chandler-Reaves, Lydia Marano, Cast: Keith David, Salli Richardson, Marina Sirtis, Jeff Bennett, Ed Asner, Thom Adcox Hernandez, Bill Faggerbake, Frank Welker (both), Brent Spiner (“The Mirror-“only), Jonathan Frakes, John Rhys-Davies, Kath Souci,

Neil Dickson, Emma Samms, Ed Gilbert (“City of Stone”-only)

Connection to Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth

There is a personal reason that I chose this as Number One: While I read Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar, and Macbeth in high school, these episodes made me love Shakespeare’s works. I adored “The Mirror” and a day after “City of Stone” aired, I borrowed a book on Shakespeare’s plays from the library and instantly became hooked.

Anyone who grew up in the ‘90s remembers this brilliantly written and amazingly animated Disney TV series about gargoyles that turn to stone during the day and arise at night to protect Manhattan’s residents from villains. The series was quite intelligent bringing in characters from Shakespeare like Macbeth, Puck, and the Weird Sisters (the latter two are members of “The Third Race, The Children of Oberon, fairies” introduced in the series’ second season) into the mix giving the animated series a literary dimension not seen in many other cartoons before or since. The best episodes in the series, “The Mirror” and “City of Stone” develops the regular Gargoyles characters but also Shakespeare’s as well.

“The Mirror” is one of the funniest and the best episode of the series. After being defeated many times by the protagonists, Demona (Marina Sirtis) one of the show’s primary antagonists uses a magic mirror to summon Puck (Brent Spiner) and binds him in iron to obey her commands. She commands Puck to get rid of Elisa Maza (Salli

Richardson), the Gargoyles’ human friend and potential love interest for lead gargoyle, Goliath (Keith David). Puck turns Elisa into a gargoyle which Demona (who hasn’t seen the results of Puck’s transformation) tells him to do the same to the rest of Manhattan. When she sees an island filled with humans-transformed-into-gargoyles, an incensed Demona demands that he turn the gargoyles back into humans, which he does-to Goliath and his clan.

This episode is filled Shakespearean comedy concepts of mistaken identity and confusion, such as when they are under a spell Elisa and the Gargoyles believe that they have always been a gargoyle or human. There is also the idea of transformation that is so paramount in Shakespeare’s comedies. A scene that illustrates this is when

when the bemused Gargoyles first see the island filled with gargoyles wearing clothes, shopping, and riding subways (including a trio of pretty female gargoyles giving the younger clan members the eye). “It’s kind of weird, neat but weird,” says Lexington (Thomas Adcox-Hernandez). Of course the episode pays tribute to Shakespeare’s romances in a scene in which Goliath looks at Elisa’s gargoyle form and says that “(he) never noticed how beautiful (she) was.” “You mean I was ugly before?” Elisa teases.

Above all, the scene stealer in the episode is Spiner’s Puck who is clearly having a good time throughout playing on Demona, Elisa, and the Gargoyles. In the end, he emerges the victor, as he gives Demona a parting shot that changes her throughout the rest of the series.

If “The Mirror” is a winning tribute to Shakespeare’s comedies then the four-part story arc, “City of Stone” is a memorable tribute to Shakespeare’s tragedies using Macbeth

(John Rhys-Davies) as a centerpiece. Demona is once again planning on using magic to attack the humanity of Manhattan, this time by turning them into stone at night by chanting a spell on television. The Gargoyles are determined to stop her, teaming up with multimillionaire/antagonist, David Xanatos (Jonathan Frakes). Meanwhile Macbeth and The Weird Sisters (eerily played by Kath Souci) are observing the situation with their own private agendas.

While the modern story is solid and suspenseful, the highlight is the flashback storyline which details the backstory between Demona and Macbeth. The show’s writer's reference

Shakespeare’s portrayal of the Scottish king by surrounding the storyline with the magic, fatalism, and sinister aspects of the play, such as when The Weird Sisters (here fairies instead of human witches), prophesize that both Macbeth and his cousin, Duncan will become kings and fathers of kings.

The writers also acknowledge the historic Macbeth, by revealing the king as a wise and just ruler and Lady Macbeth as a loving wife who are undone by the brutish Lord Gilcomgaine and the scheming Duncan whom Macbeth wants to seek revenge against for murdering his father and attempting to murder him.

 Demona also is involved in the life of Macbeth by aiding Macbeth in attacking his enemies for her own benefits waging war against humanity for the betrayal and murder of her clan-a betrayal that she helped arrange. The two become further linked in a pact with the Weird Sisters that makes them immortal until one destroys the other. In writing the backstory of Demona and Macbeth as figures who seek vengeance and justice ultimately bringing about their own ends, the writers of Gargoyles play on one of Shakespeare’s tragic themes of characters that bring destruction to themselves by their own behavior and choices.

Honorable Mention: Master Hal and The Boys by Athol Fugard, A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard,  "Ill Met By Moonlight"/"The Gathering", Gargoyles, Lion King II: Simba's Pride, Romeo's Ex: Rosaline's Story by Lisa Fiedler, I, Iago by Nicole Galland, "Taming of The Shrew," Moonlighting, "St. Crispin's Day"/"Romeo's Troubles," Studio C, and 10 Things I Hate About You