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Tuesday, October 29, 2024

37 Days of Shakespeare, Day 23: The Merry Wives of Windsor

The Merry Wives of Windsor, first broadcast December 28th 1982
  • When was it written? In or around 1597, possibly his 23rd play
  • What’s it about? 200 years have passed since Henry IV Part 2, but John Falstaff is seemingly alive and well in Elizabethan England, up to his old tricks. He sends identical love letters to two married women, who compare notes, and lay a series of traps to humiliate him. Meanwhile, three suitors want to marry one of the women’s daughters, who ends up with the one she loves.
  • Most famous dialogue: “Why then, the world’s mine oyster, which I with sword will open.”
  • Sources: Some elements may have been adapted from “Il Pecorone,” a collection of stories by Ser Giovanni Fiorentino.
  • Best insult: So many!
    • “You Banbury Cheese”
    • “I combat challenge of this latten bilbo” (I learned that the word “bilbo” refers to a flexible sword made in Bilboa, Spain.)
    • “Froth and scum, thou liest”
    • “O base Hungarian wight!”
    • “Out of my door, you witch, you hag, you baggage, you polecat, you runyon!”
    • “What, a hodge pudding? A bag of flax?” “A puffed man?” “Old, cold, withered and of intolerable entrails?” “And one that is as slanderous as Satan?” “And as poor as Job?” “And as wicked as his wife?” “And given to fornications, and to taverns and sack and wine and metheglins, and to drinkings and swearings and starings, pribbles and prabbles?”
  • Best word: Anthropophaginian
  • Best production of this play I’ve seen: I saw it in Stratford ON with Brian Dennehy as Falstaff and it was rather fun.
  • Notable Names in the BBC Adaptation: It’s practically star-studded: Richard Griffiths (Mr. Dursley from Harry Potter) is Falstaff, Judy Davis is one of the wives and Ben Kingsley is her husband
How’s the cast?
  • Wonderful. I saw Griffiths on Broadway in the very serious Equus, so I know he would probably do great with the more tragic material in Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, but he’s certainly great here as well in this strictly comedic take on the character. Ben Kingsley, the same year he had his big break-out as Gandhi, is delightful as a manic Mr. Ford, yet another of Shakespeare’s imaginary cuckolds (though he has more reason to be afeared than some).
How’s the direction by David Jones?
  • Very sprightly and funny. He wanted to shoot outdoors in the streets of Stratford, but was forced to stay in studio by the BBC. He nevertheless makes it feel airy and outdoorsy. My only complaint is that 2:45 is a bit too long for a lightweight (no pun intended) comedy, but blame Shakespeare for that.
Storyteller’s Rulebook: Should You Give Your Audience What They Say They Want?

The legend that has always trailed this play, whether it’s true or not, is that Queen Elizabeth saw the Henry IV plays (or possibly only the first one had come out at this point) and said she wanted more of Falstaff, so she requested a play where Sir John falls in love. Shakespeare then supposedly dashed this off quickly to satisfy the request, which has led to it being dismissed by later critics. (Personally, I find it to be carefully-constructed and very funny, so I dispute the claims that Shakespeare didn’t care about it.)

There will always be much debate about the veracity of this story, and what the timeline might have been, and what we can possibly know about what actually went down.

But let’s suppose that it’s all true, and this play really was written to give the queen a play where John Falstaff falls in love. This begs the question that is never answered, not even in the wildest speculation: What did the queen think of the new play? Did she feel it satisfied her request?

The answer is: Surely not. Falstaff doesn’t fall in love! He pursues two married women, and it’s a bit unclear if he’s going for sex or money, but love is right out. He’s barely chagrined that his plans don’t work out, and ends the play happily single, as he began it.

Did Shakespeare have contempt for his queen’s request? Did he feel it would violate the character to have him actually fall in love, whether happily or unrequitedly? Did he feel that she didn’t really want what she thought she wanted, and would have actually been horrified to see Falstaff overcome his wicked ways (“old, cold, withered and of intolerable entrails”), so he crafted a play that he knew would actually please her more? History, and even wild conjecture, tells us nothing. Certainly, she had the power to punish Shakespeare in various ways (from killing him to withdrawing his charter) and didn’t, so she can’t have been that upset.

Do audiences want characters to grow and change in sequels, or do they want more of the same? If they insist on the former, should writers confidently assume they really want the latter? Shakespeare, if this backstory is true, defied his queen and wrote a very funny play, which hopefully amused her though it might have frustrated her.

I, for one, would have loved to see Shakespeare actually try to satisfy her request, and try to write a play in which Falstaff moved from gut to heart, but I love this play, too, which stays firmly in the gut. Whether Shakespeare felt this was what Elizabeth truly wanted to see, or simply what he himself truly wanted to write, or perhaps if he felt this was all Falstaff could be, we have to respect his decision.

Friday, October 11, 2024

37 Days of Shakespeare, Day 22: King Lear

The Tragedy of King Lear, first broadcast September 19, 1982
  • When was it written? We really don’t know. Sometime between 1603 and 1606. Possibly his 28th play.
  • What’s it about? In ancient England, King Lear decides to retire early and divide his land among his three daughters, but demands they profess their love for him first. Cordelia, who actually loves him, is insulted by the request and refuses, so she gets nothing. Goneril and Regan falsely praise him and get everything. They instantly start abusing Lear after they get it. Meanwhile, Lear’s friend Gloucester has one bad son (Edmund) and one good one (Edgar), and likewise misunderstands which is which. Both old men end up wandering around outside in a storm. In the end, everybody except Edmund ends up dead.
  • Most famous dialogue: One of these three:
    • How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child
    • I am a man more sinned against than sinning
    • As flies to wanton boys are we to the Gods, they kill us for their sport
  • Sources: First Geoffrey of Monmouth and then Holinshed told the story of Leir of Britain and his daughters, supposedly from the pre-Roman times of 800 BCE. Shakespeare moves it up just a bit, because they all swear to the Roman gods. But the names of all the dukedoms match 1600 AD, not ancient times. Miller, of course, puts them in Elizabethan dress, which only confuses matters all the more.
  • Best insult: So many!
    • You whoreson dog, you slave, you cur!
    • A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a lily-livered, action-taking, whoreson, glass-gazing, super-serviceable, finical rogue; one trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd in way of good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pander, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch.
    • And yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter, or rather a disease that’s in my flesh which I must needs call mine, Thou art a boil, a plague sore, an embossed carbuncle in my corrupted blood
    • You’re not worth the dust that the rude wind blows in your face
    • Milk-livered man, that bear’st a cheek for blows
    • A most toad-spotted traitor
    • And finally we get the title of Taylor Swift’s next breakup album: “You base football player!”
  • Best word: Yokefellow
  • Best production of this play I’ve seen: I just saw it once, in Startford ON, which was good but Paul Gross was a fairly low-energy Lear.
  • Notable Names in the BBC Adaptation: They had originally planned to do it with Robert Shaw but he died unexpectedly during the planning stages. As it turned out, the only familiar face is Penelope Wilton returning as Regan.
How’s the cast? 
  • Michael Horden is excellent as a very haggard Lear. Everyone else is good but Miller did a bit too well casting for family resemblance, because I had a hard time telling the three daughters apart and the two sons apart.
How’s the direction by Jonathan Miller?
  • The good news is that, after producing the last two seasons and making a lot of bad decisions (not the least of which was having a white Othello), a new season begins here and Miller is now out as producer. But on his way out the door, he does one last job, directing this play for the new producer. And he repeats a lot of the mistakes he made before, such as using Elizabethan dress and stagebound sets, but of course the real job of a director is to get great performances, and he does that here.
Storyteller’s Rulebook: Great Plays Transcend Bad Politics

Many things made the England of 1603 unjust, but one of the worst was primogeniture. Basically, only the first born legitimate son could inherit anything and everyone else, especially daughters and illegitimate sons, was out in the cold. Shakespeare could have seen the injustice of this and protested it, but, to put it mildly, he does not do that here. 

Instead, this play could be seen as a paean to primogeniture, because it shows why it’s a bad idea to inherit your daughters and your bastard sons. Cordelia presumably would have done a better job if she had inherited some land, but she wisely rejects it and it’s made clear by several characters that the two daughters who do accept the land are particularly perfidious because they’re women. (“Women will all turn monsters.”)

And certainly Edmund does not paint a good portrait of bastard sons. (Has there ever been a good bastard son in literature? The most obvious answer is Jon Snow in Game of Thrones, but it’s the exception that proves the rule, because it eventually turns out that he’s not really a bastard, which explains his nobility.)

So the politics are bad here. But it’s a great play for lots of other reasons. Ultimately, once we begin condemning works for failing to stand up to power systems in place at the time, we’ll lose almost everything. We should still particularly praise authors who, in addition to their other gifts, actually were on the right side of history on whichever issues they address, and we should be hyper-aware of poisonous political messages lurking in the bosom of plays like Lear, but, given that, we should marvel all the more at Shakespeare’s ability to create something so emotionally powerful when coming from a politically dubious place.

Straying From the Party Line: Come Up With Complimentary Plots and Subplots

From a storytelling point of view, the biggest flaw of this play is that the plot and the subplot are too similar. Both Lear and Gloucester believe a lying child (or children) over an honest child, lose everything, end up howling mad in the same rainstorm on the same heath, finally figure it out only to keel over dead at the very end for no real reason (one of joy, one of grief).

Shakespeare usually does a much better job coming up with an A-plot and B-plot that compliment each other by approaching the same themes with different tones and plot turns. In the last play we looked at, for instance, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the teenagers in the A-plot and the fairies in the B-plot both had jealousies and love-potion shenanigans, but neither felt like a repeat of the other. They each resonate together richly.

At first, the two plots in this play are on different tracks and, while hitting the same beats, barely intersect, until the third act when Lear’s bad daughters both fall for Gloucester’s bad son. There shouldn’t be this much of a record scratch when we jump from one plot to the other, as is the case in the first two acts.

Worse, each story is precisely as bleak as the other. Both fathers suffer so extremely that we yearn for more tonal relief, and switching back and forth between these two plots provides none. (Lear’s fool provides just a bit of comic relief to his plot, and he’s my favorite character, but he doesn’t really try to alleviate the grimness)

Many consider this to be Shakespeare’s greatest play, but, for this reason, I must disagree. I would still put it very high, but not in the Top 5.

Storyteller’s Rulebook: Express Love in Ways That Love Has Never Been Expressed Before

So do I have anything positive to say? Yes, obviously, there is much to praise in this devastating play.

The most powerful moment is when Gloucester, who’s had his eyes gouged out by Regan and her husband, wanders the heath and runs into his good son Edgar, who (as was the case with Hamlet) may have gone mad or may be feigning madness (or both).

Gloucester, not recognizing his son’s voice, asks this stranger to lead him to a cliff he can jump off, and Edgar agrees, then leads him to the middle of a flat meadow, tells him about looking down a sheer cliff and encourages him to jump forward. Gloucester stumbles forward but there’s no cliff. Edgar then switches voices, pretends to be someone way down at the bottom of the cliff who has just seen him land, and convinces his father that he has fallen from a great height and survived, so he should now embrace life. (“Thy life is a miracle.”) This works. It’s a truly bizarre way for a father to try to save his father’s suicidal soul, and makes for a delightful scene.

This is a play about human behavior pushed to horrific extremes by terrifying events. In such twisted times, love can only be expressed in twisted ways. The oddity of it makes it all the more transcendent.

Friday, October 04, 2024

37 Days of Shakespeare, Day 21: A Midsummer Night’s Dream

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, first broadcast December 13th, 1981
  • Possibly written: 1595 or 1596, possibly his 12th play. Very early for such a great play!
  • What’s it about? It’s very complex, but I’ll attempt to sum it up. In ancient Athens, Helena loves Demetrius who loves Hermia who loves Lysander who loves her back, but Hermia’s dad insists she marry Demetrius. Hermia and Lysander go into the woods at night to elope, followed by the other two trying to stop them. Meanwhile, fairies Titania and Oberon are feuding and their war affects the teenagers as well as some workmen who are rehearsing their play in the forest. Oberon sends out his servant Puck with love potions, and soon the boys both switch their affection from Hermia to Helena, and Titania falls for one of the workmen, who has been given the head of a donkey. In the morning, the teens finally pair off into two happy couples and Bottom rejoins the workmen. They perform their play at a wedding, unintentionally amusing the other characters.
  • Most famous dialogue: Either “The course of true love never did run smooth,” or “Lord what fools these mortals be”
  • Sources: None! This is considered one of Shakespeare’s few truly original works. Aristophanes’ The Birds does have a scene similar to the scene with Titania and Bottom.
  • Best insult: Lots of them:
    • Away you Ethiope! Hang off, thou cat, thou burr; let loose or I will shake thee from me like a serpent. Out, tawny Tartar, out!
    • You juggler! You canker-blossom! Thou painted maypole
    • Get you gone, you dwarf, you minimus, of hind’ring knot-grass made! You bead! You acorn!
  • Best word: None stood out.
  • Best production of this play I’ve seen: I’ve seen many very good productions. One at Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem had a very funny Bottom. There was a good one at Stratford during the Iraq war that was shockingly warlike. But perhaps I have the most affection for the bare bones version I saw in the brief time we had a Shakespeare company here in Evanston. I loved that Flute, as Thisbe in the play at the end, gives a shockingly great performance that quiets the hecklers.
  • Notable Names in the BBC Adaptation: Helen Mirren returns for the first time since As You Like It, this time in the very different role of Titania. Geoffrey Palmer, who you’ve seen in a million things, shows up as Quince. They’re both very good.
How’s the cast?
  • Excellent. As you would expect from the BBC, the “teenagers” are a little long in the tooth, but they’re very funny, especially Cherith Mellor as Helena. The real stand-out is Phil Daniels as Puck. Moshinsky said he didn’t like portrayals of Puck as a harmless sprite and had Daniels play him as an “anti-establishment punk.” (He sounds like Billy Bragg, so I guess that’s an Essex accent?) I’d never seen a scary Puck who genuinely dislikes the people he’s zonking, and it’s a great interpretation.
How’s the direction by Elijah Moshinsky?
  • It’s delightful. Everything is very funny and, as opposed to the last two, which were over three hours long, this one is under two hours because it’s played fast, so fast in fact that they spend half the time talking right over each other. The sets, while stagy, are beautiful, with much use made of pools and puddles, and the lighting really makes it feel like a forest on a moonlit night.
Rulebook Casefile: The Case for Imperfection

Previously on this blog and in one of my books, I talk about being T.A. for Andrew Sarris’s Hitchcock class at Columbia, and a student asking me, “Why does everybody say that Vertigo is better than North by Northwest, when North by Northwest is generally considered to be perfectly constructed and Vertigo is so messy.” My answer was that depth is found in holes. Vertigo’s plot holes make it deeper, more mysterious, and more beautiful.

Likewise, this play has always been my favorite Shakespeare play. But it’s a mess.

The pacing is bizarre. Every other comedy builds up to the fifth act, when all of the misunderstandings are resolved in the final scene and true love wins out at the last possible minute. But in this play, that all happens in the fourth act. Almost every storyline wraps up in Act Four Scene Two, and Act Five is just a long one-scene epilogue, where our two pairs of happy lovers just do some heckling while the workmen put on their play.

I’ve always wondered when I’ve seen this play on stage or screen, if anyone has ever tried to “fix” it, slice and dice it, and move the resolution of the teenager and fairy plots until after (or during) the performance of the workmen’s play. I think you would have to make a terrible hash of it if you did, but I’ve never stopped thinking about ways to do it.

But no, this is as it should be. Shakespeare, masterfully splicing together other people’s plots, would usually interweave many story elements until they tie together into a beautiful fifth act bow. In this, one of the only plays without source material, he doesn’t try, and allows many of his (original) plot elements to be resolved early, with only one plot element awkwardly spilling over into the final act. It’s a somewhat baffling decision, but still wildly entertaining.

It’s a mess, but it’s his most beautiful mess, and greater than many plays that are far more (and perhaps far too) tidy.

Straying From the Party Line: Don’t Give Physical Descriptions of Your Actors!

This is one of the few Shakespeare plays which limits who can play which part, because it’s a big element of the dialogue that Helena is taller than Hermia. And indeed, I think in every production I’ve seen they did cast the taller actress as Helena. It breaks a big rule of playwriting, because it means they can’t cast just anybody in any part, but it’s a very funny dialogue runner (see the insults above), so Shakespeare can get away with it just this once.

Storytellers Rulebook: Redeem the Old “Take Her Glasses Off” Trick

The production does an old trick: Helena wears glasses (one of many anachronisms) and, when Demetrius finally realizes he loves her, the glasses are, of course, off.  But I loved that later, when they spend the fifth act just heckling the play, the couple are happy together and the glasses are, thankfully, back on.  Guys may not make passes at girls who wear glasses, but once they realize they’ve found the one, they’ll hopefully let you see again.