Happy Christmas!

This is just a short entry to wish you all a very Happy Christmas and to let you know that I have not forgotten this blog, even though it may seem I have neglected it of late. This has been due to technical issues and inordinate demands on my time because of family matters and travel. But Shakespeare has been with me all along, and I am now nearing completion of the Collected Works, even though I have not been able to post entries lately. These will appear again soon and in chronological order. I have decided after that to continue the Shakespeare blog and write about various other aspects of his life and work than just the plays, poems and film adaptations that have formed the bulk of this year's posts. I quickly realised that there is just so much that can and should be addressed when it comes to Shakespeare, and one never really finishes with him. So, until the next entry (which will concern Henry V), may I wish you all a very Happy Christmas!

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING –The One With Shakespeare’s Stupidest Character

Much Ado About Nothing is many people’s favourite Shakespeare comedy, and it certainly has great potential to sparkle on stage given the right actors and energy, but for my part it has not been a play I particularly have cared for or list among my favourite comedies, though I have never really been able to pin down why –perhaps it is just that I like some of the others so much better, or identify with characters in them more than in this play where I struggle to find a sympathetic ”guide” to drag me along into this particular world and milieu.

However, upon reading it afresh I have come to appreciate it more, not least for its fine balance of comedy and drama, though I find it hard with this play in particular to get certain performances I have seen out of my mind. And this is probably because Much Ado About Nothing, more than many other Shakespeare plays (and that’s including other comedies) cries out to be performed and really only works and blooms when it does. The playfulness of the comedy, and in particular the fast exchanges between Beatrice and Benedick need to be staged to be fully enjoyed. And yet and close reading reveals the skill with which Shakespeare constructs their ripostes and allows us to appreciate more of the many puns and twists of language that he employs –which in performance frequently hurtle past us so fast that we can only just take them in before the next one whizzes towards us. And the comic dexterity here is sharp and delicious –less ornate and ”showy-offy” than in Love’s Labour’s Lost, and in no way as trite as in for instance The Merry Wives of Windsor. The comedy (and here I refer to the scenes and story between Beatrice and Benedick) is modern, instantly grasped and delightful not only to the audience/reader, but also to the other characters of the play, some of whom delight in matching these two supposed ”opposites” together.

But, and it is sometimes hard to remember, the play is not essentially about Beatrice and Benedick, even though they are the characters who everyone remembers. They are actually ”supporting characters” –but, just like in so many Hollywood romantic comedies– it is the supporting characters who steal the show. The ”main” love story of Much Ado About Nothing is between Hero and Claudio –the young sweethearts– and their path to love has to pass through far darker woods than those of Beatrice and Benedick. At times we are almost in Romeo and Juliet territory, and there are certainly strong thematic links between the two plays. And there is even more darkness here –the fascinating and hard-to-grasp character of Don John; a man who is one of Shakespeare’s absolute darkest creations –there is an unwritten play in his life story. And though he supposedly comes good in the end, I wonder…

And then we come to Dogberry…

Well, Dogberry is the stupidest character in all of Shakespeare. That’s pretty much without a doubt as far as I am concerned. I have carefully considered possible other contenders for that title and no one comes close. There are all manner of FOOLISH people in Shakespeare (and none of the ”fools” are at all stupid) –Sir Andrew Aguecheek, for instance, and plenty of gullible, clownish, naive and feeble-minded poor dears, but there are all relatively few plain STUPID characters. And what makes Dogberry particularly stupid is that he flaunts his stupidity in the guise of believing himself to be much more intelligent than he is –and primarily because as constable he has been given a position of (small) power. Stick a moron in a uniform or give them a badge and they think they’re God Almighty! One feels sure Shakespeare must have encountered such characters in his daily life, for the portrayal is wickedly funny, but one does so want to slap/smack him (Dogberry, that is, not Shakespeare). I rate it as another sign of Shakespeare’s supreme gift of universality –he fills his plays with all kinds of people, and, with a very, very few exceptions he is always fair to his characters in that he presents them honestly, no matter how important, grand, slight, flawed or, in this case, plain stupid they may be. But Dogberry’s stupidity and petty bureaucratic power-trip and failure to act almost causes tragic consequences in the central ”love plot” of the two young main characters. Without his stupidity there would be no drama, so he is thus an important character in the unfolding of the story.

Yet Dogberry is the kind of character who would puff and peacock himself precisely because I have just called him the stupidest character in all of Shakespeare. He would consider that a great honour! And Dogberry, dastardly, thick and annoying as he is is not a caricature –he just happens to be that way, poor sod! And there are such people in the world; believe me, I’ve met them!

Favourite Line:

Beatrice:
I am gone, though I am here.
(Act 4, Sc.1)
(and add most of Benedick’s speeches)

Character I would most like to play: Benedick

HENRY IV PART TWO –The One With Rumour and a Trailer!

Henry IV Part Two starts with a very intriguing, and for Shakespeare unique, prologue. The stage direction: Enter RUMOUR, painted full of tongues really says it all. This is an innovation more associated with classical, and especially Roman, theatre –a characterization of an abstract. Shakespeare has used prologues before (for example in Romeo and Juliet) and the technique will be further continued and reach its highest narrative effect in Henry V, but unlike in those plays, Rumour here makes only this one appearance, at the beginning of a play. As a theatre technique its novelty would certainly get the audience’s attention (as it does the reader), for the image is very striking, and it magnificently sets the stage for what is to come. What I particularly like, though, is that Shakespeare is clearly eager to experiment, and try new things, new ways of bringing his audience in. It’s an avantgarde device, in an otherwise narratively quite straightforward play, though –another typically shrewd Shakespeare stroke of commercial savvy – the play ends with what can only be described as a trailer –an unashamed plug for the next ”episode” –that of Henry V. This epilogue is sometimes spoken by the ”Rumour” character of the prologue, and that would seem to satisfy a desire for neatness (and economy) on the part of a director, but it is not made explicit in the text that these two speeches are given by the same character.

The play itself continues the story of Henry IV and the events leading up to his death and the accession of his son Hal to the throne, as Henry V. Like Part One, the story is both intimate and familial, with the scenes between father and son, being particularly brilliant, and sprawling on a fairly grand scale. Thus, there are family squabbles and battles, and though the play is generally darker than part one, there are numerous scenes and moments of comedy, naturally often involving Falstaff. Yet Falstaff’s comic trajectory takes a nose-dive in this play when he is rejected by the newly crowned king, and he is left a broken man. And because we have come to love this rogue, we cannot but feel a sense of sympathy with him in the final instance, even though we may equally understand the reasons the new king (Prince Hal) must shake off his ”former self” and steer away from those who have been so much a part of his youth. Or do we? Perhaps the new king is too harsh? I have always found his behaviour a little troubling, but Shakespeare is typically brilliant in creating this sometimes unsettling ambiguity in a character who would otherwise be too ”perfect” were he without flaws. I worked quite extensively on Henry/Hal’s character when I was at drama school, and always found this particular play to be the most intriguing of the three he appears in (four if you count his very brief appearance in Richard II).

Shakespeare also shows his theatrical savy by both giving us more of what we liked in Part One, and introducing enough new characters and plot moments to keep us on our toes. Some of the new characters here had actually been introduced in The Merry Wives of Windsor, so they would be quite familar already though in a different context. Justice Shallow, is perhaps my favourite, but we also get the explosive braggart Pistol, whose trajectory will continue through into Henry V. And who can forget the wonderfully named Doll Tearsheet!

Though I admit to liking Henry IV Part One somewhat more than the follow up, that is only a personal preference; both parts compliment each other and together they present a magnificent pageant of a particular time and atmosphere that is unmatched anywhere else in Shakespeare in breadth and development of myriad characters from low to high. And whereas Part One is for me a richer play, Part Two contains more individual scenes, speeches and ”moments” that astound, delight and inspire me upon re-reading it. Of the productions I have seen, I again rate the RSC’s version of the early 1990s as the best, but I have recently been quite pleased with at least large parts of the television version presented in The Hollow Crown, though, of course, I was sad about many of the cuts. I have recently acquired an earlier BBC version of both parts of Henry IV (the published version of which forms the photograph at the top of this entry), but as yet I have not had the opportunity to see it.

Favourite Line:

Falstaff
If I had a thousand sons, the first human principle I would teach them should be to forswear thin potations, and to addict themselves to sack.
(Act IV, Sc.3)

Character I would most like to play: Falstaff or Pistol

THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR –The One Requested By Queen Elizabeth!

At least that’s how the legend goes –Queen Elizabeth I was, apparently, a great fan of Falstaff and famously expressed a desire to see him in love, prompting Shakespeare to write this delightfully frothy, cheeky comedy before completing Henry IV Part Two (which again will feature Falstaff and several other characters who appear in The Merry Wives of Windsor)

Thus, it would seem Shakespeare is pandering directly to his audience, many of whom would doubtless have shared Queen Elizabeth’s wish, and what a great way to do it: Without interfering with the narrative of the historical plays in any way, he keeps it ”hot on the stove” by showing another side of its comic characters, and placing them in a suspiciously more Elizabethan world than the period of the Henry IV plays –without that really making much difference. This is Shakespeare’s first ”spin-off” play! And it’s light, bright and sharp, and wholly rewarding as a theatrical experience.

It’s also great fun to read aloud, with the opportunity to try out many different voices –for here Shakespeare has given us some really golden comic characters to sink our teeth into. And though Falstaff, as expected, dominates and is the crux and butt of the comedy, the supporting characters are no less interesting and amusing, and almost all of them could have a play unto themselves. They are each of them busily occupied with their own little strifes and concerns and pettiness in the best soap opera manner, yet brought together through various intertwining plots –at the heart of which lies the obligatory love story; in this case the wooing of the clearly very attractive and desirable Miss Page by numerous parties, both worthy and unworthy. Much of the intrigue and plot of the play is somehow connected to this endeavour.

The ”merry wives” of the title are older characters, one being Miss Page’s mother, and a great deal of the play’s comedy concerns the tricks they play on Falstaff (who is unashamedly after their money) and their own jealous husbands. But everyone seems to be playing tricks on each other in this play, or trying to get ”one-up” on a rival, and so there is much petty domestic squabbling and intrigue –which makes this play seem somehow more modern that a number other Shakespeare comedies; the people we meet are not kings and queens or even princes, but middle-class folk going about the business of living their lives, and this is reflected in that virtually the whole play is written in prose rather than verse. Thus it seems instantly more down-to-earth and accessible than some of the more refined courtly dramas of Shakespeare. Here he seems to be playing in a lighter key, allowing himself a cheeky freedom and gaiety he will not really return to in any of the plays to come. Indeed, this is perhaps the lightest and frothiest of all Shakespeare’s plays (and I don’t mean that as a criticism in any way) Though there will be more comedies to come, they will always have a touch of darkness about them (even Much Ado About Nothing has some pretty dark moments) or, increasingly, introduce elements of melancholy. In The Merry Wives of Windsor, there is none of that –but there is farce, satire, sexual innuendo, slapstick, hanky panky, scathing wit, cunning plans, arguments of words, music and folklore shenanigans –AND, I believe, Shakespeare’s only instance of a character in drag! (Falstaff has to dress as the wonderfully named ”wise woman of Brainford” in order to escape detection by a suspicious jealous husband when visiting one of the ”merry wives”)

I thoroughly enjoyed revisiting The Merry Wives of Windsor and delighted in discovering new gems in its colourful kaleidoscope of comic treasures. Many of the puns and clever twists of language are easier to appreciate when reading rather than seeing a performance when one is naturally drawn along more by all the visual information of plot, character and action. But it is primarily a play to delight in and be carried along by rather than to dwell too much on, or seek deeper meaning in, other than an appreciation of what you are presented with –skillful construction, high comedy, memorable characters, and lots and lots of fun. And I’m sure Elizabeth I must have been delighted too!

Favourite Line:

Falstaff
I cannot cog, and say thou art this and that, like a many of these lisping, hawthorn-buds that come like women in men’s apparel, and smell like Bucklersburry in simple time; I cannot; but I love thee, none but thee; and thou deserv’st it.
(Act III, Sc.3)

Character I would most like to play: Falstaff (But Ford, Doctor Caius and Sir Hugh Evans are all delightfully appealing parts too.)

HENRY IV PART 1 –The One That Introduces Falstaff

Henry IV Part One holds a special place in my Shakespeare heart as it is not only one of my absolute favourite amongst his plays, but one which I have had the good fortune to see numerous marvellous productions of, including the terrific Royal Shakespeare Company version of the early 1990s, in which Robert Stephens as Falstaff gave the finest performance I have ever seen by anyone on any stage, anywhere. And without comparing myself in any way to that aforementioned great actor, I myself have played numerous scenes from this play over the years, as Falstaff, Prince Hal and Henry the Fourth himself, and thoroughly enjoyed every moment doing so. There have also been some brilliant televised versions, most recently as part of The Hollow Crown series, and I recommend this to anyone curious about the play.

Thus, revisiting the text is both a joyful experience and a slightly dangerous one. Joyful because of memories evoked from previous encounters with the play on stage or on screen; dangerous because such memories can easily influence the impartiality of one’s reading. A colourful character like Falstaff may be seen in numerous ways, but as one reads his lines it is so very, very tempting to conjour up performances of the past. I should state, right away, that I am a huge Falstaff fan, and consider him the finest comic character ever created, so this entry will probably be more slanted to him than to any of the play’s other characters, but that is not to say they are any less interesting in their own right. Falstaff, after all, is essentially nothing more than a sidekick, the amusing supporting role, who (as is so often the case) creates such a mark that his character towers above all others in people’s minds, and leaves us wanting more, much more –fortunately, Shakespeare quickly ”got” this, and the character will appear in two more plays, including the direct sequel to this one. Here he represents one extreme –we are drawn to him much as Prince Hal is, and though we may be frequently appalled by his behaviour, we are fascinated by his audacity and sheer mastery of life and living to the full.

However, the play is titled Henry the Fourth (in nature and character the king is Falstaff’s direct opposite), and the serious action of the play concerns Henry's uneasy reign and his attempts to quell rebellion from disgruntled former allies who have now turned against him. There is a tenseness about Henry that prevails throughout, and he is both burdened with feelings of guilt about his own accession to the throne (by overthrowing Richard II), and exasperated by the seeming inadequacy of his heir, the young Prince Hal, whose happy-go-lucky, carefree lifestyle of drinking and partying with miscreants like Falstaff, is anything but what the King expects or needs from his successor. The king regards his son as a failure, a loser, and admires far more in this respect the other Henry of the play –Hotspur, the son of his main enemy who seems to embody all the traits and character that the king’s own son lacks. And really, the central conflict of the play is this personal one between father and son, rather than the grander conflict of warring factions. Thus, the play is essentially very personal and immediate, and gripping too because we are right in there seeing the king trying to hold things together in both his kingdom and his family. The ironic conceit, of course is that everyone encountering the play knows (or should know) that Prince Hal will come up to scratch and later become the most illustrious and heroic of all English Kings, Henry V, and Shakespeare drops a few hints about this here and there, and part of the brilliance of Henry IV Part One is the way Hal is suspended between the influence of Falstaff and his crowd on one side and the King and court and his duty on the other. Though both are important to him he cannot play to both masters, and it is through learning from both and choosing between them that we see him becoming the great king to be.

Aside from all this Henry IV Part One is a glorious patchwork of England at this time. The many memorable scenes in the tavern seem ageless –though nominally set in the early1400s they would be instantly recognizable to Elizabethan audiences who first saw the play, and are just as much so today –every pub has its braggarts, its gullible hangers-on, its storytellers and its pranksters. And there are plenty of memorable set-pieces, both in this tavern setting and elsewhere throughout the play. My personal favourite is Falstaff’s boasting of how he fought off an attack by two... four... seven... nine... ruffians, his lies and exaggerations growing from line to line. And anyone looking for colourful insults to add to their repertoire need look no further than the marvellously salty exchanges of name-calling between Prince Hal and Falstaff. Shakespeare must surely have enjoyed creating them as much as we delight in hearing them! (see the exchange under Favourite line(s) below for an example)

Finally, I must mention briefly two of the female characters that inhabit this otherwise very male play. Lady Percy (the wife of Hotspur) is a relatively small but memorable part, with a great speech and scene with her husband in Act II, and one almost wishes she featured more in the play. And Mistress Quickly, hostess of the Boar’s Head, makes the first of her several appearances in Shakespeare’s works. She, like the other ”regulars” of the tavern can very easily be overplayed or presented as mere bawdy caricatures, but I think there is a lot more to her than this, and intelligent productions cotton on to that without negating her comic role. She is a bit like a mother hen to all these miscreants, someone they so often take for granted, but without whom they (and the play itself) would be all the poorer.

Favourite Line(s):

Prince Hal (of Falstaff)
..this sanguine coward, this bed-presser, this horse-back-breaker, this huge hill of flesh–
Falstaff (to Prince Hal)
’Sblood, you starveling, you eel-skin, you dried neat’s-tongue, you bull’s pizzle, you stock-fish – O for breath to utter what is like thee! – you tailor’s yard, you sheath, you bow-case, you vile standing tuck!
(Act II, Sc.4)

Character I would most like to play: Falstaff (again) or Hotspur

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE –The One With the Pound of Flesh!

The Comical History of the Merchant of Venice, or Otherwise Called the Jew of Venice (as it is titled in the First Folio) is undoubtedly one of Shakespeare’s most famous plays (and among of my own personal favourites), but both it and the character of Shylock have a certain notoriety because of the unavoidable question of anti-semitism. Shylock is not a particularly big part (he’s only in a few scenes), but it’s a great part, such that it dominates the play in much the way Falstaff will in Henry IV soon after. He is undoubtedly the villain of the piece, but I don’t find the presentation of him to be narrower or unfairer than that of any other of Shakespeare’s creations. Certainly the play deals with the issue of anti-semitism, but it is seen primarily in the way Shylock is treated by many of the other characters rather than his own character –I think Shylock is a fascinating character, and to call him a caricature or stereotype is to negate the subtext of so much of his words and actions. Essentially, I think he is a very sad person, but that does not mean we have to be sympathetic to him or condone his actions.

The play is ostensibly described as a comedy, but this is an ill-fitting coat; much of the action of the play is far from comic, and the play falls more into a category best described as ”a mixed bag” –part tragedy, part comedy, part romance, but, unlike many other such unclassifiable plays, one that somehow almost always seems to work on stage. I think this is primarily because there is at its heart a really good story, or rather several stories, linked through good characters and terrific set pieces, like the choosing of the caskets and Act IV’s famous court scene. This is the first time I have actually read the whole play. Previously, I have only read extracts or worked on speeches from it, but I knew the play well nonetheless, having seen several wonderful productions, both on stage and screen. Each of these had their outstanding moments, but the best overall stage production I’ve seen was that produced at Birmingham Rep in 1997, directed by Bill Alexander. Trevor Nunn’s tired production at the Royal National Theatre in 2000 was by far the worst, but even in that the power of the story shone through. I also recall a very odd Danish production directed by Staffan Holm at Copenhagen’s Royal Theatre back in 1993 which concluded by having an enormous golden ball roll across the stage, Indiana Jones-style, while the song Mad About the Boy blared over the loudspeakers (I really must do a blog entry on bizarre and whacky innovations in Shakespeare productions!)

Favourite Line:

Lorenzo:
The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treason, stratagems and spoils.
(Act 5, Sc.1)

Character I would most like to play: Shylock (but Portia would be fun too)

KING JOHN –The One First to be Filmed!

King John (aka The Life and Death of King John) is an odd play in the Shakespeare canon. For one thing it is a history play that stands apart from all the others, not fitting neatly into the chronological sequence of the other English histories. King John’s reign was from 1199 to 1216, thus the play takes place long before the great cycle of plays starting with Richard II. Secondly, its tone is very different to many of the other histories –perhaps because Shakespeare (it is believed) based his play on the framework of an earlier anonymous play: The Troublesome Reign of John, King of England, and –with some notable exceptions– pretty much followed that play’s scene-by-scene construction; much more so than with other plays he ”adapted”. Some people believe that Shakespeare himself wrote the earlier play too and that King John as published in the First Folio is actually Shakespeare’s later, modified, version.

It is certainly very rarely performed these days, though as of May 2016 there happens to be a production directed by Trevor Nunn running in London. I have not had the opportunity to see this, or indeed ever seen a production of it. Yet in Victorian times it was one of Shakespeare’s most popular and frequently performed plays –perhaps because of the Victorians' fondness for declamatory acting (which this play lends itself to extremely well.) Its popularity at that time is probably one of the reasons it was the first Shakespeare play ever to be filmed –albeit as a short, silent adaptation– way back in 1899. I believe this may be viewed on YouTube!

In addition to most people probably never having seen the play performed, I would boldly state that very few will have read it, or know much about it, despite King John in so many ways being key to British history. Everyone knows something about him though –if only through his connection with the signing of Magna Carta (which is, perhaps surprisingly, not part of the play), or his reputation as a sneaky, slimy go-getter through his role in the story of his brother Richard the Lionheart and the Robin Hood legend. (For some reason I still always see John in my mind’s eye as the conniving, crowned big cat in the Disney cartoon!)

King John in Shakespeare’s play comes across as a hard but much more rounded character than portrayed elsewhere, but it is difficult to really ”get hold” of him as a man –certainly compared to the other great Shakespeare kings of British history who are much more open to us in revealing their inner workings. Much of the play’s language is heavier too, which makes our enjoyment of it more of a challenge than usual. Like Richard II, it is written in verse, but is frequently more obscure and less stylised than that play. The New Penguin version edited by R.L. Smallwood has the best notes and most useful commentary of the editions I have come across.

Interestingly for the histories, Shakespeare puts a character at the centre of the story who never actually existed historically: Philip (Faulconbridge) –revealed in the play as Richard the Lionheart’s bastard son. Shakespeare makes a lot of this character and gives him some wonderful lines and scenes. Just about all the other characters are historically accurate (in that they actually lived, at least), but as always, there is much compressing of time and events, and a certain amount of dramatic licence in the way scenes unfold. A great deal of the play consists of bickering –it’s a real family power struggle at heart, and though frequently vicious there is also a certain amount of humour in the constant taunting and accusing of the various parties. It lends itself somewhat to satire in this respect, but the latter part of the play has some extremely dark moments, and for me the play really comes alive in the last two acts.

Leaving the biggest impression (on me, at least) is the story of Arthur, John’s young nephew who, being the son of Prince Geoffrey (John’s older brother), is the rightful heir to the crown. He is ultimately gotten out of the way and the scene in which he pleads with Hubert of Angiers, his would-be executioner, in Act IV is one of the most poignant in all Shakespeare (it’s also a wonderful piece to do as an extract or as an exercise for two actors). In fact, the whole play is filled with potentially exciting confrontations for actors to get their teeth into, which (if they are good) may make up for the fact that the arc of the drama itself doesn’t match the greatness of style and execution of Shakepeare’s more exalted and popular history plays.

Favourite Line:

Philip the Bastard:
Mad world! Mad kings! Mad composition!
(Act 2, Sc.1)

Character I would most like to play: Hubert of Angiers