“Welcome Spirit, How Camest Thou hither?” The sources for Puck
Puck, in medieval English folklore, a malicious fairy or demon. In Old and Middle English the word meant simply “demon.” In Elizabethan lore he was a mischievous, brownielike fairy also called Robin Goodfellow, or Hobgoblin. As one of the leading characters in William Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, Puck boasts of his pranks of changing shapes, misleading travelers at night, spoiling milk, frightening young girls, and tripping venerable old dames. The Irish pooka, or púca, and the Welsh pwcca are similar household spirits.
Shakespeare also took inspiration from English poet Edmund Spencer, who visited Ireland in the 1590s and adapted the folklore he picked up into his opera The Fairy Queen, which Shakespeare adapted into A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Types of fairies you can “spot” at the Lullymore Park in Ireland:
Puck/Robin’s Dual Nature
The old stories tell that Fairies are magical creatures who live in hollow places in the earth. Some are benevolent and help give rain and pleasant weather to the Earth, Like the king and Queen of the fairies, Oberon and Titania:
And the mazed world, By their [the tides] increase, now knows not which is which: And this same progeny of evils comes From our debate, from our dissension; We are their parents and original.
— Titania, (Queen of the Faries), A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act II, Scene i.
Titania in this speech shows great concern for nature, humanity, and the planet. She believes it is the responsibility of fairies, particularly herself and her husband Oberon, to control the elements and keep humans and fairies safe. Some fairies, however, are cruel and enjoy playing tricks on mortals, just like Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, or Queen Mab in Romeo and Juliet.
Close reading of Puck’s speech (MND II, i)
Close reading of Puck’s speech (MND II, i)
Close reading of Puck’s speech (MND II, i)
Close reading of Puck’s speech (MND II, i)
Close reading of Puck’s speech (MND II, i)
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This is a short analysis I created of the tricks Puck plays on people in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as part of my acting course on Ouschool.com. Note the different ways Puck is portrayed in photos as a satyr, a rotund elf, and sometimes as an almost- demon like figure.
Punishments or contracts with fairies formed a significant part of Goodfellow’s purpose on earth. While he could issue good fortune and support, this was always at the cost of those involved. As Reginald Scot commented, Goodfellow had a ‘standing fee’ of a ‘mess of white bread and milk’, which he expected after supporting housewives with their chores. If his payment was forgotten, Goodfellow was believed to steal from the home that owed him, often stealing grain and milk from the dairy.
Abigail Sparkes, Historic UK.com
Performing Puck
Because Puck is not human, and somewhat ambiguous in the text, an actor can play Puck in many different ways. Generally speaking, actors tend to explore Puck’s attitude toward humans, their love of mischief, and how to translate that physically and vocally
Puck. My mistress with a monster is in love. Near to her close and consecrated bower, While she was in her dull and sleeping hour, A crew of patches, rude mechanicals, Were met together to rehearse a play The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort, Who Pyramus presented, in their sport Forsook his scene and enter’d in a brake When I did him at this advantage take, An ass’s nole I fixed on his head:
Anon his Thisbe must be answered, And forth my mimic comes. So, at his sight, away his fellows fly; And, at our stamp, here o’er and o’er one falls; He murder cries and help from Athens calls. I led them on in this distracted fear, And left sweet Pyramus translated there: When in that moment, so it came to pass, Titania waked and straightway loved an ass!
I am just ecstatic to talk about this year’s hit Broadway Musical Six. It swept the Tonys, and has opened up touring productions across the country, and I JUST GOT TO SEE IT!
This vibrant, clever retelling of Tudor her-story was created by TOBY MARLOW & LUCY MOSS in association with the Chicago Shakespeare Festival. The show is incredibly smart, and creative, and delves into the lives of some fascinating women, re-told as a singing contest with the characters singing their lives for you to judge what it was like being the queen of England and living with the turbulent and fickle Henry VIII.
What really appeals to me in this show is that like Hamilton, the musical takes these six semi-mythical women and tells their story in a way that is fresh and exciting. It bridges the gap between Tudor History and the modern-day by equating being a queen with being a celebrity, with all the drama of ambitious parents, romantic drama, public opinion, and even being exploited and sexualized by a male-dominated society. This comes across in the music, the costumes, the lyrics, and even the lighting!
Why “Six” Slaps
The costumes are brilliant and iconic. Catherine Of Aragon is like a cross between Beyonce, a saint, and a medieval knight. The lighting is incredible! You could tell the whole story using the lighting design as it pulsates, dances, changes into different colors, turns into different shapes, and finally flashes the name of the show in triumphant gold letters.
One particularly brilliant way the music works in “Six” is the fact that it uses the song “Greensleeves” as a motif both musically and thematically. One big theme of the show is how, unlike Henry VIII, most of the history of his six queens is lost and replaced by legends and even songs. The first line of the show is the famous rhyme about their fates: “Divorced. Beheaded. Died. Divorced. Beheaded. Survived.” As the video above helps illustrate, Marlowe and Moss know that most people only know the rhyme about their deaths and the myth that Henry wrote a song about one of them; that their lives are overshadowed by their deaths and the misconceptions that people have written over the years. Howard Ho points out how the song musically forces itself into the first number, “Ex Wives,” but by the end of the show, the six queens break free from these musical bars! You can hear the change of key and notes during this performance at the Tonys, which puts the opening number and closing reprise together.
The Cast of “Six” perform live at the 2021 Tony Awards.
But how do the queens go from “one word in a stupid rhyme,” to a group of powerful, individual queens singing in harmony, without the man who made them famous? That’s what the solo numbers in “Six” do so incredibly well- tell each queen’s solo stories as rocking ballads, hilarious dis-tracks, soulful love songs, and… well stay tuned.
Part II: The Women and Their Queenspirations
1. Catherine of Aragon
Catherine of Aragon was Henry’s first wife and is still universally beloved, even though Henry decided to divorce her. As the epitome of a stand-alone power queen, it makes sense that Six modeled her character, costume, and songs after Beyonce, with a Shakira-inspired Spanish beat for good measure:
My favorite thing about her solo, “No Way” is how the writers paraphrase her real-life speech during the divorce trial in 1529. Below are the lyrics and the real speech:
Alas, Sir, where have I offended you? Or what occasion have you of displeasure, that you intend to put me from you? I take God and all the world to witness that I have been to you a true, humble and obedient wife, ever conformable to your will and pleasure. This twenty years and more I have been your true wife, and whether it be true or no, I put it to your conscience.
— Katherine of Aragon, 1529
2. Anne Boleyn
In some ways, the version of Anne Boleyn in “Six” is less a pop version of the real queen and more of a commentary on the nature of celebrity. If you watch the video, you can see how in life she was admired for her beauty and fashion but hated for her comments on Queen Katherine, her scandalous love affairs, and her brash nature. This explains the spiky pop-punk princess look they gave her, (which evidently resonates with many audiences since I saw at least two girls cosplaying as Anne in the audience). Sort of like a celebrity who gets canceled on Twitter or Princess Diana, Anne shows how a person can be undone when they dare challenge an established order, especially the Royal Family.
After the show, I found it a bit weird that they portrayed Anne Boleyn as a jetsetting airhead, but then again she is one of the best-known queens in history, so they can get away with it. In reality, Anne Boleyn was highly educated and a member of an ambitious and social climbing family who basically pushed her to woo Henry. As you can see in this clip from “Anne Of A Thousand Days,” Henry and Anne’s family bullied her constantly to become the King’s mistress after HE ALREADY GOT HER SISTER PREGNANT, so Anne knew that the only way to keep Henry from ruining her life was to convince him to divorce Katherine of Aragon and marry her.
Of course, this strategy didn’t save Anne in the end, which says more about how cruel Henry VIII was, chewing up women and spitting them out in his ravenous quest for a son. So is this an accurate portrayal of Anne’s life? No. Is it fun, ABSOLUTELY!
III. Jane Seymore
I’m more than I seem, or am I?
“Six” The Musical.
This version of Jane Seymore was inspired by Adele, so appropriately, she has a heart-wrenching power ballad about her turbulent relationship with Henry. Sadly, we don’t know much about Jane’s real life, so the song takes some liberties. If you go to the Hampton Court Website, you can actually vote as to whether Jane was a devoted wife or a social climbing gold-digger. Probably the real woman was something even more complicated, though we’ll never know for sure.
IV. Anne of Cleaves
Anne of Cleaves is the funniest part of the show! Many of us have heard the story that Henry divorced Anne after he found her ‘ugly.’ What “Six The Musical” does is amend the story, by pointing out that after he divorced her, Henry gave her a castle and a huge retainer, allowing her to live like a queen, without being married to a king! Accordingly, her song is a Rhianna-style dis track that shows off her awesome lifestyle, and spits in Henry’s stupid face!
As fun as this, rags-to-riches story is, the truth is less fun- Anne was the sister of a German duke, so Henry’s lord Chancellor Thomas Cromwell probably forced Henry to marry her for diplomatic reasons (source: Hampton Court: “Anne of Cleaves”). Naturally, Henry didn’t like being told what to do- I suspect he resented Anne before even meeting her because he didn’t get to pick her himself.
As for whether Anne was actually ugly, the truth is really surprising- Henry actually disguised himself as a peasant during a masked ball when he first courted Anne, and she foundhim repulsive. At the time, Henry was 49 years old, and in very poor health. As such, he was intermittently impotent and blamed his inability to conceive a child with her on her supposed ugliness to save face.
Even though Anne in the show hates Henry, in reality, once the marriage was annulled, Anne and Henry remained good friends for years! She attended his next wedding to Katherine Howard, and, just like in the show, Henry treated her much better after the divorce:
‘YOU SHALL FIND US A PERFECT FRIEND, CONTENT TO REPUTE YOU AS OUR DEAREST SISTER. WE SHALL, WITHIN FIVE OR SIX DAYS …DETERMINE YOUR STATE MINDING TO ENDOW YOU WITH £4000 OF YEARLY REVENUE…YOUR LOVING BROTHER AND FRIEND.’
Henry VIII, 1548, six months after their wedding, when the annullment went through.
V. Katherine Howard
Without question, Katherine Howard is portrayed as the most tragic of Henry’s six wives and her song is a huge sucker punch. The writers never let you forget that Katherine’s first affair was when she was 13, and she died at age 19. Like Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymore, Henry picked Katherine for his queen among his ladies in waiting and her song “All You Wanna Do” satirizes his and many other men’s lustful appetites. The song begins as a raunchy, sexy pop ballad in the vein of Britney Spears’ “Toxic” and “Womanizer” about Katherine Howard’s love affairs, but then devolves into a cry for help, as Katherine confesses how she was abused, used, and manipulated by the men in her life, (including her own cousin Thomas Culpepper) until she was beheaded in 1542. It masterfully satires both Henry’s cruelty and the hypersexualization of teenage pop stars which certainly took its toll on Britney Spears and Ariana Grande, Katherine’s major ‘Queenspirations.’
VI. Katherine Parr
Historically, Katherine Parr had to turn away her fiancee Thomas Seymore (just like Anne Boleyn was previously engaged to Henry Percy) once the king set his eyes on her for his wife, so her song is a sad, soulful Alicia Keys-inspired bittersweet song where she tearfully says goodbye to Thomas to spare his feelings and probably his life.
Not only does this song once again show how Henry’s selfishness and his lust ruined the lives of the women he married, (as well as the men who already wanted to marry them), but it also sets up the main idea of the show:
His-Story overthrown
In the final number, the wives turn the tables on Henry- they have spent centuries being defined by him, but in reality, he is just as much defined by them! Going forward, history should not define these great women as just, “The Six Wives of Henry the Eighth,” but to celebrate their individual lives and contributions to history. Katherine Parr mentions this when she points out that in life, she fought to allow women to be educated, she wrote books, and was a scholar of theology. Historically, Henry and Katherine would argue about religion and he nearly executed her after she disagreed on points of theology, but Katherine kept her life by claiming she was “Not disagreeing with [him], but simply learning from [him].”
I Don’t Need Your Love is sung by Catherine Parr in SIX: The Musical. The first part of the song refers to her love of Thomas Seymour, whom she probably wanted to marry rather than Henry (and did marry after Henry’s death). However, the song also protests at the fact that women are often defined by their relationship with men, rather than as people in their own right. Catherine wants to be remembered for what she did, rather than the men she married or loved.
Katherine Parr, Six.
The final number completes the idea of the ‘historemix’ by having the Six queens/pop stars come up with a re-imagined happy ending for themselves, one that doesn’t include the pain that Henry inflicted on them: Katherine A becomes a singing nun, (like Whoopi Goldberg in Sister Act), while Anne Boleyn starts writing lyrics for Shakespeare (which is a fun idea since he does mention “Greensleeves” twice). Jane Seymore forms a band with her many surviving children, Katherine Howard goes solo, and Katherine Parr joins the other queens in a supergroup. It’s not at all historical, but it is a fun and sweet way to put an epilogue on these (mostly) tragic lives.
It’s odd, however, that the show invents an epilogue instead of talking about the six queen’s greatest legacy- Queens Elizabeth and MaryI. For a show that wants to highlight the often-forgotten legacy of these queens, it is an odd oversight. Remember Catherine and Anne gave birth to queens who eventually ruled England without a king. Jane Seymore gave birth to a king, and Catherine Parr helped raise them and restored them to the line of succession- She’s the reason her stepdaughters were able to become queens in the first place.
My issues with the epilogue aside, it is great to see history be recontextualized and shared in such an accessible way. We all know that European history is dominated by the names of white guys- king whoever, duke what’s-his name. To see important women in history be given a voice by a multi-ethnic cast is a great way to make it resonate, and using the metaphor of pop stars works extremely well in this context- these women mostly didn’t choose stardom, but they deserve it for what they went through.
Brava.
Educational links related to the six wives of Henry VIII:
Book cover for Ian Doescher’s “The Empire Striketh Back,” a Shakespearean parody of Star Wars Episode 5.
Well today is May 4rth, when a lot of people have chosen to celebrate one of the most iconic movies of the 20th century: Star Wars! And why not? The story is full of conflict, introspection, love, change, the conflict between fathers and sons, and occasionally guidance from ghosts. Wait, that sounds familiar- it’s a lot like Shakespeare! Yes, the movie has a lot of parallels with the Shakespearean canon, and I’d like to share some of those similarities here. Below is a post I did for the American Shakespeare Center about how the Star Wars prequels parallel Shakespeare’s history saga of Henry the Sixth:
As I was writing William Shakespeare’s The Empire Striketh Back, I was surprised to realize I had made more references to Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing than any other play. Much Ado is a comedy—probably my favorite of Shakespeare’s comedies—so it was strange that lines from it kept popping up in the darkest of the original Star Wars® trilogy.
William Shakespeare’s Star Wars is a series of parody plays written by Ian Doescher that takes the prose screenplays of the Star Wars story and transforms them into Elizabethan verse. Last time I mentioned how much I loved the cheeky references to Shakespeare and Star Wars, and how Doescher adapts the cinematic quality into Elizabethan drama very well. In my podcast, I also emphasized the way Doescher gives each character verbose Shakespearan language that works very well for radio and theater:
My podcast episode where I do dramatic readings of “Verily A New Hope.”
What I want to do with this post, (and the accompanying podcast), is to see whether this edition captures the fun, the clever wordplay, and the Shakespearean storytelling of “A New Hope,” with the second installment of the series, and if it helps to capture the shift in tone between the two movies, as Luke is tempted by the dark side and Han is betrayed and frozen by Lando.
Notes about the play
The first play in the series, “Verily, A New Hope,” took plot and structure inspiration from Henry V; it tells the story as an epic heroic story of Luke’s heroic deeds, much like how Henry V is about a king who grows from boy to man.
By the playwright’s own admission, the dialogue is stuffed with lots of re-purposed quotes from Much AdoAbout Nothing, Shakespeare’s comedy of a womanizing, self-centered soldier who becomes a devoted husband. This is appropriate since the Leia/ Han plot within the play and movie starts out with them bickering like Beatrice and Benedick. Doescher says this was an accident, but I think he might have subconsciously taken inspiration from their love affair to help structure the dialogue. In the accompanying podcast episode, I talk more about how the use of Much Ado quotes helped to flesh out the characters of Luke, Leia, and especially Han.
Structure
Movies and plays follow a similar structure where the action starts at a static place, tension rises, and finally, things get resolved at the end. A lot of the same elements are in both issues. The main difference is how they are arranged. Let’s see how Doescher translated the three-act structure of a screenplay, to the five-act structure of an Elizabethan tragedy.
A Chorus is a short speech where a character who is not part of the action of the play introduces the plot. It functions the same way as the famous title crawl at the beginning of Star Wars.
I mentioned last time that “Verily: A New Hope” uses choruses liberally, which is appropriate because the tone of this story is so much darker, and since the action follows the journeys of Han and Luke so closely Ian doesn’t use choruses as much. I suspect this is partly because unlike The Empire Strikes Back, A New Hope jumped around more between planets and locations and used wipes and other transitions heavily:
Below is a link to the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Learning Zone, where you can learn about the language of the Henry V chorus.
The literary technique of stichomythia has characters who speak at more or less the same time, using slightly different forms of dialogue. Doescher uses this well as a staging device by having Vader and Luke speak similar lines as Luke plummets down the shaft after losing his lightsaber duel:
These similar lines highlight the connection these two have (no spoilers), and also emphasize that, though the actors might be physically close onstage, their characters are meant to be far apart; they wouldn’t be saying this to each other.
In Romeo and Juliet, there’s an excellent example of stichomythia in Act IV, Scene iv, right after Juliet’s parents and Nurse discovers her, apparently dead. There is a long series of laments by her parents and nurse where they are shocked and horrified at her sudden death:
Lady Capulet. Accursed, unhappy, wretched, hateful day! 2702 Most miserable hour that e’er time saw In lasting labour of his pilgrimage! But one, poor one, one poor and loving child, But one thing to rejoice and solace in, And cruel death hath catch’d it from my sight!
Nurse. O woe! O woful, woful, woful day! Most lamentable day, most woful day, That ever, ever, I did yet behold!2710 O day! O day! O day! O hateful day! Never was seen so black a day as this: O woful day, O woful day!
Paris. Beguiled, divorced, wronged, spited, slain! Most detestable death, by thee beguil’d,2715 By cruel cruel thee quite overthrown! O love! O life! not life, but love in death!
Capulet. Despised, distressed, hated, martyr’d, kill’d! Uncomfortable time, why camest thou now To murder, murder our solemnity?2720 O child! O child! my soul, and not my child! Dead art thou! Alack! my child is dead; And with my child my joys are buried.
Romeo and Juliet, Act IV, Scene v lines 2702-2723.
When I played Friar Laurence and the cast and I rehearsed this scene, the actors playing the Nurse and Juliet’s parents were struck by how similar the lines are and worried that these long passages of laments would get tedious to an audience. I realized by looking at the similar lines, the similar words (especially at the ends of lines), and the fact that Friar Laurence interrupts them at the end, led me to believe that these lines are meant to be spoken AT THE SAME TIME. This creates an effect of organized chaos where the actors seem to be wailing and ranting, but are actually speaking a carefully composed quartet of grief. Thus Doescher cleverly mimics Shakespeare’s use of stichomythia to convey Vader and Luke’s physical distance, and complementary feelings at the same time.
3. Parody Lines
The biggest appeal of William Shakespeare’s Star Wars is the fact that it is a parody, and I’ve said for many years that parody and gentle riffing on Shakespeare is a great way to get students to overcome their fear of Shakespeare and engage with him. Students who know Star Wars but don’t know Shakespeare will recognize the familiar characters and plots of the movies and then see how Shakespeare’s language tells the story anew. Similarly, people who know Shakespeare will recognize the way Doescher re-tools famous Shakespeare quotes to give to characters in the Star Wars Universe, like here, where he spoofs the intentionally bad speech of Snug the Joiner and gives it to the Wampa from Empire Strikes Back:
Peter Keavy as Snug the Joyner in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” 2017.
In the Educator’s guide, which I’ve attached below, Doescher tells you exactly which lines he has parodied and the plots of the original plays so the students can learn about Shakespeare through these famous speeches. Orson Wells once said that “We sit through Shakespeare in order to recognize the quotations,” and this edition gives us thrilling space battle, wonderful characters, and witty dialogue to keep us entertained while we wait.
Staged moments
As Doescher worked his way through all nine installments of Star Wars, he continued to expand and experiment with his storytelling. There are a couple of moments in “Empire” that work only onstage such as the aforementioned moment of stichomythia after the lightsaber duel, and the scene in Act II, Scene ii where the Imperial Walkers known as AT-ATs actually speak to each other onstage. Like the French in Henry V, it’s interesting to see the battle from the enemy’s point of view, albeit a highly biased one. I won’t reprint it here for copyright reasons, but I will put this funny sketch in as a placeholder:
My Criticism
Although I loved “Verily, A New Hope,” I feel that Doescher didn’t go far enough to adapt the dialogue in interesting ways and play with the stagecraft of Star Wars to make it more distinct from the film and the first installment. My favorite moment of the play was the Wampa speech which was great because it not only parodies one of my favorite speeches in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it also made the Wampa attack tonally distinct from the film- the film is tense and grim, while the Wampa speech is funny and charming. I wish Doescher had embraced the parody and silly tone he shows in this speech and applied it more to the rest of the play; we already know Empire is the darkest installment of the series, but that doesn’t mean it needs to be played like that the whole time.
What I think works best in the film is the romantic comedy between Han and Leia; Doescher does a wonderful job pointing out the parallels between Han and Leia and Benedick and Beatrice which is not only fun, but helps Star Wars fans appreciate the comedy of Much Ado About Nothing even more. This is why I’m glad Doescher took painstaking notes on how he parodied Much Ado and other plays in the guide below:
If you enjoyed the accompanying podcast episode to this post, please consider subscribing and donating to help me continue making fun and educational content like this!
This is an interactive game that teaches the craft of Shakespeare’s writing and stagecraft in the form of an Elizabethan escape room. You must find the lost play of William Shakespeare before a mystery thief destroys it! Solve the clues and learn about Shakespeare’s writing and theater to uncover a historical mystery!
Course Description
In this fully online, fully interactive game, you play as a member of Shakespeare’s company. You’ve just discovered that someone has stolen Shakespeare’s new play “Love’s Labors Won,” and you need to find it before the show tonight! In the course of the game, you search the Globe Theater and Shakespeare’s study. Then a mysterious note reveals that someone has stolen the play! You must figure out who it is, and find the play before the thief burns it! Through the course of the game, you will learn about Shakespeare’s theater, the secrets of how he wrote some of his great plays and beautiful poetry, and the work of his contemporaries in a fun, interactive way.
The class is organized into four parts, based on four locations where you will search for the missing play:
Part I- Search the Theater
Part I- Search the theater (website/ Slides/ Jamboard) You learn the basic parts of an Elizabethan stage (Google slides) You label the parts of the theater (Google Forms) You do a virtual tour of the theater (via Globe Theater.com) Web quest- answer 3 questions about Shakespeare’s Globe: https://www.shakespearesglobe.com/ (handout) You search the tiring house (the backstage area of the Globe), and find the letter from the thief (Sites).
Part II- THe Crime
A video plays where the thief declares that he’s stolen Shakespeare’s play for money and revenge. After the video, you will learn about plays, printing, and theft in Shakespeare’s day through a series of Google Slides Activity- make a folio, quarto, and octavio with just a piece of paper (handout) Web Quest- answer 3 questions about how Shakespeare’s plays were printed and the first folio (Slides) Activity 2: make an actors’ scroll or roll the way that Elizabethans might use (video) Easter egg- find a pair of gloves in the print shop and answer questions.
You’ll gain new understanding of the types of plays Shakespeare wrote and their basic plot structure via Google Slides. You’ll then take a short quiz to confirm what you learned.
-Plot Structure You’ll learn about the basic structure of Elizabethan plays via Google Slides. A second set of slides will demonstrate the plot structure of Romeo &Juliet You’ll mix and match a series of plot elements to create your own Elizabethan play via Jamboard
Tragedy:
A hero is given some unwelcome news
He feels betrayed by those close to him
He agonizes about the ethics of killing someone close to him.
He kills someone (or banishes an honest man) and immediately falls into a downward spiral.
The hero does (this will be a mandatory choice)
Comedy:
The heroine disguises herself as a boy
A hero or heroine swears (s)he will never fall in love and immediately falls in love
The heroine pretends not to be interested in the hero, (but secretly loves him).
A loyal best friend is captured, sent to prison, or bewitched
The hero and heroine hate each other due to a series of misunderstandings.
The hero and heroine get married (this will be a mandatory choice).
History:
An ambitious young man arises to challenge the king for the throne.
The old king dies, (or is murdered)
A new king becomes king
Duels and or battles
Someone dies in battle
Someone is murdered, assassinated, or sentenced to death.
New King gets married
King and Queen reign peacefully (at least for now)
Romance ( if students pick this option, they can mix and match everything (except the main character dying)
Verse practice- You’ll learn about the verse Shakespeare wrote, through a series of slides and a jam board. Activity- You will be given a series of famous lines from plays and movies, (such as a quote from a Disney Movie, a Star Wars film, or a song). You will then determine if it is an iambic pentameter line (Google Slides). Easter egg- you find a second note from the thief (Google Sites).
Part IV- THe Tavern
You will look at a series of pictures and videos about Shakespeare’s contemporaries and try to figure out which of them stole the play. Through the handout, you will conclude who the thief is. You find a dagger in the tavern and take it. Outside the tavern, you will fight the thief in a short animation. GAME OVER.
THe FIrst Class starts April 28th, 2023. CLick here to register!
Just for fun, I found this superhero creator website, and decided to create a Shakespeare character from it:
I put the real Shakespeare’s coat of arms on his chest, and decided to use the same color scheme. Hence, the black cape, the black mask that looks like an eagle, (since in Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, the god Jupiter appears on an eagle. I also gave him yellow tights as a nod to Malvolio from Twelfth Night. I also kept colors that hint at Batman, since of course, Batman is partly inspired by Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
If I were to make a full comic book of this character, I’d probably make Shakespeare’s quill magic and either cover people with ink, or temporarily control their actions. He can also throw a wooden Globe at criminals and cram them inside it (an homage to the Prologue of Henry V.
I’d make Shakespeare a detective who can solve crimes because of his great storytelling abilities.
What do you think? Should I make a full comic of Shakespeare Man? Who should his nemesis be? And would this be something that you would enjoy seeing on this blog on a regular basis?
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No, you aren’t hallucinating. This is a clip from the short-lived Warner Brothers kids cartoon show “Histeria,” an educational variety show, sort of like Horrible Histories or “Who Was.” This clip is a song about the life of Henry VIII.
The show was produced by Worner Brothers for the WB back in 1996. It starred many successful voice actors from other WB projects like Billy West (Renn and Stimpy), Tess McNeill (Tiny Toon Adventures), and Frank Welker (The current voice of Curious George). In addition, the show was created by Tom Ruegger, Executive Producer of Warner Animation, who also created Tiny Toons, Animaniacs, and Pinky and the Brain. Those of you who grew up in the 90s know that the WB occasionally sprinkled their shows with educational sketches especially with Animaniacs:
So the idea of using these creative people to create a show about history was not a bad one in and of itself. It could have been a modern-day Schoolhouse Rock. The problem is that the characters are TERRIBLE.While Tiny Toons had likeable characters who were the modern-day successors to classic Warner characters like Buster Bunny, Plucky Duck, and Hampton pig, Histeria has lame characters nobody knows or has any interest in like Froggo, World’s Oldest Woman, and Big Fat Baby. In addition, there is no through line to any of these sketches so it seems like a bunch of random skits. While the Animaniacs was about crazy weird characters trying to escape from the Warner Bros. lot, it seems unclear as to why these characters are talking to me about history.
In short, Histeria feels like a bunch of talented people were forced to make it, and they gave little thought to how to make it a popular series. Still, the animation is good, the voice acting is top-notch, and occasionally, the jokes land very well, and the songs are very catchy. Not surprisingly, my favorite song is this one, where the cast summarizes in song, all 37 plays of William Shakespeare:
The Shakespearean Student 