Richard III's Voice, the Federal Theatre Project, and Breakdancing Shakespeare
Plus: "Wherefore" still does not mean "where"
What Did Richard III Sound Like?
Very Yorkshire. There has been interest in Richard’s voice ever since he was dug up. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions and only note that he sounds much better without a sad violin behind him (skip to the end). The text is an English translation of a Latin letter making his son the Prince of Wales and the Earl of Chester. It’s bureaucracy, not heartbreak.
This is a deliberate troll, right?
Your annual reminder that “wherefore” does not mean “where.”1
Shakespeare and the Federal Theatre Project
What do we do when the Library of Congress drops a shiny new dataset of playbill transcriptions? Why, hit “Control+F” and look for cool stuff of course. This latest is from the Federal Theatre project, producer of the Orson Welles “Voodoo” Macbeth and reminder that federal funding for the arts was once a thing. Highlights:
An all-Black musical New Orleans Taming. I’m temped to dig up the script if only to find out what “the corpse” is doing.
A Coriolanus with 30+ actors that includes the overture Beethoven wrote for an 1804 German adaptation.
On the other hand: a fifty-minute Coriolanus for NYC high school students.
“A Comedy of Carnival-Time in Old Italy” (Really? Merchant?!)
“Stage Manager Gene Langston, who also plays William Shakespeare...” (Please note the charming apostrophe in “‘phones” to indicate that the word has been rudely shortened.)
If You Like Gloucester’s Eyeballs, You’ll Love This Show!
The creators of the new Avett Brothers musical feel that if you can handle King Lear, you can handle their show:
At its climax, as with the real-life shipwreck, “Swept Away” turns brutally dark — certainly more traumatic than many Broadway audiences are used to. The principals never considered watering the story down, pointing to stage works like “King Lear” and “Sweeney Todd” as productions that are unafraid of challenging theatergoers.
The article doesn’t mention the specific horrors depicted2 however it is funny (only a little) that the name of the historical ship (spoilers ahoy) shares a name with a condiment. (A very VERY little.)
Events
November 26, Virtual, Free – Join Laura Seymour and Gillian Woods in conversation about Laura’s new book, Shakespeare and Neurodiversity.
December 3 & 4, London, in person, $$ – the National Opera Center presents an evening of contemporary opera based on Shakespeare’s plays, including the premiere of excerpts from “Perdita,” an unpublished 1917 opera by composer Dorothy Howell based on The Winter’s Tale.
Quick Links
The NSA has a podcast (!) that mentions Elizebeth Friedman, my favorite cryptologist, Baconian troll, and maker of exquisite Christmas cards.
Aasif Mandvi’s first show in New York was Troilus and Cressida in the back of a restaurant, and if you love Dwight on the office, you have Shakespeare to thank:
The RSC’s relationship to the USA. Yes, American audiences are loud, but can we at least get some credit for making (approval) and (disapproval) sounds at the correct times?
“The audience at Chicago Shakes…was more responsive, laughing at some of the play’s zanier plot twists (pirates!), with sporadic outbursts of approval (for romance) and disapproval (for incest).”
Reflections on the RSC’s collaboration with Google in creating a “real time” Midsummer on social media.
“The king’s fate was directly affected by circumstance and not by personal drama as related in Shakespeare’s plays.” (Yes, but personal drama is the fun bit!)
An All’s Well with an unexpected pairing.
“Walker dares to thrust the disdainful Bertram’s caustically witty pal Parolles centre-stage and makes it clear – with caresses and a kiss – that the pair are seized by the love that dare not speak its name.”
Hartford Stage’s Breakdancing Shakespeare program is going strong.
“Treasonable necromancy” in 2 Henry VI + witches & Henry VI’s horoscope.
Folger Guides to Teaching Shakespeare for Macbeth, Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet are now available, featuring comics by Good Tickle Brain.
When Falstaff says that Shallow is, “like a man made after supper of a cheese paring” what he means is…
Recommendations
Let me be clear: I fully agree with Deirdre O’Connell that we should make the weird art. Please don’t take the following to mean, “Don’t make the weird art.” Please make the weird art. Give money to the weird art. Okay? We good? Excellent. The only thing I can think of while watching this is this.
Who thought a shark-powered pontoon boat was a good idea?
The first recorded use of compound interest. (“May Enlil destroy him!”)
Happy Thanksgiving to the Americans, here’s advice from 1837 on how to truss your bird so it is not “exceedingly ugly.”
Picasso offered to design Jean Cocteau’s sword for the French Academy. (Yes, they all get swords.) Cocteau *hated* it and designed his own instead.
Irving Finkel is a “real wizard” who lent his personal chess set to Harry Potter.
Harvard’s Spunker Club. (sfw, I promise)
On the threshold I take off my workday clothes, covered with mud and dirt, and put on the garments of court and palace. Fitted out appropriately, I step inside the venerable courts of the ancients, where, solicitously received by them, I nourish myself on that food that alone is mine and for which I was born3
The author warns that “holing ourselves up into a room with too many books may not always be a good thing, liable to induce claustrophobia and paranoia.4”
Thanks to Korey for the heads up. If you see Shakespeare news in the wild, send it my way!
The historical event is famous in literary circles for bearing an intensely spooky similarity to an Edgar Allan Poe novel.
What a pretentious git.
The only time I literally barricaded myself into a room with too many books, I became neither claustrophobic nor paranoid but rather grimly satisfied after emerging with most of a thesis bibliography that plausibly resembled Chicago style. I took the precaution of bringing both a friend and snacks and refrained from repeating “For the love of God, Montresor!” in anything other than a low whisper three or four times. If you wish to use your books as a weighted blanket and stay very still for the next couple years, I support you.
