And I think it's you!
I'm excited about the par-tay tonight. So sorry I couldn't make it to the shiz-ow last night. I was actually asleep by 10:45. Lame.
We can hash out more video ideas tonight...and maybe sneak in a drunken game of spades.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Tonight
My good friend Abbie Isaac is coming into town for the evening. I believe we will start out by heading to the Bean and walking through the park briefly, followed by dinner somewhere...not sure where yet.
Then we'll get a drink and head to iO for the 10:30 PM show of The Reckoning, which is only $5 apparently and Ben recommends them.
If you're interested in joining, please do! As always: the more the merrier.
Good luck with your interview Gabbx!
Then we'll get a drink and head to iO for the 10:30 PM show of The Reckoning, which is only $5 apparently and Ben recommends them.
If you're interested in joining, please do! As always: the more the merrier.
Good luck with your interview Gabbx!
EVERY IDEA IS GREAT
especially mine.
i forgot about demon eviction notice. it's kind of involved. but i think we could totally rock it. especially if we just kept it in a hallway or inside with the demon peeking out from behind the door...
DEMON EVICTION!
also any sketches i wrote for SC classes are up for grabs...
i forgot about demon eviction notice. it's kind of involved. but i think we could totally rock it. especially if we just kept it in a hallway or inside with the demon peeking out from behind the door...
DEMON EVICTION!
also any sketches i wrote for SC classes are up for grabs...
Just Say Nay
So far I vote for Cat Law Firm. I don't think a Shakespeare video would be very funny...and would be a little too theatre people-y.
Monday, September 22, 2008
shakespeare in 5?
Shakespeare video? Maybe we could do something with my delightfully unusable ideas...Lovers kept apart by their disparate plays...Lady Macbeth and Falstaff meet at a bar...well maybe not...
There's always Cat Law Firm!
There's always Cat Law Firm!
New Project
I read Twelfth Night. And so did you.
BUT...it appears we have a new focus...
1. To Become the greatest Spades players in the world
AND
2. To make a humorous 5 minute film for the Annoyance
I'm excited about both.
Let's discuss the film though...throw out your ideas on this sounding board.
I also may retool the blog to fit our new filmmaker/spadeplayer image.
Ready. Go.
BUT...it appears we have a new focus...
1. To Become the greatest Spades players in the world
AND
2. To make a humorous 5 minute film for the Annoyance
I'm excited about both.
Let's discuss the film though...throw out your ideas on this sounding board.
I also may retool the blog to fit our new filmmaker/spadeplayer image.
Ready. Go.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Twelfth Night FTW!!!
Twelfth Night is the winner, despite Ben's last ditch efforts to sabotage the election.
Frank the Cat was ecstatic.
Frank the Cat was ecstatic.
Inspiration
We happy few, we band of brothers...
Branagh knows best. Gilderoy Lockhart is my homeboy.
dialogue inspired by 80's radio
Cher: If I could reach the stars, I'd give them all to you.
Me: Thanks, Cher. And what exactly am I going to do with all the stars. That's your problem. YOU DON'T THINK. Where am I going to put these. I LIVE IN A BASEMENT.
Me: Thanks, Cher. And what exactly am I going to do with all the stars. That's your problem. YOU DON'T THINK. Where am I going to put these. I LIVE IN A BASEMENT.
Ben's Vote Doesn't Count
Much like in the presidential election, Ben's vote doesn't count in this poll either.
Twelfth Night is declared the winner by an overwhelming majority.
Unless of course...you're serious about the plays to read in your poem, in which case I will read Titus Andronicus and Much Ado About Nothing over the next week.
So...a new poll will go up shortly!!!
Twelfth Night is declared the winner by an overwhelming majority.
Unless of course...you're serious about the plays to read in your poem, in which case I will read Titus Andronicus and Much Ado About Nothing over the next week.
So...a new poll will go up shortly!!!
blind optimism
we are so made of win! I can't wait to bring the complete hardback collection of Shakespeare to the beach. Patrick, you wanna TA a 826CHI class with me? Us? good. cuz i'm forwarding it to you now.
On Failing and Reading
I declare the reversal of fail
as this project we nail.
I'll read As You Like It and Taming of the Shrew
you read Titus and Much Ado..
The three of us will succeed if we get a chance to sit down and read.
If for no other reason, about Shakespeare we'll talk,
and put on a show staring Fairuza Balk
as this project we nail.
I'll read As You Like It and Taming of the Shrew
you read Titus and Much Ado..
The three of us will succeed if we get a chance to sit down and read.
If for no other reason, about Shakespeare we'll talk,
and put on a show staring Fairuza Balk
New Poll!! AND Fair Verona, IL!!!
Just ignore that last post folks!
Let's start off fresh with something fun: a poll!!!
Features are fun!!!
So this poll is about the book club idea. I'm going to propose two plays for us to read (because if I proposed three, it might be a split decision, since there are only three of us that know of this project's existence...which is very Descartes of us).
Choose ONE of the plays and you can read it while on your cruise! Hooray for boats! Hooray for the ocean! You can do research on shipwrecks! Hooray shipwrecks!
ALSO...there IS actually a Verona, IL, though it's not a beach. It's a little under 2 hours away from Chicago and it looks like there's absolutely nothing there! Hooray desolation! I smell a road trip...
View Larger Map
Let's start off fresh with something fun: a poll!!!
Features are fun!!!
So this poll is about the book club idea. I'm going to propose two plays for us to read (because if I proposed three, it might be a split decision, since there are only three of us that know of this project's existence...which is very Descartes of us).
Choose ONE of the plays and you can read it while on your cruise! Hooray for boats! Hooray for the ocean! You can do research on shipwrecks! Hooray shipwrecks!
ALSO...there IS actually a Verona, IL, though it's not a beach. It's a little under 2 hours away from Chicago and it looks like there's absolutely nothing there! Hooray desolation! I smell a road trip...
View Larger Map
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Book Club
I suggest we start a Shakespeare Book Club in order to brush up on our Bard knowledge.
If we could read a play a week for a month and then discuss it at our weekly meetings (along with other ideas), I think this project would really get off the ground.
What say ye?
If we could read a play a week for a month and then discuss it at our weekly meetings (along with other ideas), I think this project would really get off the ground.
What say ye?
Monday, August 18, 2008
More Shakespeare on Dreams
Don't forget Shakespeare's other famous references to dreams... as in A Midsummer Night's Dream. But the dream theme is prevalent in many other plays:
Notably:
Hamlet - III, i
"To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;"
Hamlet is of course weighing his options in the famous "To be, or not to be" speech. Shall he shuffle off this mortal coil or carry on with his plot of revenge and justice. The "dreams" of death's "sleep", of what's on the other side, tempt him.
And also:
Romeo and Juliet - I, iv
"ROMEO: I dream'd a dream to-night.
MERCUTIO: And so did I.
ROMEO: Well, what was yours?
MERCUTIO: That dreamers often lie.
ROMEO: In bed asleep, while they do dream things true."Mercutio sees Romeo's sighing and dreaming as a pithy distraction. Romeo is adamant that his dreams tell him something. Mercutio believes they lead him astray.
And furthermore:
"True, I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy,
Which is as thin of substance as the air
And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes
Even now the frozen bosom of the north,
And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence,
Turning his face to the dew-dropping south."
This text is delivered brilliantly by Harold Perrineau in Baz Luhrman's controversial Romeo + Juliet. Mercutio's final point on dreams is not a positive one. "the children of an idle brain, begot of nothing but vain fantasy...as thin of substance as the air." Hardly favorable descriptions...but fantastic, vivid imagery.
I propose we title our project (at least tentatively):
Notably:
Hamlet - III, i
"To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;"
Hamlet is of course weighing his options in the famous "To be, or not to be" speech. Shall he shuffle off this mortal coil or carry on with his plot of revenge and justice. The "dreams" of death's "sleep", of what's on the other side, tempt him.
And also:
Romeo and Juliet - I, iv
"ROMEO: I dream'd a dream to-night.
MERCUTIO: And so did I.
ROMEO: Well, what was yours?
MERCUTIO: That dreamers often lie.
ROMEO: In bed asleep, while they do dream things true."Mercutio sees Romeo's sighing and dreaming as a pithy distraction. Romeo is adamant that his dreams tell him something. Mercutio believes they lead him astray.
And furthermore:
"True, I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy,
Which is as thin of substance as the air
And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes
Even now the frozen bosom of the north,
And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence,
Turning his face to the dew-dropping south."
This text is delivered brilliantly by Harold Perrineau in Baz Luhrman's controversial Romeo + Juliet. Mercutio's final point on dreams is not a positive one. "the children of an idle brain, begot of nothing but vain fantasy...as thin of substance as the air." Hardly favorable descriptions...but fantastic, vivid imagery.
I propose we title our project (at least tentatively):
THE DREAMS THAT STUFF IS MADE OF
Thoughts?
Such Stuff...
Prospero:
Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on; and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
The Tempest Act 4, scene 1, 148–158
Perhaps I'm just a little overly sensitive when it comes to discussions of such ephemera as dreams and stuff, but I've always been a little bit bothered by how "...such stuff as dreams are made on;" is misquoted by generations of starry eyed, slack jawed individuals with a passion for poetics.
As seen above, most commonly, we hear the variant "...the stuff that dreams are made OF." I suppose you could argue that Bogey's famous line from the wonderful "Maltese Falcon" is meant to evoke a completely different feeling. Prospero is speaking of illusion, the illusion of life coupled with the illusion of the play. We see his double meaning especially in the lines:
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
Here Prospero is presenting us with an interesting idea, the play(really the play within a play in Tempest) is an illusion, but guess what, so is the reality that surrounds it(and one can only assume the reality in the actual world. Shakespeare gives us this little subtlety by the simple evocation of the "globe", as it's meaning telescopes, we are meant to understand that Prospero is indeed referring to the characters, but also those watching the show in the Globe Theatre.
Bogey's "stuff" seems to be more a nod to an abstraction, stolen from an ideal world and made real by human hands. It's our entrance to the dream of perfection in many forms: beauty, worth, form and meaning.
The two idea's sit at seemingly opposite ends of the spectrum. On one side, we have Shakespeare's confirmation that no matter how amazing the world is, it will one day unravel as we awake(die), on the other side we have Bogey taking the dream world and making it real, thus creating MORE reality.
How do you bring these two idea's together?
With Punch and Cookies, meaning you punch who ever says the "Dreams are made of" in the cookies if they say it's Shakespeare.
In this case "cookies" means stomach, face, and/or balls.
Or make them listen to this.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on; and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
The Tempest Act 4, scene 1, 148–158
Perhaps I'm just a little overly sensitive when it comes to discussions of such ephemera as dreams and stuff, but I've always been a little bit bothered by how "...such stuff as dreams are made on;" is misquoted by generations of starry eyed, slack jawed individuals with a passion for poetics.
As seen above, most commonly, we hear the variant "...the stuff that dreams are made OF." I suppose you could argue that Bogey's famous line from the wonderful "Maltese Falcon" is meant to evoke a completely different feeling. Prospero is speaking of illusion, the illusion of life coupled with the illusion of the play. We see his double meaning especially in the lines:
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
Here Prospero is presenting us with an interesting idea, the play(really the play within a play in Tempest) is an illusion, but guess what, so is the reality that surrounds it(and one can only assume the reality in the actual world. Shakespeare gives us this little subtlety by the simple evocation of the "globe", as it's meaning telescopes, we are meant to understand that Prospero is indeed referring to the characters, but also those watching the show in the Globe Theatre.
Bogey's "stuff" seems to be more a nod to an abstraction, stolen from an ideal world and made real by human hands. It's our entrance to the dream of perfection in many forms: beauty, worth, form and meaning.
The two idea's sit at seemingly opposite ends of the spectrum. On one side, we have Shakespeare's confirmation that no matter how amazing the world is, it will one day unravel as we awake(die), on the other side we have Bogey taking the dream world and making it real, thus creating MORE reality.
How do you bring these two idea's together?
With Punch and Cookies, meaning you punch who ever says the "Dreams are made of" in the cookies if they say it's Shakespeare.
In this case "cookies" means stomach, face, and/or balls.
Or make them listen to this.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Idea
Bardolatry is a term that refers to the excessive adulation of William Shakespeare, combining the words "bard" and "idolatry". Shakespeare has been known as "the Bard" since the nineteenth century.[1] The term derives from George Bernard Shaw's coinage "Bardolator", in the preface to his play The Devil's Disciple, published in 1901. Shaw professed to dislike Shakespeare's work because it did not engage with social problems, as his own did.[2] Shaw also compared Shakespeare unfavourably to himself in his late puppet play Shakes Versus Shav.
Totally unrelated...
Question: What two characters from two disparate plays who would be absolutely perfect for each other? I think it would be wonderfully tragic for two characters to be soul mates, but fated to be apart by their circumstances...as in, their absolutely separate narratives. I think that would be a fun game to play with overlapping scenes/splitting up dialogue from different plays. We could play around with monologues in the forms of letters...like online dating...they'll never meet...
Does that make any sense?
I think that might be a neat way to balance out a sort of bitter married couple who are totally disconnected. Maybe it would be cool if we have the two young couples in the woods' stories, interspersed with the worrying parents....that way the disconnected yuppy suburban hateful mother and father could serve as an interesting accent/game without having the pressure of holding up the entire show.
hmm.
Note to self: learn to articulate thoughts.
Totally unrelated...
Question: What two characters from two disparate plays who would be absolutely perfect for each other? I think it would be wonderfully tragic for two characters to be soul mates, but fated to be apart by their circumstances...as in, their absolutely separate narratives. I think that would be a fun game to play with overlapping scenes/splitting up dialogue from different plays. We could play around with monologues in the forms of letters...like online dating...they'll never meet...
Does that make any sense?
I think that might be a neat way to balance out a sort of bitter married couple who are totally disconnected. Maybe it would be cool if we have the two young couples in the woods' stories, interspersed with the worrying parents....that way the disconnected yuppy suburban hateful mother and father could serve as an interesting accent/game without having the pressure of holding up the entire show.
hmm.
Note to self: learn to articulate thoughts.
Chorus
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
Whole misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
And the continuance of their parents' rage,
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
Do you think it's interesting that at the beginning of Romeo And Juliet, we're told EXACTLY what going to happen to the young lovers, yet somehow by the end we find ourselves cheering for the kids and ultimately shocked by their untimely demise.
I think liberal use of Chorus is interesting in any show.
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
Whole misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
And the continuance of their parents' rage,
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
Do you think it's interesting that at the beginning of Romeo And Juliet, we're told EXACTLY what going to happen to the young lovers, yet somehow by the end we find ourselves cheering for the kids and ultimately shocked by their untimely demise.
I think liberal use of Chorus is interesting in any show.
Lights Up
Be not afraid of greatness: some men are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them. - "Twelfth Night", Act 2, Scene 5
Let the greatness commence.
Let the greatness commence.
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