The Tragedy of Arthur_ A Novel - Arthur Phillips [51]
Act III causes me the most trouble. After Arthur marries, one of his many abandoned loves finds comfort with a kindly shepherd named Silvius, willing to marry Arthur’s sloppy seconds. This is more than the most lenient statistician can bear.
16
DANA WAS CAST as Ophelia in a Hamlet out in New Jersey. I went out there one night to pick her up after rehearsal. I arrived early, sat in the dark theater, and listened to her castmates up onstage discussing their approach to a tricky scene.
Shakespeare’s plays, unlike most modern scripts, rarely include stage direction and never any of those adverbs that force us to read or perform a certain way. No “(angrily)” or “He crosses on her last word and delicately strokes the sword.” Instead, each reader and actor is given the chance to make sense of the puzzle himself, to peer into the wavering mirror and report back. This is, I believe, one of the reasons Shakespeare continues to be popular: he offers directors a share of credit, lets them add their two cents. It also makes actors and directors responsible for justifying weaknesses in the plays. To wit:
The older actress playing Gertrude was making a point, reading from her open script: “… fantastic garlands did she make / Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples / That liberal shepherds give a grosser name, / But our cold maids—see, wait a sec. Why does she do that? I’m telling you your sister killed herself, and that’s very sad, but I stop to point out that some flowers look like penises?”
There was much theatrical tittering onstage. The blond boy playing Laertes offered: “She’s nervous. You know, people giving bad news sort of go off-point, blurt the first thing comes to mind. You could play it like that.”
“That’s not bad,” agreed the director. “Anyone else?”
“Bollocks,” said the bearded Scottish giant playing Claudius. “Big fat hairy bollocks. She’s not hemming. Not a bit of it. She can’t help it. She’s a filthy bird, our Gertrude. She knows Claudius is watching her, laughing at Laertes behind his back, and so, even breaking young Laertes’ heart, Gert winks at her man and makes a cock joke, because you and I are All. About. That.” And with that he grabbed his stage queen’s rump and she swatted at him with her rolled-up script.
My sister laughed but interrupted: “No, because here she’s already regretting marrying you. Hamlet’s convinced her you’re a murderer.”
“Codswallop! He didn’t convince her of anything, girlie,” said the actor, whom I now disliked intensely and strongly suspected of not being Scottish. “When she’s rolling about with him in the boudoir and Polonius’s blood is splashed all over the place, she’s just playing along. She’s coddling her pantywaist son. Boy didn’t tell her anything she didn’t know. She doesn’t care. She knew all about me from day one. She’s a Mafia wife, she is. She lives for a bit of rough, long purple.” And he reached again for the ass of the nice middle-aged part-time actress and mother from Montclair.
It was all very precious, and I complained about their manner to Dana afterward, over rum and Cokes. And, boring old me, I couldn’t help pointing out my theory: “That was perfect. Shakespeare was the greatest creator of Rorschach tests in history. That’s why we keep going back to him for the ten billionth production of this lame play. Look, look: you have a weak spot where Will’s not thinking very clearly, and the character rambles on, and Will sticks in a joke that he likes about flowers that look like wieners. It plainly doesn’t belong there. Any editor would cut it. It breaks the rhythm and the logic of the scene. And your sweet old Gertrude noticed it and rightly points out the weak spot. Anybody else, we’d say, ‘Whoops. Not buying it, Will.’ If I wrote it, they’d send me home to rework it. Instead, what do you all do? You all talk it out until you make it make sense for him. He wrote it, so it must