A Dialogue of Shakespeare and Daly - Essay Example

It’s 1867. The first production of Augustin Daly’s Under the Gaslight commenced earlier at the Fifth Avenue Theatre on 24th St. The show was a resounding success and Daly has been basking in the praise he received from the receptive audience. It’s the first time he has received a moment alone. Daly begins to dream about his place among the pantheon of great playwrights and begins to think that he may actually be better than Shakespeare. Just as this thought passes his mind he feels a tap on the shoulder. He turns around and Shakespeare himself is standing there. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Daly? Really? Better than me? AUGUSTIN DALY: …Why not? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Seriously? AUGUSTIN DALY: Look, you may have enjoyed some success during your time, but your plays are overrated and only performed by theatre houses full of pomp and intellectual pretentiousness. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: OK. So I just sat through your play. A few notes -- AUGUSTIN DALY: Here we go… WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: The opening few interactions between Laura and Ray and whoever the third person is I forgot AUGUSTIN DALY: Pearl. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Yeah Pearl. They’re meaningless. Let’s get to the action already or at least fill the dialogue with something of poetic significance. AUGUSTIN DALY: You insolent old codger that opening scene leads directly to the letter, which is a crucial part of the play. Besides your play Hamlet is full of meaningless filler. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Argh. First of all my plays aren’t as pretentious as you’re making them out to be. During my time they were attended by many people from the lower classes. They were regarded as popular entertainment, while other playwrights like Christopher Marlowe were considered intellectual and pretentious, as you so politely indicated (Greenblatt). As for filler, the opening scene of Hamlet opens to a ghost sighting. A terrifying ghost sighting! The play is immediately in the thriller/horror genre, not like yours which just meanders around for a -- AUGUSTIN DALY: Are you finished? You talk just like the characters in your play, endless, long-winded, boring monologues. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Look I wrote long monologues because it allowed me to capture the character’s in-depth thoughts. This way I was able to explore aspects of the human condition that typical dialogue can’t attain. It was also the style of the time; sure I could have written realistic dialogue, but it wouldn’t have appealed to as large as an audience. I worked within the conventions of my time, but explored timeless themes. AUGUSTIN DALY: OK OK. So maybe you did. But what about all the poetic language? Sure some of it is good, but do we really need every freakin’ line to be in iambic pentameter? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Partially I wrote that way so my actors could learn their lines easier (Greenblatt). I also wrote that way because it more closely approaches the sonorous quality of music. This way my characters weren’t merely talking, they were singing to the essence of the heavens and human condition! AUGUSTIN DALY: Are you really this full of yourself? Your ego has been blow up beyond all proportion. You think you’re like God or something. Look, with my work I’m not trying to explore the meaning of life, I’m just trying to make a statement of society. Expose some hypocrisy. Maybe change some minds. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Really? Because all I got out of your play was some filthy street rat got knocked of her perch. AUGUSTIN DALY: You obviously don’t understand subtlety. So for instance, consider the scene when Pearl tells Ray that Laura was actually a poor pickpocket and instead got brought into aristocracy at the age of 6. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Yeah… AUGUSTIN DALY: So in this scene Ray, who had been professing his unending love for Laura just 2 minutes earlier, starts saying that he can longer be with her because of her lowly upbringing. You have to understand the absurdity there. What I’m doing is mocking parts of society that think money and wealth and upbringing make a person who they are. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: That sounds like a giant Charles Dickens rip-off. Great Expectations anyone? AUGUSTIN DALY: You’re really one to talk. From what I understand nearly every one of your plays is based off an earlier story from some other writer or mythology. Besides my play was the first to ever have an ending where a character gets tied to railroad tracks. Do you realize how many people ripped that off from me? All that’s ever been ripped off your plays are their ending. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: OK OK, you got me there. But still, you aren’t exploring these deep aspects of human meaning. You’re basically just writing small talk compared to works like Hamlet. AUGUSTIN DALY: Oh please. That play is basically about a guy who is too scared to murder his stepfather. How does that explore these exalted themes you keep talking about? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Look it’s complicated. You really have to read the play many times. I’ve purposely layered it with complicated meanings. So considers the scene in Act III, scene i. Hamlet says, “To be, or not to be, that is the question:/ Whether 'tis Nobler in the mind to suffer/ The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,/ Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,/ And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep/ No more; and by a sleep, to say we end/ The Heart-ache, and the thousand Natural shocks/ That Flesh is heir to?” Look the guy here is contemplating the very meaning of life. He’s walking around questioning whether it is nobler to suffer all the hardships one faces in life or to end them by taking his life. To me that is meaning or that ‘exalted theme’ you keep talking about. I don’t believe in some God or high power, but I believe it’s our responsibility as humans to consider these issues and that is what Hamlet is doing here. Oh and for pretentious language...try writing something as powerful as that you, you PHILISTINE! AUGUSTIN DALY: Woah there Shakespeare. Settle down buddy. I got you. Look it’s a hot piece of writing I’ll give you that. I’m just talking about the totality of the work, there’s just a lot of filler in there is all I’m saying. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Look I recognize you think you can use figurative language and metaphor, but it’s weak. For instance, your comparison of society to a pack of wolves. It’s ok. What is it you write? AUGUSTIN DALY: “Heave you ever heard of Siberian wolves? When one member of the pack falls through weakness, the others devour him. It is not an elegant comparison – but there is something wolfish in society” WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Yeah, that’s it. I mean I get it. It’s social commentary. But I feel it’s just a pedestrian comment on society that most of us already understand. My work is exploring the human condition. Think of Hamlet when says, “I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.” Look this statement cuts right to the core of not just the human condition, but also presents a deep comment on epistemology. AUGUSTIN DALY: How? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Don’t you understand? Hamlet is suffering from an existential reality. He has recognized that life is not determined by some God or deterministic force, but rather that he is entirely alone and left to his own devices. Furthermore, he is considering that he constructs his very reality. These are ideas that are still being explored in constructivist learning theory. AUGUSTIN DALY: OK I feel you there. From what I’m getting you’re definitely concerned with expression a personal vision of the world? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Yeah, I guess you could say that… AUGUSTIN DALY: Look, Will. So am I. That’s what I’m all about. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Oh? AUGUSTIN DALY: Yes, look I demanded to have complete control over the production (‘smc’). Not just writing the dialogue, but I took control over the theatre, the costumes, the way everything was presented. I truly viewed this play as my personal vision and I wanted to ensure that it would be expressed as such. In many ways you can call me the first auteur. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Are you really claiming credit for that? I also had my own theatre company and we worked to claim great control over everything. AUGUSTIN DALY: Just saying is all. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Whatever. OK, so back to my notes. Act II of your play starts with Laura having gone from aristocracy to photographer’s assistant. Where’s the development? To me the most interesting part would have been experiencing the way that she experienced this devolution. Look at Ophelia and to a lesser degree Prince Hamlet. In both instances we see these characters at a place of composure and esteem, only to gradually devolve into madness. This is where we experience the true essence of being. AUGUSTIN DALY: Look I’m also trying to entertain here. You can’t make any statement if your audience is asleep or too depressed to actually listen to the reason. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Your plays are too unrealistic. Why would Laura simply leave the house she stayed at for years? AUGUSTIN DALY: That’s funny coming from someone writing ghost stories. But to answer your question. Look I know the premise is slightly a stretch, but that’s the form I’m working in. It’s a melodrama. So just like you take creative liberties with things like poetic language, I’m taking creative liberty with the plot. The important thing is not exactly replicating reality, but articulating it in an entertaining way that makes a viable social comment. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: You don’t think I’m making a social comment in an entertaining way? AUGUSTIN DALY: Honestly Will. I don’t know. I’m sure some of your work resonates with the society of the time. To me you’re dealing in these grand themes more than day-to-day social themes. Perhaps this is why your work has lasted as long as it does. As for being entertaining – I mean we have different philosophies on that. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Please elaborate. AUGUSTIN DALY: Well like, for me I think the only goal of dialogue is to advance the drama. Sure there’s some stuff in there for purely comedic or character reasons, but for the most part it’s all there for a purpose. Look at the end of Act II with the trial and then Act III – all that dialogue is building to the play’s climax. I get that you do that with your work, but there’s a lot of just random self-conscious reflection that doesn’t really contribute to the narrative. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: How so? In what way? AUGUSTIN DALY: Like Hamlet -- the guy mopes around trying to decide what to do half the time. Why? WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: To me that’s part of the dramatic action. Sure it doesn’t lead to climax in a direct way, but it still directly contributes to the dramatic action. In this way my play is more like a symphony, there’s ebbs and flows and juxtapositions and a fantastic finish. Your work is just formulaic. AUGUSTIN DALY: Whatever William. I’ve about had enough of this. Your play is depressing. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Yours is simple minded. AUGUSTIN DALY: Yours is misogynistic. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: How so? AUGUSTIN DALY: C’mon need I say it – Ophelia as the weak woman who can’t live after being wronged by men. Laura in my story is the heroine. She overcomes social oppression and saves the man! WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: Oh come off it. Your ending merely panders to women. That silly line, what is it – ‘And these are the women who ain’t to have a vote!’ come off it! AUGUSTIN DALY: Oh let’s just kill everyone off. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: I’ll kill you that’s for sure! At this instance Shakespeare reaches his hand at Daly’s throat. Before he reaches it Daly suddenly emerges from a slumber a wiser man. He taken on Shakespeare and survived. Works Cited Daly, Augustin. Under the Gaslight. New York: American Melodrama. 1999. Print Greenblatt, Stephen. Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare. London: W.W. Norton. 2008. Print Shakespeare, William. Hamlet: Prince of Denmark. London: Oxford Classics. 2002. Print "Theatre in the nineteenth century." smc. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Oct 2012. . Read More