Okay, most of them are. My latest experience with “Julius Caesar” kind of left me frustrated, maybe not with the bard per se, or the production, but with the characters in this famed work. Oh man alive. Well not alive here, but that’s what I say. The point of this play seems to be that white men are the worrrrrrrrrst. And not just ‘the worst’ but the Jean-Ralphio “worrrrrrst”.
*seriously Portia is nuts. She’s mad her husband won’t trust her with his dark secrets and assumes it’s because he deems her a little fragile woman so she CUTS HER THIGH and is like ‘LOOK HUSBAND LOOK I CUT MYSELF I CAN TAKE IT TELL ME YOUR SECRETS’ what a f-ing lunatic.
Freal though, “Julius Caesar” should be called “Cassius & Brutus, or Who Will Have Me Now”. It’s just another love story except between two psychopaths, and they are sexually frustrated so they start a mutiny and a war. At one point Brutus says to him:
I will come home to you; or, if you will,
Come home to me, and I will wait for you.
Now tell me I’m wrong! Also this immediately put ‘Lover Lay Down’ (DMB 4eva) in my head, whereupon I realized this shit would be the shiiiiiit as a musical! SOMEONE GET ON THAT.
Then of course the best part is when Cassius says “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves” and I was like a) the brilliant John Green capitalized on this line but good, b) Green was right when he said fate is plenty at fault, but c) in this play at least, Shakesy was right because all these men are definitely responsible for their own shitty ends. Seriously is this a satire of all male politicians? Like, “Heyyyy we don’t like the guy in charge, so let’s kill him Murder On The Orient Express-style (everyone stab him once) (sorry spoiler for two things) and then just hope it all kinda works out chill for us like.” F-ing idiots. SERIOUSLY WHAT DID THEY THINK WAS GOING TO HAPPEN?
Cassius says early on:
Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that “Caesar”?
Why should that name be sounded more than yours?
Write them together, yours is as fair a name;
Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well…
Like all that matters is how a name sounds? What is he getting at? If that were true our president would be Jermajesty because best name ever. Secretary of State Moxie Crimefighter. I know that’s not what he really was getting at but damn if that isn’t some blatant flirting.
Side note, is Casca supposed to be played somewhat fey? It seemed almost offensive how in his first scene he was like ‘HAAAYYYYY’, and that was pretty much it. And then he talks about how he wouldn’t dare laugh or talk while cavorting among the general populace because (paraphrase) “poor people have the worrrrst stinking breath AM I RIGHT BRUTUS UP HIGH!” I think he’s one of my favorite Shakespeare characters.
I really appreciated that this classic play displayed legit crazy all from men (and Portia) for a change, but my actual favorite part comedically was that every single damn time one of the many senators entered a room, they would all greet each other by name. and then five minutes later someone else would come in and greet everyone again. So every 2 minutes, with each entrance, you’d get “Oh tidings Cassius, Brutus, Cicero, Cescaphe, Trombonius, Tinnitis, Marsupial, Cinnamon, Supercilious, Imbecilius, tidings.”
The greatest part artistically was that the actor who played Caesar (since he was done early) came back to play the soldier Strato, he who holds the sword upon which Brutus runs to kill himself. Now that was some deep and heavy double-casting of the Captain Hook/Mr. Darling variety.
But yeah, legit crazy. Seriously, this is the plot: All these jackwagons plotting to kill Caesar, then they kill him, then they fall apart because they realized they killed a man and don’t really have a plan, so then they all kill each other/themselves. You think during it that Mark Antony is kind of sort of decent, but then he closes the play by proclaiming how Brutus was the most noble Roman of all. Ummm sure. Sure sure. Nahhhht! The end.