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On Muppets, Casting, and Shakespeare

10/26/2011

8 Comments

 
As both the Muppets and Shakespeare are on many people's minds these days for various reasons (especially with the new movie about to be released), I thought I'd share a classroom exercise that I've used at both Tufts and Emerson that uses our furry friends to articulate the effects of casting choices on the execution of a play.

It goes like this:

_Take a classic play.  Say... Hamlet or Waiting for Godot for instance (for the purposes of a class exercise, I've found it is best that everyone use the same play).    I've found that this works particularly well with Shakespeare and the Greeks.

Cast it with Muppets (Sesame Street characters are also open, and you can have a single human celebrity guest star as per The Muppet Show).

Discuss the various choices and how they might change the execution of the play as the semiotics of each muppet overlay the semiotics of the character they are cast as.

This exercise does two things.  One, it illustrates how the performer completes the role through their interpretation using their own personal qualities as their interpretive tools.  Two, it illustrates how casting might work with stock companies wherein each performer is a known quantity.  By using the known qualities of each muppet to articulate the goals and objectives of any particular character in a play, students gain a deeper understanding of the play's structure and the character's development.

I've had some really interesting choices come out of my students during this exercise. 

In the case of Hamlet for instance: Kermit as the Ghost with Robin as Hamlet is a very different production than Kermit as the Big H and Snuffy as the Ghost, with both being perfectly valid.  Statler and Walorf are a very different Rosencrantz and Guildenstern than Honeydew and Beeker.  Gonzo as Claudius and Miss Piggy as Gertrude make a lot of sense with Kermit as the Ghost (as opposed to say, Sam the Eagle), but Kermit as Hamlet is a very understandable choice as he is the company manager and the default star.  I had a student use Britney Spears as the human guest star to play Ophelia, which put a certain spin on that character's descent into madness as well.

For Waiting for Godot there is the interesting problem to solve of paired characters and traditionally paired muppets.  Snuffy as Godot is a common joke for students above a certain age as well (because he used to be an imaginary character).

As with many of my blog posts, this may be something that I expand later.

If you have any particularly good muppet casts of classic plays  (Shakespearian or otherwise), please leave a journal comment!
8 Comments
Danielle link
10/26/2011 05:22:23 am

....I, for one, would love to see Miss Piggy do Lady M. She and Kermit would be The Scots fairly perfectly...

Reply
Corianna
2/2/2012 12:49:14 am

Haha yes! Now I wish I knew the muppets better, but this seems like a great exercise.

Reply
Colleen link
10/30/2011 02:21:29 pm

Yes! Snuffy as Godot! Ernie and Bert as Vladamir and Estragon. And, hmm, maybe Guy Smiley as Pozzo and Frazzle (this dude: http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Frazzle) as Lucky. and Elmo as the Boy.

Wow, I could think about plays starring Muppets forever. I think the Fraggles could pull off a pretty decent Hamlet. Gobo as Hamlet, Traveling Matt as the Ghost, Boober and Wembley as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Mokey as Ophelia. I guess that leaves Red as Gertrude. And maybe one of the Gorgs as Claudius and Doozers for Laertes and Polonius. hehe.

Reply
Cara
1/30/2012 07:24:40 am

How about The Cenci? I don't remember all the characters but I'd cast:
Count Cenci: The Great Gonzo
Lucretia: Miss Piggy
Orsino: Kermit? Maybe?
Cenci's son's: the two-headed monster
The assassins- Crazy Harry and Lew Zeland
The Pope should actually appear at the end and should be played by the Swedish Chef
oh... and Snooki should play Beatrice

Reply
Patrick Bradley link
2/10/2012 03:08:11 am

Okay, I've been meaning to come back to this for some time. There is probably way too much thought behind my choices at this point, but here goes...

Hamlet is played by Fozzie the Bear. This is the only acceptable choice. Fozzie is optimistic, but still lacks the confidence and impulsiveness that every other Muppet possesses. This is the tragedy of a bear that couldn’t make up his mind.

Claudius & Gertrude are Kermit & Piggy, respectively. My reading has Claudius behaving with the best interests of the kingdom in mind. Much like Kermit he tries to please everybody and cannot help but come up short. Gertrude likewise acts out of a deep unquestioning love for her (new) husband.

This brings us to the Ghost, the former king now transformed into a spirit obsessed with revenge (even at the cost of a seemingly happy kingdom). For such destructive simplemindedness, there is no better choice than Animal. “AVENGE MY DEATH! AVENGE MY DEATH! RAH! AH! AH!”

Laertes is Gonzo. He is well-meaning, easily manipulated, and I really want to see him and Fozzie in a comedian’s duel at the end of the play.

Ophelia is thus be played by Camilla the chicken. It ties into Laertes/Gonzo’ protectiveness and creepy grave-jumping love. And let’s be honest, it’s not important that we understand Ophelia’s words. No one in the play actually listens to her or appreciates what she has to say, so why not just make it unintelligible to the audience as well?

Horatio is Scooter. He is present to observe the story and doesn’t do much else.

Polonius is tricky. Muppet characters are not allowed to die, let alone be murdered by one another. Thankfully, this rule does not apply to human guest stars (ref. Billy Connolly in “Muppet Treasure Island”). Consequently, I would bring back the best Polonius I’ve ever seen to reprise the role… Bill Murray.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern will be played by Rizzo the Rat & Sal Minella (the vest-wearing chimp who only recently joined the Muppet cast c. 1996). Great sidekick characters whose greediness and idiocy justifies their villainous behavior.

And finally, because they need to be in the play *somewhere*, the gravediggers should be played by Statler and Waldorf. These two can easily carry a scene on their own, and once Hamlet/Fozzie arrives it makes perfect sense that those two ridicule him further.

So there you have it. A lifelong fan of the Muppets gives an ideal cast that fits within the character scope of both Shakespeare and Jim Henson.

Reply
Eric Peterson
2/28/2012 07:20:36 pm

I like your ideas, and Waldorf and Statler as the gravediggers is inspired, but I think Fozzy makes more sense as Polonius (I think the muppets, putting on a production could pretend to die, making the production more like the show than the movies). Fozzy would try to make each of his maxims for Laertes into a joke, and draw out his death scene cutting off Miss Piggy repeatedly as she tries to say her next line until she kicks him with a loud "HI-YAH!"

I'd cast the Swedish Chef as the former king, giving Hamlet's the motivation to find out what the ghost means by "Hes poota pahsoon in mahear bork bork bork."

It's not perfect, but that's how I would cast it. Frankly I think either way would be magical.

Reply
Meron Langsner link
3/25/2012 05:07:45 am

A great response to this idea was posted on LA Bitter Lemons:

http://losangeles.bitter-lemons.com/2012/03/14/the-dramaturg-starring-kobe-bryant-as-pozzo/

Reply
Meron Langsner link
6/19/2013 05:37:42 am

A popular Broadway blog recently had the same idea!

http://thecraptacular.com/2013/06/yeah-we-went-there-the-muppetcasting-of-alex-timbers/

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    Meron Langsner, PhD

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