Happily Ever After Doesn’t Have to Mean Romantically Ever After

The first time that I read Pygmalion, I was one of those people that Jackie mentions at the beginning of her blog. With my introduction to Shaw’s work being My Fair Lady, I was unable to accept any other conclusion than a romantic one. As I prepared to re-read Pygmalion, my feelings were much the same. When I finished, however, I was pleasantly surprised. Not only did I not hate the ending of the play but I rather enjoyed it. I thought it was the perfect ending for Pygmalion. More importantly, I didn’t see it at all as an unhappy ending. Although Jackie does perfectly illustrate why a happy ending isn’t possible if it’s a romantic ending, I wanted to take a look at the ending from a slightly different approach: from the relationships not as we wish them to be (or know they can never be) but rather exactly as they are.

In the “sequel,” Eliza and Freddy marry; the two of them open a shop together; and Eliza frequently visits Higgins and Pickering. Now tell me, what’s so bad about that? No where does it say that Freddy stayed at home all day, ate bonbons, grew corpulent to the point that he couldn’t leave the house, and forced Eliza to work until she was exhausted so that he could stay living in the manner to which he was accustomed. It of course doesn’t. Was he a little bit special when it came to living in the real world? Sure, but he loved Eliza and worked hard and, really . . . who doesn’t have their flaws?

Where once this ending didn’t seem happy because Higgins did not sweep Eliza off her feet, now the ending seems happy because Eliza has a man to adore her (Freddy), a man to treat her as a lady (Pickering), and a man to debate and argue with (Higgins). And if perhaps it would be more ideal if these different facets were found in one man, the fact that Eliza has people in her life who can fulfill all her needs leads me to just one thought . . . should all girls/guys be so lucky.

Shaw is not then limiting the life of Eliza by not allowing her and Higgins to get together but rather he is promising her the best life possible. This is, I believe, the conclusion that both Higgins and Eliza come to at the end of the play and it is a conclusion that is, in many ways, unprecedented for realist theater. Whereas Ibsen’s final door-closing in “A Doll’s House” promises much sadness and bitterness, Eliza’s storming out promises a rare chance to have her cake and eat it too, to have sweet love, respectful love, and hard love.

My script version doesn’t end with Higgins laughing about Eliza marrying Freddy but instead with Higgins comfortable in the knowledge that Eliza will run his errands. Regardless of the one used, however, I feel that the final scenes can not be delivered in malice on Higgins’ part (something Conrad doesn’t believe is ever possible) or true disgust on the part of Eliza. Rather, the actors should convey the feeling that their characters are happily playing parts, Higgins’ being that of the insufferable and Eliza that of the overburdened. Thus, perhaps, Higgins could hand Eliza her coat as he mocks her; Eliza could stick out her tongue and then smile as she swoops off the stage. There should be that sense that if the scene were to last just a few more minutes, Higgins would say “same time tomorrow?” followed by Eliza’s reply that she’d be by after her and Freddy’s wedding to check up on him and Pickering. If well-done, I believe that the actors can make even the most romantically-inclined audience member feel that the kiss-free ending of Pygmalion is not only a realistic one but happy as well.

What you want, you don't always NEED!!!!

I heard many people say...I didn't like the ending. I wanted them to get together. My brain quickly responds who and why???? If the two involves Eliza and Higgins, well lets just staple the divorce papers along with the marriage license before they leave the ceremony. Shaw gives concise, clear examples of why this union would never work. He provides a descriptive masterpiece and illustrates the title of this blog. Besides the obvious conflict of class, lets take a deeper look into the pyschology of these two individuals. I don't see Eliza as a dumb, flower girl. I am aware of her circumstances but for her to be bold enough to come to Higgins house with the proposal, it shows her fire, passion and determination to do better for herself. She was used to hustling to survive. She is a woman and naturally we are wired to be more sensitive to our feelings. I point this out to justify her vunerability and soft skin around Pickering and Higgins. Lets process Higgins....headstrong, intelligent, crass, direct and wise. Of course, he could talk to her more delicately and kind. However, shaw brilliantly gives you an insight on his perception of people when he stated "The great secret Eliza , is not having bad manners or good manners, but having all manners for all human souls. In short, behave as if you were in heaven, where there are no third-class carriages and one soul is as good as another. The question is not whether I treat you rudely, but whether you ever heard me treat anyone else better." This statement was profound to me. In that line you were able to look right into Higgins soul. He's not a bad man, he revels in his own truth and does not bend on his paradigms of the world. Do they care about each other, yes! Would they have taken care of each other, yes! Would he ever have become as gentle and warm as Eliza needs him to be for her emotional stability..Probally not! It is what it is and they are who they are. People(especially men) dont change, unless they want to. No fairytale fluff here, straight forward reality that I can appreicate and definitely relate to.

Henry Higgins: Malicious Monster or Tough Lover

As I read through Pygmalion I found myself growing fonder and fonder of Henry Higgins. His inability to allow room for the feelings of others in his abrasive statements, in my opinion, is not founded in a desire to hurt. It is founded in an inability to be anything other than that which he is... brutally truthful and arrogant. It is also his method of finding other human beings he considers worthy of his time and friendship. He is a man that has no use for weakness of spirit, and it is through his constant belittlement of Eliza that we are actually able to see his love for her. Yes, I said love... His intention morphs over the course of the play from winning a bet to holding on to the thing he loves the most.

In Act I he challenges, not degrades, Eliza to live up to her strong English linguistic heritage. "Remember that you are a human being with a soul and the divine gift of articulate speech: that your native language is the language of Shakespear and Milton and The Bible; and dont sit there crooning like a bilious pigeon." Sure, his reference to a bilious pigeon is a little harsh, but if you look close enough he is asking Eliza (Flower Girl at this point) to acknowledge her own self worth. He is trying to bring her out of her pitiful, weak condition into self confidence and pride.

In Act II he again discloses his good heart in a moment of reassurance to Mrs. Pearce, Pickering, and Eliza, whom he has just offended with his comments. "My dear Mrs Pearce, my dear Pickering, I never had the slightest intention of walking over anyone. All I propose is that we should be kind to this poor girl. We must help her to prepare and fit herself for her new station in life. If I did not express myself clearly it was because I did not wish to hurt her delicacy, or yours." You might say that he makes these remarks simply to keep her there and get his way, but in retort I ask, why would he waste his time teaching her in the first place? If he were truly cruel, he would not only degrade her, but also send her away without training (which she came seeking from him, I might add). Even though it takes disdain from others to motivate the comment, his harshness most commonly comes from his style of humor: blunt truth. I once heard or read (can't remember which) that the true test of a person in England is their ability to give/take a good insult.

In Act V we see Higgins in his most vulnerable state. He is, in his own way, pleading with Eliza to stay on with him at his home. It's as if he wants to tell her he loves her, or even that he loves her company, but he is incapable of this... I'm not sure what personal characteristic keeps him from openly admitting to Eliza that he only has fun when she's with him (pride most likely), but he is unable to do it. In this exchange, he actually tells Eliza that she may do as she wants, just so that she might consider staying on with him. I believe it to be his most vulnerable moment of the play.

LIZA: What am I to come back for?
HIGGINS (bouncing up on his knees on the ottoman and leaning over it to her): For the fun of it. Thats why I took you on.
LIZA (with averted face): And you may throw me out tomorrow if I dont do everything you want me to.
HIGGINS: Yes; and you may walk out tomorrow if I dont do everything you want me to.

It is in the description of the way that Higgins "bounces up on his knees" that I see his love/enjoyment of Eliza. He even empowers Eliza saying that she "may leave if he doesn't do EVERYTHING she wants him to do". I feel sorry for Higgins in this scene, because he is unable to throw away his pride and arrogance and say the thing that Eliza needs to hear the most: that he loves her. If he could have done this, I truly believe that Eliza would have stayed with him. But like life, people are stubborn and sometimes unwilling to change.

Henry Higgins is one of my favorite characters in all of literature, and I do not believe that he is someone who sets out to be a malicious, verbal monster. Why would he spend so much time with common folk, documenting and recording their sounds? He is a lover of sound and of people. It is his bullying and arrogance that are put-ons, and it is his unwillingness to admit he's lonely and kind that cripple him. His roaring laughter is the last sound of the play, and I believe this laughter to be a cover for the great pain and solitude he feels.

Gender Shifts in “All the World’s a Stage”

Hello my beloved readers, readers who I know can hardly await the next entry painstakingly crafted and typed until the very nubs of my fingers are worn thin. On Monday I had reached my self-imposed allotted number of times to speak aloud in class, and so I didn’t get the chance to share something interesting I found as we examined Jacques’ speech. Along the lines of John’s triumphant remark that both schoolboys and snails carry the weight of their worlds on their bitty backs, I hope that my comment will add fodder for those of you embarking on UofL’s production of “As You Like It.”

I would like to direct the attention (no pun intended) towards the end of the speech as Jacques waxes eloquent about how “[t]he sixth age shifts/Into the lean and slippered pantaloon” (2.7). What caught my attention is that use of the word “shifts.” So many words could have been chosen, from moves to swings to half a dozen other thesaurus-supplied options. Instead, however, Shakespeare chose the word “shifts” a word that as a verb indicates a change but as a noun can refer to women’s undergarments. And so, we see that not only does the old man began to suffer that frightful ailment so many of you have to look forward to (the “shrunk shank” and all that good stuff), and not only does that old man have a “childish treble” to his voice, but he is also undergoing a subtle shift in gender (2.7). This change, from a sexless infant to a virile, manly soldier to a womanly geriatric is a significant commentary for Jacques to make in a play all about gender swapping.

It seems as if Jacques here is reinforcing something that Rosalind seems to know through her drag disguise: the carefully crafted categories of man and woman, male and female, are a lot more flexible than most of us feel comfortable acknowledging. For if a man becomes womanly in his older years than it is almost as if he becomes entirely sexless . . . the male and female aspects counteracting against one another. And if this sounds a bit ridiculous, perhaps that is the point. Perhaps, just as the man “plays his part” as a justice, he is also playing his part as a man. This is not to say that men and women don’t possess certain unique common characteristics (as well as body parts) making them too distinct creatures. I’m perfectly content with God’s decision to have both male and female, and I don’t believe that’s Shakespeare’s agenda at all. After all, Rosalind willingly goes back to her female appearance at the end of the play. But perhaps, just perhaps, what Shakespeare is suggesting through the visage of Jacques (and the entire play) is that the categories created by society aren’t quite as rigid or as ‘correct’ as we believe them to be. We are who we are until we are sans everything.

Is it fair...

Is it fair to still do Shakespeare?
For the longest time I struggled with Shakespeare. I had a difficult time comprehending the language and I would get stuck in the rhythm of it. I can remember reading Romeo and Juliet my freshman year of high school. I remember understanding only the major events of the play and missing important details.
My second experience with Shakespeare was my senior year of high school. I was cast as Gremio in The Taming of the Shrew. I remember feeling overwhelm in rehearsals because I knew so little about Shakespeare. I was able to fly under the radar of my director because Gremio has a clear objective that was easy for me to pursuit. It was only after I had been through two months of rehearsals that I could fully understand the details of the play.
In my undergrad, Shakespeare did not become my friend, however we came to an understanding. I learned his rules in an acting experiment called Unrehearsed Shakespeare. The goal of the experiment was to to exactly what it is called; perform one of his plays completely unrehearsed. We still met like a regular cast for a regular show. However, when we met we met to learn about the rules of the text. Moreover, we learned how let it tell us where to move, who to talk to, how to talk to them and how to keep the story moving. The rules we learned were similar to a lot of the same ones we have been discussing in class.
Elizabethan actors did not have directors like we have today. They also did not have a lot of time to rehearse. These were the exact conditions we were trying to recreate with our experiment.
Now I Pose a question…Is the integrity of the playwright honored when we do Shakespeare now days? The only reason I ask is because I feel like when Shakespeare is done people treat it like it is a blank canvas and the director, producer, or artistic director is the painter. So much so, that the intentions of the playwright are blurred, the language is lost, and there is too much reliance on the spectacle of the theme and not the beauty of the words.
So much of the beauty of Shakespeare is the beauty of the writing. The problem is that the writing doesn’t mean the same thing it used to. More specifically, the language doesn’t have the impact that it was written to have. So when we take and modernize Shakespeare, are we honoring the integrity of the playwright and is it even fair to still do it if we don’t?

Metre, Rhythm, and Rhyme; Oh My!

After scanning the article "Metre and Rhythm," I thought it was all review information. These are things that we are already supposed to know about Shakespeare, right? But after class on Wednesday when we connected the rhythm of Jaques' monologue with possible meanings, I found myself drawn back to the article for a more thorough review. My profound (or not really) discovery -it's not about defining the iambic pentameter, that's the easy part. It's about understanding the iambic pentameter; defining the reasons why it is in specific speeches, why it changes in other speeches, why it continues through several characters' speeches, or why it disappears completely sometimes. I have always known the language is our tool from a literary perspective, but now I am beginning to see why it is a tool from an actor's perspective as well. To know what a character says is one thing, to truly understand it is something different. The third-to-last paragraph in the article is what stands out to me the most:

"Always, while studying a part, go back at intervals to the metre, not to limit what you are doing with it, but to see what more shades of meaning are possible. Test your intention against the metre: small words which seem unimportant, in context with the stress take on different shades of significance, and enrich the meaning---or, rather shift the meaning. "

This is the basic "homework" of the actor. Studying the text exactly how it is written, and in Shakespeare's acting class, assigning special attention to metre, rhythm, and rhyme. But here is the controversy for me, the situation addressed at the end of the article: Should we completely obey the metre, embracing how verse should sound, or should we attempt to speak the language as naturalistically as possible, so as to keep in tune with a modern audiences' ear? Personally, I lean towards the latter, but the article points out that just because the language is spoken in a conversational method does not affirm the meaning of the language is understood, "for the meaning is so often made clear by the rhythm." So,which approach is to convey the many meanings of the text as precisely as possible? The article simply states we must find a decent combination of the two approaches. However, I don't see this being as simple as it sounds. Is it even possible?

As You Like It: An Examination of Shakespeare's Gray Areas

When I say "gray areas," I'm not talking about the gray matter that houses the mind of the playwright. Instead I'm referring to Shakespeare's straying from the often clearly defined/black & white elements that he uses in his plays. Here's what I mean:

As You Like It is not based on fact, so we can rule out its existence as a History. It most definitely cannot be classified as Tragedy because death does not occur in this play. And though there is a presence of perilous situations (Duke Frederick's banishment of Rosalind, Oliver's malicious, dogged pursuit of Orlando, Oliver being attacked by a hungry lioness), the storyline is devoid of what would be considered tragic circumstances. Perhaps it is a Comedy since it ends with a wedding, or in this case, several. However, it is not entirely fair to call it a Comedy either. There are consistent moments of comedy scattered throughout the play. But comedy does not dominate the premise. It is also wrong to combine the two and call it a "Tragicomedy." We can use scholarly terms and call it a "Romance" or even a "Dramady." But is that a sufficient classification for As You Like It? Also, was Shakespeare a man ahead of his time, creating a new form of play? Or did he simply stumble upon this brand of drama by accident?

Another confusion I have about this play is Shakespeare's definition of a type of character in this play. He succeeds in establishing the heros/protagonists/"good" people of the play; specifically Orlando and Rosalind. He also hits the mark accompanying them with loyal supporting companions or "sidekicks" by today's standards: Adam for Orlando, Celia and Touchstone for Rosalind. And adds strength to his story with the presence of subplots inhabited by dynamic characters such as Jacques, Phoebe, Silvius, Corin, Audrey, etc. Unfortunately his villains in this play lack the consistency of many of his other works. The villains of Shakespeares other Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories are clearly defined, that is, they are villains throughout their respective plays and show no remorse. Iago, Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Richard of Gloucester, Aaron the Moor, Tamora, Claudius, Cassius, Edmund the Bastard, Don John the Bastard: All are bad people; villains to the end, showing no remorse for the evil actions they have performed. Yet, this trend is not evident with the so-called villains of As You Like It. The usurper Duke Frederick meets a priest in the forest and suddenly turns to Monkhood and life in a monastery. Oliver De Boys quite suddenly has a swift change of heart about his demeanor and his opinion and treatment of his younger brother after being rescued from a random animal's attack. So can call these men the villains? Or does their potential for and eventual turn towards Good make them simply adversaries/foils?

I have other concerns about Shakespeare's As You Like It which will be addressed in my "Letter to Bill." I certainly don't condemn the play. It is a pretty decent work of Mr. Shakespeare. Still, I do have some issues about its various inconsistencies. Hopefully I'm not alone in this.

Medea = Cunning

So here's the deal. Medea proved herself to be capable of atrocities since the days of Jason and the Argonauts. She left a trail of victims that included family members, royalty etc. So was it really a surprise that she killed her own children out of nothing but pure and unmitigated spite? No. The death of the children by the hands of their mother could have forseen the minute Jason decided to leave Medea.

By Arostotle's definition Medea is not a tragic hero because she essentially is not basically good and her fortune goes from bad to worse instead of from good to bad. Medea represents a more modern of example of the flaws of ambition and vindictiveness. Let's look of a modern day scenario that could mirror Medea's actions.

Imagine a young woman whose father's business is successful and competitive. This woman falls in love with a young upstart of a rival company. She proves her love to him by betraying her family and offering the rival trade secrets, etc. The woman leaves her family and marries the rival and helps him ascend into power by sabotaging higher ups in his company. Finally the couple establish themselves with a new company, and she fulfills her role as the appropriate housewife by having children for the man. Then out of nowhere the husband leave the wife to marry a CEO's daughter of an even larger company. So at this point the woman experiences extreme rage and kills her husbands new love, her father and their children.

I wanted to put the story in a modern context so that we could see certain patterns of behavior. First off, Medea's power within the realm of society is always linked up through a man. Whether it be her husband or father. So in betraying her father Medea actually made a power play. Her access to power would be more immediate through being a wife rather than being a daughter. After all she had a brother (at least one) who would have had more rights and then the wealth and power would be passed through the brother's lineage.
The murderous deeds of Medea before the start of Euripedes' play were all moves to increase Jason's power and by proxy increase her own. The children were not an object of maternal love but rather a way to cement her connection to Jason and her place within the society of Corinth. So when Jason leaves Medea the children lose their value. Everyone and everything to Medea is a means to an end including those closest to her.
Euripedes' play basically could have been written in the twenty-first century. The pattern of behavior where women only see their value and power throught their relationships with men is still present. When the intensity of this desire towards power out weighs reason we see these extreme murderous actions.

Medea-Murderous Ex-Wife or Tragic Victim of Circumstance

I find myself incredibly torn between my shock and disapproval at Medea's murderous rampage and the victimization of her by Jason, which I believe led her into an uncontrollable, semi-unconscious madness, where it can be argued that she was not of sound mind when she committed the atrocities.

To be clear, I don't condone Medea's actions at all. Murder of innocents is not a rational or justifiable means of solving one's problems, even committing revenge. But from an objective psychological and legal standpoint I can acknowledge that Medea was NOT in a rational state of mind when she committed these murders. Before Jason's betrayal, Medea, although unorthodox in her method, was a loyal partner of Jason, dedicated to being with him and keeping them safe. She made many personal sacrifices for his benefit. But because of Jason's deep seeded insecurities and paranoia, he kicks Medea to the curb and leaves behind his innocent children whose only crime was that they were the product of a regretful congress. Crushed, with her world turned completely upside down, Medea is transformed into a relentless machine that is more volatile, and vengeful than her her former self. Her intention was to destroy Jason by taking beloved things away from him: Glauce, his status, his reputation, his sense of security, his hope, and last but not least, his children. So why shouldn't she take his life to complete her vengeance? Why not even her own out of unfathomable sorrow? This is unclear to me. But what is clear is that one thing, and one thing alone consciously/unconsciously threw her into a state of madness and incited her towards this destruction: Jason's abandonment of her and their children.

It's true. Medea and Jason's romantic relationship was a train wreck waiting to happen. Jason probably could've avoided his eventually brutal and tragic circumstances by cutting his ties with Medea in the beginning, saving him and her much heartache, and their children from living a traumatic, devastatingly short lived existence. But when he continued that relationship with Medea, married her and had children with her, he entered a sacred bond that should not be broken by law of ethics and of course, the Gods. If it was broken dire, consequences would follow. He eventually did break the family bond, and severe repercussions did occur: he lost basically everything. Jason's weakness of character, cowardice, and lack of judgement is what inevitably doomed his family.

The moral ambiguity of Madea-madness or BRILLIANCE!!!

I'm afraid my blog may not be as academically sound as our previous blogger but I will do my best. I just finished re-reading Madea. (I read it years ago for an intro to theatre class) The common consensus among most average Joe's is that Madea is a crazy stone cold bitch. First of all, I love all media forms (get it Madea forms? lol) that approach morally ambiguous decisions. It's the same reason Ben Linus is my favorite character on Lost and and the same reason I love Noah Bennett from Heroes. These are characters that make the choices and do the things that others would not. Most of us hate them for it. The rest of us....well lets just say we appreciate the situation that they are in.
I was raised on the idea of black and white=good and evil. To me, while I was growing up, there was no grey area. Then I left home and realized why Mormon life is so naive. There is no black and white good and evil, there are only shades of grey. The simple truth that most of us do not want to accept is that under the right circumstances we are all capable of anything.
The situation faced by Madea is the loss of everything she has worked for since before the play began. She sacrificed everything for Jason. And what has he done? Jason spat in her face and tossed her out on the street.
The questions I pose to you (you know the story I don't need to reiterate it) is this: Was she justified in her revenge? Should she have taken it as far as killing the children? Did Glauce deserve to go the way she did? Is Madea to blame for Creon's death even though she didn't poison him directly? Is justice by any means necessary still justice?

Aristotle and the "Inferior woman"...well, yes and no.

In his "Poetics" Aristotle notes several trends in tragedies that, in his opinion are instrumental within the construction of the "well made" play. In some ways I agree with Aristotle; In other ways, not so much:

If we look at the basic principles of Aristotle's formula for the perfect tragedy and/or comedy, many of us would agree with the idea that Plot and Character are the top two most important elements within a play's structure. We could also concur that if we excluded the other four elements (Thought, Language, Music and Spectacle) from the makeup of the play it would be an incomplete work. It's true that Aristotle had some ingenius ideas about how to create "good theatre," and many of his ideas are still used today. However, there are several beliefs held by him that I consider outdated and rarely hold water in today's society.

I actually could go on all day about what I disagree with in the world of Aristotelian theatre. But for today, I wish to comment on Aristotle's view of the role of women in theatre during the Ancient Greek play festivals, and also, how In Part XV of the "Poetics," Aristotle comments on the role of women in tragedy: "...the character will be good if the purpose is good...even a woman may be good, and also a slave; though the woman may be said to be an inferior being, and the slave quite worthless. The second thing to aim at is propriety. There is a type of manly valor; but valor in a woman, or unscrupulous cleverness is inappropriate." Not only is he referring to women as inferior and useless, but he is also advocates the portrayal of them as valorless, mindless vessels for the will of Man; Not to mention his opinion of slaves as being lowborn, lesser beings, and his belief that slavery should be a part of the woman's identity. But as time progresses we see that the woman's role in theatre would evolve and that they would take on a stronger, more substantial role in the structure of theatrical performance, particularly in the function of their character; from the captivating, dynamic and strong characters created nearly a thousand years later by William Shakespeare all the way to the empowered women who form the collective voice of the Vagina Monologues written during the new millenium, women have FAR surpassed the expectations of Aristotle.