Rejected Title: Who is Ellen Playing, Anyway?
Reason for Rejection of Rejected Title: Now that we are working on Shakespearean text for nine hours a day, we have honed our abilities to find dirty double meanings in everything.
For those of you who don’t know, or have forgotten, the parts I’m granted in each of our plays, I thought I’d dash off a quick post in answer. The fact that it can be quick is attractive to me in terms of the prospect of actually finishing a post, and also, perhaps, the prospect of you reading it.
The Taming of the Shrew: Bianca; Joseph (Servant); and other unnamed servant
The Merchant of Venice: Portia
Henry V: Princess Katherine; the Boy
Now, for all of you who responded to this list with, “O, Bianca! What a great part!” (and you were no less than a dozen different people, so don’t feel particularly guilty), let me point out the following fact to you:
Number of lines Bianca has: 71
Number of lines Portia has: 588
And for a little bit more perspective–
Number of lines the Boy in Henry V has: 72
This is NOT to say that Bianca is not a great part, nor to infer that I equate greatness with number of lines–it’s only to say that I’m very excited that we’re starting our rehearsals of Merchant!
This is all very honorificabilitudinitatibus, dear.
[...] that you will probably remember very basic things, such as blocking. And lines. Not only do I talk quite a bit in Merchant, but I am not aided by having four lines in the courtroom scene that begin “Therefore” [...]