Wascally Wabbit of Venice

Goodness. Time flies when one's in the midst of a low-grade flu.

Today, MrStinky was 'sposed to be off for a yoga-day-trip to Phoenix BUT had to cancel at the last minute cuz the friend he was to see had a stone in her single remaining kidney. (Sorta puts StinkyLu's flu in perspective, eh?) So an unexpected Tuesday afternoon at the googaplex for StinkyLu & MrStinky... Yay!

Unfortunately, the flick on the itinerary was to be the new Al Pacino version of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. Now, it's not that StinkyLulu haaaaaaaaaaaaaated the film. Really, it's not. Rather, StinkyLulu just feels immediately overtired any time folks on film start iambing in a pentametric style -- it's like StinkyLu's got an automatic grudge against them just for trying. Then if they make the mistake of playing the thing all plummy just 'cuz it's da bard? Lord gawd almighty, StinkyLulu's knickers just start to pinch...

And -- to pile insult atop injury -- it was The Merchant of Venice. Ew. Just, ew. StinkyLulu's never hooked into the interest in this play. Of all of the major plays, including Shrew, staging this one just seems to be a big poopy idea. A riotous romantic comedy full to brimming with vicious anti-semitic humor? Make that one work on a 20th/21st century stage...

Anyway, in the car, after the screening, MrStinky said simply: "I didn't get it." Didn't get what? "The rings. The complete humiliation of Shylock. The cross-dressing. Everything. It was like a bad sitcom." So StinkyLulu went on a whole rant how all of sitcomedy is straight out of Shakespeare & how TMOV is totally structured as a slap-ass comedy, with Shylock being a big buffoon of the MrRoper variety, but it just can't work cuz of the jew-baiting humor... Here, MrStinky interrupted. MrStinky -- whose Bard-ucation is thorough, though nowhere near the freaky-obsessive levels gnawed on by theater geeks like StinkyLu -- said: "THAT was supposed to be a COMEDY?" Um. Yeah?

Here, MrStinky went all brilliant on StinkyLulu's ass: "Now that totally makes sense. When Portia dresses as the Judge and tricks Shylock? That's totally Bugs Bunny -- tricking Daffy Duck or Elmer Fudd..."

So, yeah. Next time you hafta think about The Merchant of Venice: imagine Bugs in the role of Portia, with Yosemite Sam as Shylock. It really works much better... Much much better.