Shake, Mr. Shakespeare

Synopsis

Musical short. Created as a tie-in for Dieterle and Reinhardt’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (1935) the film imagines a hybrid between Shakespeare and swing music. An assistant director is told to read all Shakespeare’s works in order to mine them for potential film plots. Falling asleep on the job, he dreams of various Shakespearean characters coming to life from the pages of giant books and singing and dancing in celebration of their "goin’ Hollywood." The characters appearing include Romeo, Juliet, Juliet’s Nurse, Puck, Peter Quince, Hamlet, Old Hamlet’s Ghost, Falstaff, Antony, Cleopatra, and Macbeth. Shakespeare appears toward the end of the film to object, but he is quickly convinced by his characters to join a big song and dance routine. Includes passing references to a number of familiar Shakespearean scenes including Hamlet’s "to be or not to be" soliloquy, Romeo and Juliet’s balcony scene, Hamlet with Yorick’s skull, and Enobarbus’ speech on Cleopatra’s barge.

Language

English

Country

United States

Medium

Film

Technical information

Black-and-white / Sound

Year of release

1936

Notes

The short is included in the dvd extras on Dieterle’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (1936) available from amazon.ca (region 1 only).

The film is made available only to students and faculty of the University of Wisconsin. Researchers should contact the librarian to enquire about the possibility of an on site viewing.

Subjects

Drama; Music

Keywords

Hollywood; jazz; Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Credits

Director

Roy Mack

Screenplay

Cyrus Wood

Cast

Allan Mann
Amira Sessions
Carolyn Nash
Frank Jaquet
Harry Shannon
Richard Lane
William Hall

Production Company

Name

Vitaphone Corporation

Address

USA

Name

Warner Bros Pictures

Archive

Name

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Email

http://www.library.wisc.edu/libraries/reference/email/

Phone

(608) 265-2357

Fax

(608) 265-2754

Address

General Library
System Administration Offices
Memorial Library, Room 380
728 State Street
Madison W1
53706-1494
USA

Distributor (Sale)

 

Available from retail outlets