And Titania, the fairy queen, awakens in the forest glade
and spies the lowly weaver cavorting.
Mr Condell, Mr Kempe, in your own time.
What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
The finch, the sparrow and the lark, the plainsong cuckoo grey.
I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again. I love thee.
And woof, bang!
Show stops, roof comes off, audience wets its collective puffling pants.
There's your most celebrated comic moment
in the entire history of English theatre right there!
Celebrated comic moment, Will?
I don't understand. Surely for it to be a celebrated comic moment,
it has to be funny.
It js funny.
The fairy queen awakens from an enchanted sleep
and is instantly smitten by the first person she sees.
A common weaver!
He's common!
You know my rule -
all people of lowly birth are inherently hilarious
because of their pathetic stupidity and delusions of grandeur.
It's not enough, Will.
When you spoke of this Midsummer Night's Dream
you promised a comic tour de force.
I was expecting at the very least a funny name.
And an inspired visual gag.
And yet you give us neither.
So never mind the finch, the sparrow and the lark, mate.
What you've got here is a fresh-plucked turkey.
Ha!
It's A Midsummer Night's Snooze, Will.
And unless you can come up with a funny name and an inspired visual gag,
then I must needs find a writer who can!
Good day at rehearsals, master?
No, Botsky, it wasn't. They don't like the play.
They think it's dull and needs more gags.
That's not a very helpful comment, is it?
No, it isn't.
I mean, they could say that about any of your plays.
Just get me some ale and pie!
What do you think, Kate? Loving it?
I bet you are.
So, the whole plot depends on the machinations
of this mischievous band of fairies meddling in matters of the human heart?
Absolutely. Got to love a meddling fairy.
Box-office gold!
And the lovers' eventual devotions are dictated
by the administering of a magic potion?
A magic potion, yes. Punters love all that.
Mr Shakespeare, is your play suggesting
that a drugged person is capable of giving consent?
What? Blimey, I didn't see that coming!
But, you know, if the drug is administered by well-intentioned fairies...
that's all right, isn't it?
No, it isn't!
Goodness gracious, Mr Shakespeare.
This appalling Puck figure goes about drugging people
so they can then be forced into intimate relations
with those whom they had previously despised.
That is sexual assault, Mr Shakespeare.
God's boobikins, Kate. If...
if a mischievous sprite
can't administer a simple love potion to a sleeping innocent
without being accused of assault, then... then I give up!
Really... you must curb your tendency to apply a joyless sociopolitical agenda
to every situation.
He's right, Kate.
If you keep banging on with all this whiny-woman stuff,
you'll never get a man to marry you.
I don't want a man to marry me if it means I must needs deny myself!
Kate, have a care.
As you are well aware,
clever, gobby birds like you who remain unmarried be thought witches.
And as one who looks upon you almost as a daughter,
I'd really rather not see you burnt at the stake or drowned in the pond.
If I marry, it will be to a man who respects me for my mind.
You have spoiled me for that, Mr Shakespeare,
treating me as your equal and seeking my opinions.
Well, yes, although, kind of only when they're complimentary.
Speaking of which, predatory sprites aside,
do you like my Midsummer Night's Dream?
If I'm honest, I think it's all a bit mimsy-whimsy soppy-grotty doodah.
Mimsy-whimsy soppy-grotty doodah?
How can you say that?
Well, for a start, three of the principal characters are fairies.
And proudly so.
I would have thought that you of all people would agree that it's high time
that members of the FSNEP community
were properly represented in popular drama projects.
FSNEP?
Fairy, sprite, nymph, elf and pixie.
FSNEP characters are appallingly underrepresented in mainstream culture.
So, you really do believe in fairies, then?
Absolutely. I've met one.
You've met an actual fairy?
Indeed I have.
A puckish sprite, a will-o'-the-wisp in the employ of the fairy queen.
‘Twas from him that I got the idea for the potion,
and it is to just such a potion that I owe the love of mine own sweet Anne.
Is this one of your jokes?
Could be. I mean, it's not funny - that's usually a clue.
I'm not joking. It happened many years ago.
I'd just met gorgeous Anne Hathaway, the milkmaid,
and, after a whirlwind of sweet romance and heartfelt emotion, had...
Knocked her up.
Knocked her proper up the muffly-duffington.
My fault entirely.
She had begged that I take care in my frenzied haste,
and promised had I to ensure that the stranger in the purple helm who had...
who had come a-visiting beneath her petticoats
would ne'er outstay his welcome
but would instead withdraw post-haste before, like fiery Mount Vesuvius
disgorging hot lava upon Pompeii, an unfortunate eruption occurred.
But cometh the hour... cometh the man.
And Anne, being fertile as a new-sown meadow
spread thick with fresh and steaming dung,
was pregnant before I'd had so much as a chance to light a pipe
and ask how it had beeneth for her.
Thus was our wedding day set.
Are you actually going anywhere with this tsunami of oversharing?
Yeah. I thought you were about to tell us about meeting a fairy.
I'm getting to that.
You see, I loved Anne with all my heart
but I feared that she did only marry me because she was knocked uppeth.
To be honest, I've always lacked a bit of confidence with girls.
Yeah. Being bald.
I am not bald!
I have a tall face.
Besides which, in those days, my face was much shorter.
I had gorgeous raven locks
and as pretty an ankle as any hot-blooded youth in South Warwickshire.
But, Mr Shakespeare, if your locks were raven and your ankle pretty,
why didst thou lack confidence?
Well, I'm not saying I wasn't a catch. I was hot stuff, all right,
just not as hot stuff as mine Anne.
She was just such a classy bird!
Master, I love Mrs S to death, but classy...? You think?
I remember you telling me she didn't even let go of the cow's teats.
‘Tis true, she was a dutiful maid
and verily did milk a bucketful whilst I didst roist around the back...
which, I do confess,
lent a surprisingly erotic frisson to the encounter.
Anne was just so sexsome.
All did love her, and she love them.
And many a lusty-trousered sap-bursting roister had plighted his troth before me,
and she didn't marry any of them.
She was 26 by the time she gave my troth a plighting.
Why, having waited so long, did she choose me?
Because she was up the duffington.
Exactly.
She Aadto marry me.
But she didn't have to love me.
And distraught was I at the prospect of a reluctant bride.
And that's when I met the fairy sprite.
Blimey! I'd forgotten about him.
Not me, Bottom.
You never forget your first Puck.
Wandered had I alone in the merry greenwood.
Blimey!
Either I mistake your shape and making quite,
or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite
call'd Robin Goodfellow - are not you he
that frights the maidens of the villagery?
Thou speak'st aright.
I am that merry wanderer of the night.
I jest to Oberon and make him smile,
when I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile.
But since in daisy chains I've got you, just call me Puck.
That's as in "what the...?"
Why, then, naughty sprite, what the Puck would you with me?
A clever bargain would I strike with you, sir.
In love methinks thou art a total loser.
But...
Put this potion in your sweetheart's eyes,
and when she wakes she'll get a big surprise.
To him who first she sees, her heart's enthralled,
even if, like you, he ends up going bald.
And he gave me the potion.
Oh, my goodness! And it all came true.
Well, not entirely.
As you can see, I didn't go bald,
just a little bit less not bald, which is a completely different thing.
Anyway, Puck charged me fully five shillings for the potion.
Every penny I had, in fact.
But a small price to pay for a lifetime of domestic bliss, because it worked.
Mine Anne has been besotted with me ever since.
Just as I am with her.
Well, I mean, we've had our ups and downs.
The "dark lady" episode, for instance?
Sweet Emelia Lanier, daughter of the Danish court musician,
whom you did lust after most hornsomely.
Yes.
I do admit a brief and unfortunate infatuation there.
And the "fair youth", whom also did you want to roister most rigidly.
For the final time, Bottom,
I did not want to rigidly roister the Earl of Southampton!
Honestly, I just don't know how these rumours get about!
Well... you did write most gushsomely
about wanting to expend your spirit in his waste of shame.
By which I meant "have a nice chat".
Obviously.
But never mind all that.
The point I'm making is that my midsummer's play be not fey whimsy
but gritty realism.
You don't think this Puck bloke might have been a conman?
Absolutely not. The potion worked.
Anne's constant heart is proof of that.
And now that we have established beyond any doubt that A Midsummer Night's Dream
is definitely not mimsy-whimsy soppy-grotty doodah,
I must return to the question of gagging up the big reveal scene.
I've promised Burbage that I'll give the lowly weaver a hilarious name,
but what could that name be, Bottom?
I ask you - Bottom, what could it be?
I've no idea, master.
Also, Burbage is expecting a big visual gag
and I'm equally at a loss for inspiration there.
In come I to make an ass of myself!
What merry trick is this?
Who am I?
Oh!
Oh, it's you, Mr Marlowe!
Oh, absolutely. I just thought I'd have a bit of fun with my latest trophy.
Me and a couple of posh mates just been on a stag hunt.
Mr Marlowe, that's an ass's head.
Yeah. So much easier to bag.
I mean, think about it.
Stag - five hours creeping through streams and gorse
to probably miss anyway.
Ass - tethered to a post in a small paddock. You do the maths.
Anyway, I thought I could hang it here till I get my permanent digs.
Oh, I just love its proud brow and noble expression.
Gosh, Kit, what fun!
Nice to have something to take my mind off my search for a really telling comic image
for my midsummer's play...
which continues to completely elude me.
I can't help you there, mate.
Bottom, ale and pie, if you please.
And afterwards, I'd be obliged if you'd mount my ass.
That is not in my job description.
Ha-ha, did you see what I did there?
The head, Botsky. I meant mount the trophy.
Who is it?
Be-Be careful. Let none know I'm here.
It's that old bastable Robert Greene.
Right, well, that's all right, then.
Goodness, you seem a bit jumpy, Kit.
Can't deny it, Will.
Laying low. Debts.
Vengeance, spying, betrayal.
It's all getting a bit much, and I fear for my life.
That's why I was wearing the ass's head.
Going incognito, so to speak.
Ah! Mr Shakespeare, here I am come a-calling.
‘Tis passing strange, Mr Greene,
as 'tis well known about the town that you do hate my gutlings.
I do not visit you, Mr Shakespeare.
I would rather enter the dungeons of the Spanish Inquisition testy-baubles first
than seek your company.
‘Tis this fortunate maid with whom I would speak.
Me, Mr Greene? How so?
And why be I fortunate?
Because I come as messenger from the noble Lord Egeus,
the richest man in Southwark.
Lord Egeus, as you may know, has been ever a soldier -
a hard, manly bachelor life.
The closest he has e'er come to a boon companion to bring him comfort and love
hath been his horse.
Yes, I've heard those rumours.
Now, however, he would take him a wife and he has spied you, miss,
upon the dilly as you flit daintily from shop to shop.
I can't help it. Mad shopper, me. Love shops!
Yes, well, His Lordship's fancy hath been tickled.
He therefore sends me post-haste to plight his troth
requesting your hand in marriage.
Zounds, Kate! Lord Egeus is the richest man in Southwark.
And fully 50 years old, and mean and ugly,
and most warty be his countenance!
And he's the richest man in Southwark.
And he doth also own this house.
My mother has a lease.
A lease which be subject to terms, terms which be defined in courts,
courts which be ruled by judges, judges who owe their positions to...?
The richest man in Southwark.
Lord Egeus's sap is rising, and his fruity loins do long for your tender favours.
He demands an answer in a fortnight.
He may have my answer now, Mr Greene.
Never. Ne'er shall I marry Lord Egeus!
Madam, have a care. Lord Egeus doth love you now
as he has previously loved only Mr Snorty Velvet Flank.
- His horse? - Just so.
Please him and you could sleep on a bed of lavender-scented hay
and wear a diamond-studded muzzle.
Deny him, and you will feel his whip.
I advise you to think again.
Good day.
Kate, maybe I'm being thick here,
but what part of the sentence “the richest man in Southwark"
could you not get?
The part which says I do not love him, Mr Marlowe!
Kate, what's love got to do with it?
What be love but a second-hand emotion?
A woman in our times has no legal status at all, save that defined by a man.
She passes from being the property of her father to that of her husband.
Eventually, you must needs throw yourself on the mercy of a man,
and not all will be the richest man in Southwark!
I will not marry him! I swear I won't.
You married for love, Mr Shakespeare, and yet you think I deserve less?
I hate men.
I hate, hate, hate them!
But this is awful.
It breaks my heart to see the child in such distress.
What's more, this rich match would secure her future.
I mean, Egeus will die soon enough and Kate'll be set for life.
Still, I suppose we can't make her love the bloke.
Can't we?
Home am I!
Bring ale, bring pie.
Let all rejoice. Father is home.
Good journey, love?
Nothing more than the usual hellish nightmare, Anne.
15 hours!
15 bloody hours,
awaiting, and I quote, “a member of the on-coach team".
Oh, the irony of it.
I can't get home because the lazy bastable's who's supposed to get me home
is at home.
You're always moaning about your journeys!
I reckon you should write about it, put it in your plays.
It will be funny and also appealing to contemporary audiences.
But I don't want my plays to be contemporary, daughter.
I want them to be timeless.
Well, why wouldn't that be timeless?
I'm sure it would be of great comfort to the travelling public of some future age
to know that my brilliant son shared their pain.
Oh, come now, Mum.
I hardly think such issues will concern travellers centuries hence.
Do you really think the peoples of this sceptred isle will endlessly suffer
an underfunded, ill-run and pointlessly fractured transport infrastructure
to hobble the nation?
Thou would be mad.
What d'you reckon they're going to do about it, then?
Why, ‘tis certain that one day it will not be a ragbag of private companies
that run the means of transport in Albion
but the public itself
in some form of nationally organised collective
run for the benefit of all and profit of none.
Well, I must say, that does seem like a pretty good idea.
Except, if ever there was such a publicly funded service like that,
the first thing the Queen's ministers would do is flog it off to their mates.
Come now, Father! I hardly think people would be so stupid
as to allow that to happen.
I don't know why you bother coming home at all if it's such a total pain!
Why, to see you all, of course.
Mum, the twins, you, Sue, mine own sweet Anne.
Not Dad, obviously.
But... But the rest of the family, certainly.
Besides, I had a yearning for the country.
I would wander in the greenwood once more as I did when but a youth.
Well, if you're going to the woods, you can pick me some mushrooms.
You go too, Susanna, and make sure you pick the right ones this time.
Grandad's still coming down
from the lot you gave him last week with his chop.
I have opened the doors to spiritual perception.
Claims he saw the haloed head of Jesus in his gravy.
It was a dumpling and an onion ring!
So, you see, Sue, now you know the whole story,
and I'm returned here now in search of Puck with another love dilemma to solve.
Did it ever occur to you, Dad, that this Puck bloke might actually be a con artist
who just took five bob off for you for a bottle of water with a few petals in it?
I told you, Sue, it worked.
Your mum has loved me all her life.
Maybe she just loved you anyway.
Nice thought, Sue, but you're dreaming.
What gorgeous girl like Anne would e'er love me
without the help of a puckish potion?
I'm the greatest poet in all history but I know my limitations. I'm also...
A fartsome baldy-boots who the children laugh at on the village green.
Who comes to the greenwood with weary sigh?
Speak up,
for Puck would know the reason why.
Good sprite, some years ago,
thou didst present me with a potion that when administered to a sleeping soul
would cause them to fall in love at first sight
with whomsoever they encountered on awakening.
Which is, by the way, really, really creepy.
It's not creepy.
It's fun.
And charming.
And romantic.
It's also gone up. Ten bob.
Child...
on the morrow, Lord Egeus will come for his answer.
Yes, I know.
You have been weeping.
No, I haven't.
I have brought you a soothing balm for your red and swollen eyes.
Except they're not red and swollen, because I haven't been crying.
I-I think soothing balm could help.
I don't need balm.
I will not quarrel with thee, child, but I beg you, get a good night's sleep,
and since you have been crying...
I have not been crying!
Use this soothing eye balm.
No, seriously, just...
just put it on your eyes.
For the love I bear thee, I promise.
By the fairy's false fandangle
does this fond fool think to gull me.
‘Tis clear this soothing balm of which he speaks
is the very potion with which he did seek to enchant his Anne.
‘Tis certain he intends to ensure
that Lord Egeus be the first person I lay eyes on
on the morrow.
Well, while I be very sure that this be not magic at all
and none but a conman's trickery,
nonetheless I see a way to serve his trick back up to him
and put an end to his hopes that I marry Warty.
Who the maid?
Me the maid.
Robert Greene has come a-calling.
I am arrived at this ridiculously early hour, as instructed, Mr Shakespeare.
A most uncivilised imposition.
Well, you know, today is the big decision day,
and Kate just couldn't wait to see Lord Egeus.
He will be here shortly?
I trust your urgent summons means the girl has come to her senses.
Absolutely.
She will love Lord Egeus most fervently the moment she sets eyes on him.
But ‘tis crucial that when His Lordship arrives we hide ourselves,
that when Kate emerges she sees only him.
She must see His Lordship first.
I need no potion to perform my magic trick.
Just a fine brain and a firm resolve.
Oh, oh, Bottom! Bottom!
My night-time turding pot be fully rank and loaded.
Canst thou turf its contents from the window?
Oh, Bottom! Bottom!
Kate's awake. She'll want her turding pot turfed.
Bottom, no!
What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
Angel? Kate, it's me, Bottom. I've come for your turding pot.
- You're so beautiful. - What?
No!
What madness is this?
‘Tis as if I see thee for the first time...
My Bottom!
Come.
Embrace... my Bottom!
Kiss... my Bottom!
Caress, cuddle and delight... my Bottom!
- Bottom's his name. - Oh!
And, of course, that's all right, then.
Except not!
Lord Egeus will do dark murder to us all!
His Grace, the Lord Egeus.
I've come for the girl.
I'm sorry, my lord, but I am spoken for.
I love my Bottom.
And with good reason.
Fine buttocks.
Strong flanks.
Like a noble horse.
It's your athletic equine quality that attracts me.
Your Grace, this foolish wicked girl doth reject your advances.
She loveth another.
Never! If I can't have her, no-one shall!
I will ruin her!
I will ruin you all!
Bottom, grab Mr Marlowe's trophy,
and when I shout, "Ass!" put it on, and everybody duck.
Look over here, Lord Egeus!
Ass!
What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
You are the most attractive biped I have ever seen.
I do love thee!
I shall mount thee!
No, oh, oh!
Run, Bottom!
Lose him in the local paddock! He can take his pick!
What madness is this?
There is sorcery afoot!
Lord Egeus, what aileth thee?!
Well, that was all a bit weird.
Long story, Kit, but I think we've heard the last of Lord Egeus's infatuation.
I am completely stunned, Mr Shakespeare.
The potion worked.
Well, of course it worked. You're in love with Bottom, aren't you?
God knows how I'm going to fix that.
I'm not in love with Bottom.
I didn't use the potion.
I just wanted to find a way to stop you
trying to make me marry someone I didn't love.
Clever bird, Will.
They'll end up making a deal of trouble in the world, just you watch.
But I take back everything I said about your play.
Turns out it really is grittily realistic.
Yes.
But Burbage won't stage it.
Or at least, not unless I can come up with a really funny name for the weaver
Titania falls in love with
and an inspired visual gag for her to wake up to.
Really, I should be working on it now.
But what with Bottom putting on the ass's head and...
Lord Egeus falling in love with him, I've been a bit distracted.
Hang on.
Hang the futtock on!
It's going very well, Will.
Yes. And the big scene's still to come.
Hello.
I heard there was a show needed stopping, a roof that needed raising.
I can't believe you gave my name to a bloomin' donkey-headed clown.
Oh, don't be such a snob, Botsky. You have lent your name
to what is destined to become the funniest comic scene
in all English Renaissance theatre.
Yeah, because there's so much competition!
Mr Kempe, stick the funny head on and go out there and make theatre history.
What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
The finch, the sparrow and the lark,
the plainsong cuckoo grey,
whose note full many a man doth mark,
and dares not answer... nay!
Listen to it, Will.
The very first laughs for the big donkey gag in A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Laughs destined, I am sure, to ring down the ages,
as generation after generation discover your genius anew
and adds its voice to the ongoing chorus of merriment.
Absolutely.
And those who don't find it funny will feel obliged to pretend to,
adding their glazed, forced, teeth-gritted garglings
to the merry cacophony of mirth.
Happy with that.
Quite a story, husband.
You gave Kate a balm to soothe her troubled eyes.
That's right.
But actually it was a potion you got from a woodland sprite to make her love
- whom first she saw upon awakening? - Yes, that's right.
Funny, that.
I recall upon our wedding night you giving me a balm to soothe my troubled eyes.
Oh, right, yes, but... of course, that was eye balm, my love.
Well, it doesn't matter anyway. I didn't use it.
You... You didn't?
No.
My eyes weren't troubled.
And I don't need no bloomin' potion to love you either.
You fartsome old baldy-boots.
If we shadows have offended,
think but this and all is mended.
That you have but slumbered here while these visions did appear,
and this weak and idle theme
no more yielding but a dream.
If fun you've had and more fun seek...
come... dream again with us...
next week.