Green Thumbs: Car"tuning" Me In

He's having fun

      A go-to for filmmakers aiming to paint schoolwork as dull exercise, Shakespearean plays have been depicted as pure drudgery. It’s as though directors have deliberately gone out of their way to push students away from appreciating works of genius. Before the classroom, Shakespeare (for me) drifted in and out of movies: typical images of kids with their heads hung over textbooks, drool pooling from their lips, and eyes covered in a fog. Listening to humdrum recitals, they seemed tired, bored, and totally uninterested. Not a single word resonated, and how could it possibly—the teachers often spewed verses in a monotonous, lifeless pitch. As could be expected, those attitudes and portrayals affected my approach to Shakespeare's works. Luckily, before this, a childhood cartoon—Jimmy Neutron—convinced me to be more skeptical.

Green thumbs

 As many probably recall (though you may shy away from the embarrassment of publicly saying it), Jimmy Neutron once aired its own rendition of Macbeth. A contrived and laughable spin, the cast of characters transported the play to outer space, meant mostly to entertain. They dressed in astronauts’ apparel, painted their faces green, and brandished laser sabers—a far cry from the real deal. Some operated robots, others chanted a rap-infused spiritual. George Lucas meets 16^th century England, in a sense. Brilliantly, under the guise of cute theatrics, it found a way to still hone in on the hallmarks of Shakespeare. The show’s makers sprinkled hints of love, antiquated jargon, dramatic tension, irony, and death throughout. Never mind that they confused countless lines with parts from other Shakespearean masterpieces:

“Parting is such sweet sorrow.” (Actually from Romeo and Juliet)

AND

"I've come to bury Caesar, not to praise him." (Actually from Julius Caesar)

Perhaps the only thing more shocking than the show's inaccuracy is the fact that I’ve remembered this (barring those quotes I found while re-watching some scenes). While I doubt many over the past decades will remember a word from their run-of-the-mill Shakespeare course, this single—often goofy—episode impressed an intrigue for the art of acting and the craft of Shakespeare. Encouragingly, then, it seems that filmmakers and TV show juggernauts have a unique chance: if they improve the details, kids may walk away with a healthy dose of The Bard. Beneath wackiness of green people and play, you can insert something of consequence. Parents pureeing broccoli into a toddler's soup, if you will.