The Contemporary Shakespearean Actor As the Site of Adaptive Encounter
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The Contemporary Shakespearean Actor as the Site of Adaptive Encounter. By Anna Blackwell Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of a PhD degree at De Montfort University, Leicester. October, 2014. Acknowledgements I would like to thank Doctor Siobhan Keenan for her thoughtful and generous supervision. Her kindness, perspicacity and enthusiasm have been essential in honing my thesis and ensured that my doctoral work has been enjoyable and productive. I would also like to express my gratitude to my second supervisor, Professor Deborah Cartmell, for her exhaustive knowledge of both the field of adaptation studies and academia in general and the Centre for Adaptations for offering me the opportunity to pursue my PhD at De Montfort University. To my fellow postgraduates at DMU and other institutions around the country, my family and friends who have shown interest in my work: thank you for your encouragement and for understanding the unique pressures of completing a PhD. To David, both my thesis and I are much the better for your frequent insight, unfailing curiosity and reassurance. Finally, the greatest thanks are owed to my parents for their continued support, cheerleading and for planting the roots of my love for all things Shakespearean: without them this thesis would not have been possible. N.B. Part of the chapter on Kenneth Branagh will be published in the forthcoming edition of Critical Survey, Vol. 25, Issue 3 (2014). This article is entitled: ‘“Yes, I have gained my experience” (As You Like It, 4.3.23): Kenneth Branagh and Adapting the “Shakespearean” Actor’. i Abstract This thesis investigates the cultural uses and implied signifying practices of the work of actors who are popularly and frequently described as 'Shakespearean.' Though ubiquitous figures within culture, there is a dearth of criticism which questions what qualities are invoked in the use of the term ‘Shakespearean’ and what implicit judgements of value or taste, class or cultural function are at work in its attribution. Although works such as Carol Chillington Rutter’s Clamorous Voices have analysed the figure of the female Shakespearean, moreover, the male Shakespearean remains largely an unexplored site of meaning and definition. It is this focus on the body of the actor which represents my original contribution to knowledge. Indeed, despite the preponderance of actor-based studies in Film Studies or, indeed, Theatre Studies, Adaptation Studies has been slow to locate the body as an adaptive site; concentrating instead upon themes, authors, the work of directors or, more recently, the influence of production factors. My thesis argues for the Shakespearean actor as a site of adaptation, positing it as a conduit for the transferable commdity value which is ‘Shakespeare’ and thereby considering the differences which may occur in the production of meaning as the Shakespearean actor moves between cultural hierarchies: from ‘high’ to ‘low’, or mainstream culture. An essential part of this thesis and an aspect which further argues for its contribution to this field is, therefore, analysis of popular cultural texts which have largely been ignored by adaptation critics. Although figures such as Richard Burt have recognised the value of popular or counter-cultural texts for an understanding of Shakespeare’s far-reaching and often surprising influence, the more tangential work in the Shakespearean actor’s filmography provide equally valuable ground to mine. An understanding of a Shakespearean actor’s cultural function is ii thus served by critiquing their mainstream films as well as their more documented Shakespearean oeuvre. By focusing on the implicitly multidirectional possibilities of adaptation as a process, I explore what values the ‘Shakespearean’ holds in contemporary culture and whether these maintain a popular perception of the Shakespearean actor as a representative of conservatism, elitism and ‘high’ culture. Or, whether the Shakespearean actor contains the potential for subverting some of the associations which Shakespeare’s legacy has accrued over time. iii Table of Contents List of Illustrations 1 Introduction Part I: Presenting the Shakespearean Actor (i) Introduction 2 (ii) Structure and Rationale for Case Studies 18 Part II: Critical Framework(s) (i) Introduction 29 (ii) The Star-Body 31 (iii) The Shakespearean 36 (iv) The Body in Performance 45 (v) Adaptation Studies 54 Chapter One: Ian McKellen, the Established Shakespearean Introduction: Defining a Shakespearean 62 Monsters on Film: McKellen in the Nineties 69 McKellen in Hollywood: X-Men and The Da Vinci Code 84 ‘Real Shakespeare’: Returning to King Lear 111 McKellen and Popular Culture 128 Chapter Two: Kenneth Branagh, Adapting the Shakespearean Introduction: Kenneth Branagh’s Shakespeare 144 Branagh in the Mainstream 174 Interpreting Thor: Taste, Cultural Hierarchies and the Shakespearean 187 The London 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony: Kenneth Branagh, Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Caliban 215 Chapter Three: Tom Hiddleston, the Beginnings of the Shakespearean Star Introduction: ‘Quintessentially English’ 227 Thor and Loki 233 The Rising Shakespearean: The Hollow Crown 247 The Afterlife of a Character: Memes, Loki and Hiddleston Online 278 Celebrity and the Body: Coriolanus 300 Conclusion 317 Bibliography Books and Journal Articles 329 Newspaper and Magazine Articles 339 Internet Resources 345 Archival Material 348 Other Material 348 Filmography 349 Appendix Published Article: ‘Adapting Coriolanus: Tom Hiddleston’s Body and Action Cinema’, Adaptation, Vol. 7 Issue 3 (2014). 352 N.B. ‘Adapting Coriolanus’ is currently available online to view as the winning selection for the 2014 Adaptation Essay Prize. The journal edition will be published on December 1, 2014. List of Illustrations 0.1 Last Action Hero (dir. John McTiernan, 1993) 2 1.1 Othello (dir. Trevor Nunn, 1989) 72 1.2 X2 (dir. Bryan Singer, 2003) 88 1.3 X-Men (dir. Bryan Singer, 2000) 95 1.4 X-Men: The Last Stand (dir. Brett Ratner, 2006) 98 1.5 Screen capture of Twitter @IanMcKellen 108 1.6 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (dir. Peter Jackson, 2000) 117 1.7 King Lear (dir. Trevor Nunn, 2008) 122 1.8 Title page for Vicious (TV, ITV, 2013-) 138 2.1 Hamlet (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 1996) 169 2.2 Hamlet (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 1996) 172 2.3 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (dir. Irvin Kerschner, 1980) 172 2.4 Promotional photograph of Gilderoy Lockhart, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (dir. Chris Columbus, 2002) 180 2.5 Thor (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 2011) 210 2.6 Hamlet (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 1996) 214 2.7 Kenneth Branagh in the 2012 London Olympics Opening Ceremony (TV, BBC, July 27, 2012) 217 3.1 Suburban Shootout (TV, Channel 5, 2006-7) 230 3.2 Thor (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 2011) 240 3.3 Thor (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 2011) 241 3.4 The Hollow Crown: Henry IV, Part Two (dir. Richard Eyre, 2012) 255 3.5 Thor (dir. Kenneth Branagh, 2011) 257 3.6 The Hollow Crown: Henry IV, Part One (dir. Richard Eyre, 2012) 259 3.7 The Hollow Crown: Henry IV, Part Two (dir. Richard Eyre, 2012) 262 3.8 The Hollow Crown: Henry V (dir. Thea Sharrock, 2012) 273 3.9 Meme. Nelson Fraizer, ‘Odin are you sure Loki is the adopted one? Hannibal.’ 291 3.10 Meme. Elska Nott, ‘How do I even begin to describe Loki Laufeyson…,’ 293 3.11 Meme. The King Himself, ‘So I Made A Thing.’ 295 3.12 Screen capture of Twitter @TWHiddleston 297 1 Introduction PART I: Presenting the Shakespearean Actor Introduction A young boy, Danny Madigan (Austen O’Brien), slopes late into his English classroom after skipping school to watch the third in a series of blockbuster films of his favourite action hero, Jack Slater (Arnold Schwarzenegger). His teacher (Joan Plowright) introduces a clip from Laurence Olivier’s 1948 Hamlet, telling her class that some of them might recognise the actor from the Polaroid commercials or, with slight resignation, ‘as Zeus in Clash of the Titans.’ Despite his teacher’s assurances that Hamlet was one of the first action heroes, however, Danny quickly grows impatient with Olivier’s Hamlet and as the Dane shies from murdering Claudius at his prayers, hisses: ‘Don’t talk, just do it!’ The camera cuts from its close-up on Danny back to the film, but this time it reveals his personal fantasy of Hamlet as a bombastic piece of action cinema, complete with the genre’s conventional explosions, spectacular violence and Schwarzenegger’s typically deadpan delivery. Fig. 0.1 Schwarzenegger contemplates Hamlet’s most famous meditation, deciding ‘To be or not to be… Not to be.’ 2 With the voiceover for Danny’s action Hamlet intoning parodic appropriations of the text such as, ‘Something’s rotten in the state of Denmark… and Hamlet’s taking out the trash’, Last Action Hero dramatises some of the issues relating to Shakespeare’s use in popular culture. Danny’s imagined film relies upon its visual similarity to Olivier’s Hamlet in order to function as a parody. The same monochromatic, dark blue colour palette is enhanced by sudden sparks of colour, however, which arise from the play’s newly interpolated action scenes, such as the match lighting Schwarzenegger’s cigar (see above), bomb explosions and the shards of glass as Claudius is pushed through a window. Similarly, the familiar image of Hamlet’s graveside philosophising is undercut by Schwarzenegger hurling Yorick’s skull as a weapon. That the Shakespearean actor as an individual is determined as much by their frequent movements between ‘high’ and mainstream culture as it is by their high cultural cachet is also suggested by the film. This is present in Plowright’s English teacher and her attempts to popularise Hamlet for her students, the description of Laurence Olivier of the Polaroid commercial and Clash of Titans fame and a later cameo in which Ian McKellen, implacably blank, stalks nineties New York as Death from Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (1957).