Upstart Crow

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".