What classic American television series included Shakespeare episodes? |
It might almost be said that it’s easier to list those long-running TV series that didn’t do a Shakespeare show! Producer Sherwood Schwartz (Gilligan’s Island, The Brady Bunch) offered one reason when he discussed the popular Gilligan’s Island episode “The Producer,” in which the castaways put on a musical version of Hamlet. As Schwartz explained, actors in a regular series are usually eager for a change of pace from their own roles and a chance to do something different. Shakespeare, already familiar to the television audience, offers just such an opportunity.
Star Trek may have included more Shakespeare references and plot lines than any other US television series (or, in the case of Star Trek, multiple series). Many Star Trek episodes have Shakespearean titles, the characters often quote Shakespeare, and performances of the plays were worked into some episodes. Some good examples from the original series include Elaan of Troyius, in which Kirk encounters a situation inspired by The Taming of the Shrew, and a Macbeth production by a touring space troupe that is central to the plot of Conscience of the King (itself a reference to Hamlet). The Simpsons probably runs a close second, with more than twenty Shakespeare-related episodes. These include the classic episode Tales from the Public Domain, in which Bart plays Hamlet, Lisa plays Ophelia, and Moe the bartender is Claudius.
The comedy series Moonlighting also included various references to Shakespeare—including the Atomic Shakespeare episode, a feminist retelling of The Taming of the Shrew, in which most scenes were written in iambic pentameter. Among other examples too numerous to list in full, Shakespeare took center stage in the Happy Days episode A Star is Bored, in which the Fonz, at first reluctantly, plays Hamlet. School-age characters ranging from Urkel and Marcia Brady to the teenagers of Beverly Hills, 90210 have found themselves caught up in Shakespeare productions. Columbo once took on Macbeth, and Martin Lawrence’s show Martin tackled Romeo and Juliet. Romeo and Juliet also inspired an early Bonanza episode, The Truckee Strip, in which a feud between the Cartwrights and the Bishops comes between Joe and the woman he loves; a later Bonanza episode, Woman of Fire, is a Western retelling of The Taming of the Shrew.
Plot lines and quotations are not the only evidence of Shakespeare in American television shows. In the 1960s Batman series, Bruce Wayne gained access to his hidden Batcave by flipping open a bust of Shakespeare to use the control button inside. And the ghost of William Shakespeare took on a career as a TV screenwriter in the Twilight Zone episode The Bard.
Do you know of other examples of Shakespeare in classic American TV shows? Share the information in the Comments section below.
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