Shakespeare, Madness, and Music: Scoring Insanity in Cinematic Adaptations

165 Pages·2009·0.6 MB·English

by  Kendra Preston Leonard

SHAKESPEARE,
Film • Instrumental Music L
E
O
In Shakespeare, Madness, and Music: Scoring Insanity in Cinematic Adaptations, Kendra Preston N
A
Leonard examines the use of music in Shakespeare’s three political tragedies—Hamlet, R MADNESS,
D
Macbeth, and King Lear. These three plays all involve the recurring trope of madness,
which, as constructed by Shakespeare, provided a wider canvas on which to convey
details that could not be otherwise expressed: sexual desire and expectation, political MUSIC
AND
unrest, and ultimately, truth.
Music has long been associated with madness and was often used as an audible symptom
of victims’ disassociation from their surroundings and societal rules, as well as a loss of
S
H
self-control. Whether discussing contemporary source materials, such as songs, verses,
A
or rhymes specified by Shakespeare in his plays, or music composed specifically for a K
E
film, Leonard illustrates how the changing social and scholarly attitudes toward the SCORING INSANITY IN CINEMATIC ADAPTATIONS
S
P
plays, characters, and conditions that fall under the general catch-all of “madness” have
E
A
led to a wide range of musical accompaniments, signifiers, and incarnations of the afflic-
R
tions displayed by Shakespeare’s characters. E
,
M
Focusing on the most widely distributed and viewed adaptations of these plays for the A
D
cinema, each chapter presents the musical treatment of individual Shakespearean char-
N
acters afflicted with, or feigning, madness: Hamlet, Ophelia, Lady Macbeth, King Lear, E
S
and Edgar. The book offers analysis and interpretation of the music used to underscore, S
,
belie, or otherwise inform or invoke the characters’ state of mind, providing a fascinating A
N
indication of culture and society, as well as the thoughts and ideas of individual direc-
D
tors, composers, and actors. A bibliography, index, and appendix of Shakespeare’s film M
adaptations complete this fascinating volume. U
S
I
C
KENDRA PRESTON LEONARD is the author of The Conservatoire Américain: A
History (Scarecrow Press, 2007).
For orders and information please contact the publisher
Scarecrow Press, Inc. 90000
A wholly owned subsidiary of
The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 9 780810 869462 Kendra Preston Leonard
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200
Lanham, Maryland 20706 Cover photo: Jean Simmons as
1-800-462-6420 • fax [phone] Ophelia in Hamlet (1948), directed by
www.scarecrowpress.com Laurence Olivier. Author's collection.
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Shakespeare, Madness,
and Music
Scoring Insanity in
Cinematic Adaptations
Kendra Preston Leonard
THE SCARECROW PRESS, INC.
Lanham • Toronto • Plymouth,UK
2009
Published by Scarecrow Press,Inc.
A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group,Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard,Suite 200,Lanham,Maryland 20706
http://www.scarecrowpress.com
Estover Road,Plymouth PL6 7PY,United Kingdom
Copyright © 2009 by Kendra Preston Leonard
All rights reserved.No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
electronic or mechanical means,including information storage and retrieval systems,
without written permission from the publisher,except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Leonard,Kendra Preston.
Shakespeare,madness,and music :scoring insanity in cinematic adaptations,2009.
p.cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8108-6946-2 (pbk.:alk.paper) — ISBN 978-0-8108-6958-5 (ebook)
1. Shakespeare,William,1564–1616—Film and video adaptations.2. Mental illness in
motion pictures.3. Mental illness in literature. I.Title.
ML80.S5.L43 2009
781.5'42—dc22
2009014208
(cid:2)™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials,ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
To Karl Rufener
An ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken

Contents
Acknowledgments vii
A Note on the Text ix
1 Shakespeare, Madness, and Music 1
2 Hamlet 7
3 Ophelia 35
4 Lady Macbeth 69
5 King Lear 97
6 Edgar 117
Afterword 127
Appendix A:Films Referred to in the Text 129
Appendix B:Selected Film Productions and Adaptations of Hamlet,
King Lear, and Macbeth 131
Bibliography 139
Index 149
About the Author 153
v

Acknowledgments
T
o those listed here, I can no other answer make, but, thanks, and thanks:
Byron Adams; Ruth Benander; Carol Brobeck; Linda Carmona; Amada Eu-
banks Winkler; Jessie Fillerup; Donna Fournier and the staff of Swarthmore
College’s Underhill Music Library; Eric Hung; Linda Hunt and the staff of
Swarthmore College’s McCabe Library; Melissa Kramer and the staff of Bryn
Mawr College’s Canaday Library; Karen and Winston Leonard; Jessie Ann
Owens; Karin Pendle; Karl Rufener; the staff of Yale University’s Beinecke
Rare Books and Manuscripts Library; and the members of the 2008 Folger
Shakespeare Library Shakespeare on Screen in Theory and Practice Seminar:
Thomas Cartelli, Annalisa Castaldo, Rebecca R. Chapman, Alexander C.
Huang, Farrah B. Lehman, Michael Noschka, Katherine Rowe, Amy E.
Scott-Douglass, Jonathan L. Sircy, and Kay H. Smith.
I am also grateful to my editor at Scarecrow Press,Renée Camus,and the
outstanding staff there.
Research for this book was supported in part by the Folger Shakespeare
Library.
vii

A Note on the Text
U
nless otherwise noted, all references to Shakespeare’s plays are from the
Folger Shakespeare Library Edition, edited by Barbara A. Mowat and Paul
Werstine (New York: Washington Square Press, 1992).
All references to the plays are notated as Act,Scene,Line(s);thus,2.2.224
would be Act 2, Scene 2, Line 224.
ix