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Song Parodies -> "MacBeth's Silver Dagger"
Original Song Title:
"Maxwell's Silver Hammer"
Original Performer:
The Beatles
Parody Song Title:
"MacBeth's Silver Dagger"
Parody Written by:
Lifeliver
The Lyrics
A couple of days ago I was quite taken with veteran AIRhead Warren Baker's use of a Beatles song to relate a synopsis of a Shakespeare play (Come Together/Hamlet). It inspired me to try something similar. For the Shakespeare-challenged (a shameful thing to be for any aspiring writer) I hope the sketchy footnotes are helpful.
It's perhaps worth mentioning that it's one of his last plays, produced shortly after the ascent of the Scottish James I, the first of the Stuart kings. The consensus among historians is that it's mostly BS. MacBeth was apparently a popular and benevolent king by the standards of the times and not one of history's great villains at all. The play is also Shakespeare's shortest, believed to have been substantially abridged (or censored for political reasons) and also the most violent. This has made it a popular choice in high school senior English syllabi.
The 1971 film version by Roman Polanski was his first after the Manson murders claimed his wife and unborn child, and is a disturbing bloodfest from start to finish, apparently somehow cathartic for the director.
It's perhaps worth mentioning that it's one of his last plays, produced shortly after the ascent of the Scottish James I, the first of the Stuart kings. The consensus among historians is that it's mostly BS. MacBeth was apparently a popular and benevolent king by the standards of the times and not one of history's great villains at all. The play is also Shakespeare's shortest, believed to have been substantially abridged (or censored for political reasons) and also the most violent. This has made it a popular choice in high school senior English syllabi.
The 1971 film version by Roman Polanski was his first after the Manson murders claimed his wife and unborn child, and is a disturbing bloodfest from start to finish, apparently somehow cathartic for the director.
MACBETH'S SILVER DAGGER
Cauldron fizzical, future king he izzical
Witches send him home
Late night all alone with a dagger
Oh, uh uh oh
Lady's the steady one: 'C'mon, Mac, you ready son?
New Thane of Cawdor
Can you take him out, old King Duncan?
Gore uh uh ore!'
Drunken soldiery beddy-bye go
He sneaks in through the door
Sank fang - Macbeth's silver dagger
Ploughs into king's gut
Shang lang Macbeth's silver dagger
Makes sure he is ker-put
New king rule again, but he'll need that tool again
Gets quite paranoid
Wish to null and void witches have fore
see -ee-ee-een
Malcolm and Donalbain (Duncan's sons) have run away
With Macduff combined
Down in England raising an army
Slow, though, too slow
When Banquo turns his back on ally
They creep up from behind
Thwack hack! Glinting battle axe blade
Comes down upon his head
Stand back! Blood all over the glade
But son Fleance is fled*
No more purty-one. Lady's got a dirty one
Hand will not wash clean
Out with testimonial damn spot!
Mad sleepwalk scene
Malcolm and Macduff, streaming in from Birnam rough
Thwart this killing spree**
Macbeth does not agree and resists them
No he won't go
But as bold words are leaving his lips
Macduff revenge in mind
Dice! Slice! Macduff's mighty broadsword
Shears clean off his head
Ewww! Nice! Macduff, ripped from mother's womb***
Made sure Macbeth was dead
End of story - just like the witches said
orig. recording on YouTube
Cauldron fizzical, future king he izzical
Witches send him home
Late night all alone with a dagger
Oh, uh uh oh
Lady's the steady one: 'C'mon, Mac, you ready son?
New Thane of Cawdor
Can you take him out, old King Duncan?
Gore uh uh ore!'
Drunken soldiery beddy-bye go
He sneaks in through the door
Sank fang - Macbeth's silver dagger
Ploughs into king's gut
Shang lang Macbeth's silver dagger
Makes sure he is ker-put
New king rule again, but he'll need that tool again
Gets quite paranoid
Wish to null and void witches have fore
see -ee-ee-een
Malcolm and Donalbain (Duncan's sons) have run away
With Macduff combined
Down in England raising an army
Slow, though, too slow
When Banquo turns his back on ally
They creep up from behind
Thwack hack! Glinting battle axe blade
Comes down upon his head
Stand back! Blood all over the glade
But son Fleance is fled*
No more purty-one. Lady's got a dirty one
Hand will not wash clean
Out with testimonial damn spot!
Mad sleepwalk scene
Malcolm and Macduff, streaming in from Birnam rough
Thwart this killing spree**
Macbeth does not agree and resists them
No he won't go
But as bold words are leaving his lips
Macduff revenge in mind
Dice! Slice! Macduff's mighty broadsword
Shears clean off his head
Ewww! Nice! Macduff, ripped from mother's womb***
Made sure Macbeth was dead
End of story - just like the witches said
orig. recording on YouTube
* the witches predicted descendants of Banquo would inherit the throne, so he was next on MacB's hitlist. In Shakespeare's day, the then monarch, James I (James VI of Scotland, of KJV Bible fame) was believed to be a descendant of Banquo and Fleance, a lineage apparently proved false in the 19th century. Shakey was not so stupid as to go non-PC in those dangerous times.
** learning that MacDuff would sire future kings, MacB had his whole family massacred in one of the play's grisliest scenes. In classroom playreadings, we used to crack up at MacDuff's son's line: 'He has killed me, mother'. The witches had predicted that MacB would not fall 'until Birnam wood came to (Castle) Dunsinane, which it did in the form of camouflage branches for Malcolm's army.
*** MacB was reassured by the witches' statement that 'no man born of woman' could kill him. It turned out that Macduff was born by Caesarian section: 'from his mother's womb untimely ripped'. This plot device will no doubt be familiar to Tolkien lovers, i.e. Eowyn the Shieldmaiden's showdown with the Witch-king of Angmar, though with a slightly different twist.
** learning that MacDuff would sire future kings, MacB had his whole family massacred in one of the play's grisliest scenes. In classroom playreadings, we used to crack up at MacDuff's son's line: 'He has killed me, mother'. The witches had predicted that MacB would not fall 'until Birnam wood came to (Castle) Dunsinane, which it did in the form of camouflage branches for Malcolm's army.
*** MacB was reassured by the witches' statement that 'no man born of woman' could kill him. It turned out that Macduff was born by Caesarian section: 'from his mother's womb untimely ripped'. This plot device will no doubt be familiar to Tolkien lovers, i.e. Eowyn the Shieldmaiden's showdown with the Witch-king of Angmar, though with a slightly different twist.
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Bravo!! I haven't seen Shakespearean musical parody at this level of sophistication since the episode on Gilligan's Island when the castaways put on "Hamlet: The Musical"
More sophisticated than Gilligan? LOL 'Flattery, thy name is Lennie'.
I plead guilty to one aspect of this submission - studying MacBeth as a high school senior.
During these dark days of Lindsay Lohanesque lowest *Common* denominator drek, how refreshing to be entertained and 'elevated' by the increasingly rare *other* kind of 'bare bodkin'! Bravo LL!
Comments appreciated, fellow thespians.
@ Steve: I not only studied it at HS, but taught it, long ago. Most of my students were 17-y-o 2nd-gen Aussies of various Slav backgrounds. I recall inviting questions after the first reading: 'Yeah, what does 'thou' mean, Mr L.?' Sigh! The boys dug the 'brewer's droop' reference in the Porter's comic soliloquy, though, while the girls just looked confused, or pretended to.
We routinely screened the Polanski film each year. My colleague Mrs B said she'd seen it five times, but still hadn't seen the whole movie. The girls were all looking forward to this cultural experience; the boys were sheepish.
In the first scene, MacBeth and a comrade are picking their way through the fresh bodies on the battlefield. One of them stirs pitifully for help. A knight produces this great mace and lays into him until he's a bloody pulp. By this time the girls are all either under the seat or buried in their hankies, and the boys are all on the edges of their seat going 'Cooool!' Happened every time. Ah, precious school memories!
@ Steve: I not only studied it at HS, but taught it, long ago. Most of my students were 17-y-o 2nd-gen Aussies of various Slav backgrounds. I recall inviting questions after the first reading: 'Yeah, what does 'thou' mean, Mr L.?' Sigh! The boys dug the 'brewer's droop' reference in the Porter's comic soliloquy, though, while the girls just looked confused, or pretended to.
We routinely screened the Polanski film each year. My colleague Mrs B said she'd seen it five times, but still hadn't seen the whole movie. The girls were all looking forward to this cultural experience; the boys were sheepish.
In the first scene, MacBeth and a comrade are picking their way through the fresh bodies on the battlefield. One of them stirs pitifully for help. A knight produces this great mace and lays into him until he's a bloody pulp. By this time the girls are all either under the seat or buried in their hankies, and the boys are all on the edges of their seat going 'Cooool!' Happened every time. Ah, precious school memories!
Amazing wordsmything, LL. I'm glad someone else gave the Shakespeare/Beatles marriage a go. Would love to see more, to be honest, or at least some movie synopseseseses. John B did a whole series on Hitchcock films, I did three on Shakespeare plays (Hamlet, Macbeth, and Romeo and Juliet).
LL, write havoc and set quips to plays of yore.
LL, write havoc and set quips to plays of yore.
Thanks, Warren. Could you give me a link to your own Macbeth effort? I didn't follow last sentence - parodying a Shakespeare quote?
Here's the link:
http://www.amiright.com/parody/60s/beatles637.shtml
Hope you enjoy it.
As to the line, spoken by Marcus Antonius in Julius Caesar- "Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war;"
http://www.amiright.com/parody/60s/beatles637.shtml
Hope you enjoy it.
As to the line, spoken by Marcus Antonius in Julius Caesar- "Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war;"
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