Orloff calls Shapiro an asshole

Screenwriter John Orloff and actor Rhys Ifans featured on
title card of today's Don't Quill the Messenger podcast

by Linda Theil

In a long reminiscence of Rolland Emmerich's 2011 film Anonymous, screenwriter John Orloff recalled Robert (sic) Shapiro as an "asshole". Twice.

In the Oct 20, 2023 "Not so Anonymous" episode of his anti-Stratfordian Don't Quill the Messenger podcast, host Steven Sabel spoke to Orloff for over an hour about the making of Emmerich's epic flop that brought the Shakespeare authorship question to international prominence. (See: "Anonymous Opens . . .", et al on Oberon weblog.)

At time-mark 38:30 during a discussion of the Anonymous post-release furor, Orloff opined regarding Shakespearean scholar James Shapiro -- although Orloff did Shapiro the ultimate disrespect of not remembering his first name correctly:

"Robert (sic) Shapiro! Oof, that guy! . . . he's such a dishonest broker. Above anything else. I mean, whatever else you want to say, he's just an asshole. I mean, he's just an asshole. He wouldn't be on stage with me so I couldn't come to things that he would denounce our film at. He published two articles about the movie, maybe three. It was just endless."

Shapiro's discourse on the topic can be recalled here:

"Hollywood Dishonors the Bard" by James Shapiro, New York Times, Oct 16, 2011

"Shakespeare - a fraud? Anonymous is ridiculous" by James Shapiro, The Guardian, Nov 4, 2011

During the interview, Sabel suggested the film should be made into a series for streaming, like Masters of the Air -- a series soon to be released on Apple TV for which Orloff wrote the screenplay adaptation from the Donald Miller book.

Wouldn't that chap somebody's ass.

Waugaman named Oxfordian of the Year 2021

by Linda Theil Waugaman taking his first selfie in his home office in Potomac Maryland The Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship named Richard Waugaman, MD, Oxfordian of the Year 2021 at their annual conference on October 9, 2021. Waugaman is a clinical professor of psychiatry on the faculty of Georgetown University, a training and supervising analyst emeritus with the Washington Psychoanalytic Institute, and is in private practice of psychiatry and psychoanalysis in Potomac, Maryland. For over a decade Waugaman has published extensively on the topic of Shakespeare authorship including work in journals outside the normal reach of the subject such as Psychoanalytic Quarterly , the International Journal of Psychoanalytic Studies , and Contemporary Psychoanalysis . He has presented on the topic before such diverse venues as the International Psychoanalytic Congress, the New Directions Conference, the Shakespeare Association of America, the American Shakespeare Center, and the Cosmos Club in ...

What's a popp'rin' pear?

James Wheaton reported yesterday in the Jackson Citizen Patriot that the Michigan Shakespeare Festival high school tour of Romeo and Juliet was criticized for inappropriate content -- " So me take issue with sexual innuendoes in Michigan Shakespeare Festival’s High School Tour performances of ‘Romeo & Juliet’" : Western [High School] parent Rosie Crowley said she was upset when she heard students laughing about sexual content in the play afterwards. Her son didn’t attend the performance Tuesday because of another commitment, she said. “I think the theater company should have left out any references that were rated R,” Crowley said. “I would say that I’ve read Shakespeare, and what I was told from the students, I’ve never read anything that bad.” She said she objected to scenes that involved pelvic thrusting and breast touching and to a line in which Mercutio makes suggestive comments to Romeo after looking up the skirt of a female. The problem with cutting out...

Dudley nails it to the door

Michael Dudley author of The Shakespeare Authorship Question and Philosphy: Knowledge, Rhetoric, Identity (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2023) Michael Dudley views his vocation of librarian at the University of Manitoba with dialectic rigor. "Librarianship has a duty to inform democracy," he said in Kathryn Sharpe's virtual bookclub on April 27, 2024. Dudley discussed his new book The Shakespeare Authorship Question and Philosophy: Knowledge, Rhetoric, Identity published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing last fall. Update 08/21/24 Dudley's book is also available as an ebook from Google Play . In SAQ and Philosophy Dudley uses the hammer of logic to nail his accusations against the barricaded door of the Shakespeare citadel. "The question of Shakespeare's authorship is a malformed debate practiced in an unethical fashion," Dudley said. When asked why his book is important, Dudley said: "What sets my book apart from others on the authorship quest...

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