Wednesday, May. 25, 2005
Shakespeare in Love, posted at 6:26 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Sometimes kids are so funny.Today we're watching Shakespeare in Love for extra credit after school. There's about forty kids in my room. A lot of the humor is over their heads, but that's okay - it was for me, too, the first time I saw it. They're into it, reacting at the humor and offering little comments at the R and J connections. Anyhow, the nude scene with Gwyneth Paltrow came on. Just as Joseph Fiennes is unwrapping Gwyneth, and you know what's going to happen, I jump up and fast-forward it a couple of scenes. I just don't want to deal with any repercussions of that, even if the film is for extra credit after school (and even if one of my fondest high school memories was seeing Juliet's nudity in the Zefferelli version of the film).
Anyhow, the forty kids explode into a chorus of laughter and "Aw, come on"'s. It's funny and all, but as soon as the laughter dies down, this kid named Alan, a white boy with the deepest voice you'll ever hear on a 14-year old, said, "Mr. E, that's just wrong. Thomas was trying to concentrate." Thomas, the boy sitting to his left, took a moment, let it sink in, and then there was a moment of epiphany where you could tell that he got it, and that the joke was quite a dig. He then jokingly slapps the Alan. It was all so sharp and funny that I couldn't do anything except pretend I didn't hear it.
That's a really good movie, by the way. I should watch it again soon, but without having to shush forty 14-year olds behind me.