All the World’s a Stage
-Shakespeare’s As You Like It
I haven’t read As You Like It in ages so I “cheated” and looked it up on SparkNotes to refresh my memory. When I first read the play some 20 years ago I didn’t realize there isn’t really a main plot because I was so entertained by the subplots. My husband described it more like long-form improv with several stories crossing paths; this sounded about right. There is a cohesiveness, though, throughout the play around the themes of love and change. This play celebrates love and even ties everything up with a big, happy marriage at the end. Poor Jaques, who is more in love with melancholy than anything else, is left alone.
Chicago based actor and fight designer, Tony Pellegrino, had a sincere and clever response when answering the question of why he chose this speech. “I performed both this monologue and this character for 5 months while in a fellowship program at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. It is a monologue that will always stay with me, as solid as ever, while I myself move through these 7 stages of life. It's interesting to not only think about the stages, but where you are I regards to them, and where you came from. Who were you then as the schoolboy? Or the lover? Are you now the soldier or the Justice? As the pantaloon, do you fear second childeshness? Or do you welcome the mere oblivion?”
For more background on Pellegrino, visit his website.
Tony Pellegrino as Jaques in As You Like It:
THE MONOLOGUE: AS YOU LIKE IT, ACT II SCENE 7, JAQUES BY TONY PELLEGRINO
“All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’s eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.”
MORE ABOUT THE MONOLOGUE PROJECT
Our goal of Shakespeare from the Ground’s Monologue Project is to collect a library of Shakespearean monologues to share with our community for virtual entertainment while we are still socially distanced. You don’t need to be a professional actor to participate. If you’re inspired and ready to record, great! If you need help selecting your Shakespearean Monologue or getting it recorded, reach out and we’ll help you get the ball rolling. Are you ready to take to the boards once again…virtually?
