Julius Caesar

Plot synopsis:
The play opens with the commoners of Rome celebrating Caesar's triumphant return from defeating Pompey's sons at the battle of Munda. Two tribunes, Flavius and Marrullus, discover the commoners celebrating, insult them for their change in loyalty from Pompey to Caesar, and break up the crowd. There are some jokes made by the commoners, who insult them back. They also plan on removing all decorations from Caesar's statues and ending any other festivities. In the next scene, during Caesar's parade on the feast of Lupercal, a soothsayer warns Caesar, "Beware the ides of March." This warning he disregards. The action then turns to the discussion between Brutus and Cassius. In this conversation, Cassius attempts to influence Brutus's opinions into believing Caesar should be killed, preparing to have Brutus join his conspiracy to kill Caesar. They then hear from Casca that Mark Antony has offered Caesar the crown of Rome three times and that each time Caesar refused it, fainting after the last refusal. Later, in act two, Brutus joins the conspiracy, although after much moral debate, eventually deciding that Caesar, although his friend and never having done anything against the people of Rome, should be killed to prevent him from doing anything against the people of Rome if he were ever to be crowned. He compares Caesar to "A serpents egg/ which hatch'd, would, as his kind, grow mischievous,/ and kill him in the shell." He then decides to join Cassius in killing Caesar.
Caesar's assassination is one of the most famous scenes of the play, occurring in Act 3, scene 1. After ignoring the soothsayer, as well as his wife's own premonitions, Caesar comes to the Senate. The conspirators create a superficial motive for coming close enough to assassinate Caesar by means of a petition brought by Metellus Cimber, pleading on behalf of his banished brother. As Caesar, predictably, rejects the petition, Casca grazes Caesar in the back of his neck, and the others follow in stabbing him; Brutus is last. At this point, Shakespeare makes Caesar utter the famous line "Et tu, Brute?" ("And you, Brutus?", i.e. "You too, Brutus?") Shakespeare has him add, "Then fall, Caesar!" This suggests that such treachery destroyed Caesar's will to live.
The conspirators make clear that they committed this act for Rome, not for their own purposes, and do not attempt to flee the scene. After Caesar is killed, Brutus delivers an oration defending his actions, and for the moment, the crowd is on his side. However, Mark Antony makes a subtle and eloquent speech over Caesar's corpse, beginning with the much-quoted "Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears!" In this way, he deftly turns public opinion against the assassins by manipulating the emotions of the common people, in contrast to the rational tone of Brutus's speech, yet there is method in his rhetorical speech and gestures: he reminds them of the good Caesar had done for Rome, his sympathy with the poor, and his refusal of the crown at the Lupercal, thus questioning Brutus's claim of Caesar's ambition; he shows Caesar's bloody, lifeless body to the crowd to have them shed tears and gain sympathy for their fallen hero; and he reads Caesar's will, in which every Roman citizen would receive 75 drachmas. Antony, even as he states his intentions against it, rouses the mob to drive the conspirators from Rome. Amid the violence, an innocent poet, Cinna, is confused with the conspirator Lucius Cinna and is taken by the mob, which kills him by tearing him to pieces for such "offenses" as his bad verses.
The beginning of Act Four is marked by the quarrel scene, where Brutus attacks Cassius for supposedly soiling the noble act of regicide by having accepted bribes. ("Did not great Julius bleed for justice' sake? / What villain touch'd his body, that did stab, / And not for justice?") The two are reconciled, especially after Brutus reveals that his beloved wife Portia had committed suicide under the stress of his absence from Rome; they prepare for a war against Mark Antony and Caesar's adopted son, Octavius. That night, Caesar's ghost appears to Brutus with a warning of defeat. (He informs Brutus, "Thou shalt see me at Philippi.")
At the battle, Cassius and Brutus, knowing that they will probably both die, smile their last smiles to each other and hold hands. During the battle, Cassius has his servant Pindarus kill him after hearing of the capture of his best friend, Titinius. After Titinius, who was not really captured, sees Cassius's corpse, he commits suicide. However, Brutus wins that stage of the battle--but his victory is not conclusive. With a heavy heart, Brutus battles again the next day. He loses and commits suicide by running on his own sword, which is held by a soldier named Strato.
The play ends with a tribute to Brutus by Antony, who proclaims that Brutus has remained "the noblest Roman of them all" because he was the only conspirator who acted, in his mind, for the good of Rome. There is then a small hint at the friction between Mark Antony and Octavius which characterizes another of Shakespeare's Roman plays, Antony and Cleopatra.

Tags: tragedy

Review:
More Television Technique Than Usual Here.
This production of Julius Caesar was directed by Herbert Wise.
It was his first and only contribution to the BBC Shakespeare series, and he was undoubtedly offered the job because of his superlative work directing the series "I Claudius." (Be sure also to track down his "The Woman in Black," a case study of how to scare the stuffing out of the audience with zero 'yuk' factor.) Shakespeare makes different demands than Robert Graves or Nigel Kneale, however, and the director gives us a production more tailored to the strengths and weaknesses of the television medium than most in the series.
Only here do we get gigantic closeups of the actors' faces, which are sometimes not sufficiently photogenic for such intense scrutiny.
On one of today's large-screen televisions, the effect can be overwhelming.
Also, the soliloquies are almost all voice over on the soundtrack accompanying the face of a closed-mouth actor, with actual speech only on certain key passages.
Either you find it more psychologically valid, or totally disruptive.Thanks to Herbert Wise, the general interplay of emotion is considerably more precise than in many others of the BBC Shakespeare series.
People talk, listen, act, react, think in the most detailed way, and the pace is always just.
Though the political aspect of the drama is given its due, the emphasis here is on the interpersonal relationships.The director is on record as saying that Shakespeare and television make a bad fit, and that no one up to this time has "cracked it." We can argue among ourselves whether he was right or not, but this show is different from all the others, and well worth watching.Richard Pasco, Charles Gray, Keith Michell and Virginia McKenna all turn in well-rounded performances.
Elizabeth Spriggs surprises as a warm and mobile Calpurnia.
given her chatty Mistress Quickly in "Merry Wives," and memorable turns in TV adaptations of "Middlemarch," "Martin Chuzzlewit" and "Sense and Sensibility." David Collings' Cassius starts out lean and hungry, but goes mushy and hysterical a little early.The play itself usually runs out of steam after Antony's oration, and here it is less of a problem than usual.
The physical production by Tony Abbott is good, providing a more spacious Rome than that of the Coriolanus broadcast, and a somewhat flowery battlefield.However, for those in search of an alternative, find on the Internet the audiocassette of the Caedmon Shakespeare Recording Society version of a generation earlier.
Anthony Quayle is the Brutus, John Mills the Cassius, Alan Bates the Mark Antony and Sir Ralph Richardson as Julius Caesar.
Even without visuals, everyone is one size larger, and I for one appreciate it..
A full play gives fuller characters and themes.
Unlike the movies, this is a full version of the play, clocking in at a little under three hours.
In performing the whole play, we see that Julius Caesar is one of Shakespeare's best plays- not simply for the masterful rhetoric but for the characterisation.
There are shades of Iago in the manipulative Cassius, eaten away by jealousy, and Brutus is a mixture of Macbeth and proto-Hamlet.The BBC Complete Shakespeare series has been criticised for over-reverence to the text, emphasising educational value over dramatic value, and for its low budget productions.
However, by presenting the full play, or at least, as full a version of the play than you are ever likely to get, they show subtleties and ambiguities that aren't present in streamlined versions.This production's strength is that it does not offer us the big tragic hero.
Initially, it looked as if Richard Pasco was going to play Brutus as the typical bland noble hero.
However, once Brutus does the deed, Pasco presents him as a lonely man with a lot of power but the inability to do anything with it.
This adds a wonderful irony to Brutus' earlier soliloquy musing on the extent of Caesar's ambition.David Collings initially presents us with a villainous ambitious Cassius, but then Cassius slowly becomes a tragic figure, who does what he does out of love and admiration for Brutus.
Admittedly it does come across as a bit stereotypically homosexual at times, but it is interesting to see Cassius as ultimately a good guy.Charles Grey is a very toad-like Julius Caesar.
Initially I disliked his performance; Caesar has generally been presented as a feeble man with a God-delusion.
Grey's Caesar is very much a man of the people.
He represents popular politics that are based around personalities (much like today's politics), which helped to contrast with Brutus' archaic concepts of honour.
Keith Michell as Marc Antony also showed that he belonged to the school of politics that appeals to emotions rather than honour.
Antony is probably the closest thing the play has to a hero, and even he looks villainous at one point, as he orders the death of his nephew.I would urge people who think they know the play to watch this production, look past the skimpy togas, and discover a play rich in themes and characters.
Julius Caesar is an eternally relevant play, more so than any other Shakespeare play..
So much more interesting at full length.
The strengths of this otherwise ploddingly straightforward production are that it gives us the whole play, which is for two-thirds of its length quite absorbing, and that it is so well spoken - from the principals to John Elliott as Octavius' messenger.
I wish it had been clearer that we'd moved from one scene to the next, and the unmouthed soliloquies work less well than in, say, Olivier's 'Hamlet'.
But Richard Pasco is a throughly decent Brutus (noble and nearly always wrong!), at his very best in the 'quarrel scene', David Collings (though overshadowed, as are all others I've seen since 1953, by Gielgud in the Mankiewicz film) a fine, mercurial Cassius (alas he played only a tiny part in the recent revival of the play at London's Barbican), Keith Michell is a thrilling, crafty Marc Antony and Charles Gray is splendidly self-important as 'JC' himself.
Sam Dastor's laconic account of Caesar's refusal of the crown is masterly, though thereafter he fades.
As for the women, a gaunt Virginia McKenna is a poignantly vulnerable Portia and Elizabeth Spriggs a warm Calpurnia.
The final battle is, as usual, distinctly underwhelming!.
Men at some time are masters of their fates.
When it comes to compiling a list of Shakespeare's best plays, from personal opinion, 'Julius Caesar' would not make the list, though it would certainly not be on the lesser play list.
That is not saying that it's a bad play, quite the contrary.
It is compelling with fully rounded characters, interesting themes and some of Shakespeare's most famous lines and speeches, Shakespeare once again showing how unrivalled he is in mastery of language, text and poetry whether in a few lines or big monologues.
It does though run out of steam dramatically towards the end and in performance very rarely is the final scene nailed.The late 70s-early 80s BBC Shakespeare adaptations are very interesting.
Quality-wise they are variable with not all of them being great, but it is great to see productions that are generally faithful and respectful and have distinguished casts (most with performances that are good or more, not all mind).
Even if some have problems with over-faithfulness, lack of imagination and under-budget.
Their 'Julius Caesar' from 1979 is towards the better end on the whole and the second best of the four productions transmitted at this point of the series, King Richard II' being the best and the others being 'Romeo and Juliet' (left me mixed) and 'As You Like It' (uneven but decent).
Though there is better in the series definitely.'Julius Caesar' is not completely perfect, a couple of aspects being hindered by budget.
Although there are worse in the series, the costumes are unimaginative and somewhat drab (though the attempt at authenticity is admirable), those togas do look quite cheap.As expected, but hoping the production would do it well, the final scene is once again not nailed and actually underwhelms.
The momentum had gone and the staging felt static.However, this production is interesting in quite a few respects.
The camera work is more expansive than that for most productions in the series and doing the solliloquies in voice overs had a very effective psychological qualities.
The characters are already fully rounded and flesh blooded, but are given more complexity and detail in the interpretations here (especially Brutus and Cassius).
The stage direction is on the most part involving on a dramatic level, everything makes sense and nothing distracts or comes over as tasteless, credit is also due in having more detail and precision in the interactions and emotions than most in the series, complex in some places and subtle in others.Costumes aside, 'Julius Caesar' doesn't look too bad with the sets being more authentic than those for the productions of the other Roman-set Shakespeare dramas/plays.
Shakespeare's text shines brilliantly, all the major lines having their impact and the speeches/solliloquies having the right amount of nuance and intensity.
There are great performances all round, a more subtle than usual Charles Gray portraying the title role with dignity and authority, nothing weak about him.
Keith Michell is a virile Marc Antony and Richard Pasco brings a conflicted edge to Brutus.
Same with David Collings as Cassius.
In the female roles, Virginia McKenna and Elizabeth Spriggs more than hold their own, the former very touching and the latter a warm and interesting departure from the roles she tended to usually play (very well just to say and more).On the whole, a 'Julius Caesar' worth praising and not one to bury.
8/10 Bethany Cox. A Fine Version of The Tragic Drama.
William Shakespeare's classic tragedy, Julius Caesar, has always been one of his lesser liked plays.
It's predominantly an all male drama with only two supporting female characters like Calpurnia and Portia.
It was still a male dominated world in Caesar's time where women are wives, nurses, maids, and mistresses.
The BBC did a service in producing Shakespeare's plays faithfully to the word.
I watch the English subtitles to get a better account of the story.
The BBC has faithfully recreated the background scenes without much cost.
There is no audience for a reaction or applause.
The cast includes Charles in the title role.
He is a fine Caesar.
Richard Pasco and Keith Michell are also fine too.
Unlike Shakespeare's other tragedies, this story is about politics, power, corruption, and greed..
Cassius and Brutus plot to kill Caeser.
Heeding a warning and taking counsels is like a stitch in time which saves nine.
If Ceaser had listened to the counsel of refraining on the ides of march (15th march) he would have saved his soul alive.
On the other hand Cassius is a thoughtful and serious looking man who conspired with Brutus to assassinate the would be Roman ruler.
His ambitious life and high standards stopped his ears from counsels(as the saying goes in a multitude of counselors there is safety) The evil that men do will always live after them as the good that men do will inter with their bones unto their children's children.
For once swallow your pride and listen to reproves if perhaps you will be delivered.
Cassius has very curious looks and which Caeser could have noticed..
Best of the Roman-set Shakespearean dramas.
Heavy on dialogue and lacking in humour, "Julius Caesar" nevertheless has a great deal going for it - the powerful characters and some memorable speeches (I needn't list which ones), along with political intrigue combined with a supernatural undertone make this the best of Shakespeare's Roman dramas.Julius Caesar (Charles Gray) arrives back in Rome after a glorious victory in Pompey.
However, his inclinations towards political moves that would see him assume absolute control over the country see a rebellion among his inner circle that kick-starts a civil war that threatens to destroy the Roman Empire.Unlike "Coriolanus" and "Antony and Cleopatra", this production actually makes an effort for accuracy in it's period detail and the Roman costumes and sets (within the confines of a BBC budget) actually look pretty good.
The production employs an interesting technique of having the actors seem to 'think' their monologues (reacting wordlessly in camera as the monologue is spoken as a voice-over).
This is a great idea that I'd like to see used more often in Shakespeare screen adaptations.Charles Gray restrains the camp with which he imbues many performances and gives a very dignified and honest portrayal of Caesar.
Richard Pasco and David Collings are very good as the scheming Brutus and Cassius, and Virginia McKenna gives a very spirited and sensual performance as Portia.
Also of note is Keith Michell, who is excellent as Marc Antony.It's a sit-through with little humour to counter the drama but it's worth it..
A slightly dry political tragedy.
We have here one of the major plays by Shakespeare but it is not the one that is most often played or really and extensively quoted.
This is a political play with practically nothing else around.
The political bones are the very flesh of this animal.
Julius Caesar is a very short lived hero in this play.
He dies so fast that we can't even remember his face.
He is the hero of the play absent most of the time by failure of living long enough.
A small group of people come together to assassinate Julius Caesar because they are jealous of his fame and his power and his popularity.
They manage to get Brutus, the closest friend of Julius Caesar on their side and he will deliver the third but killing blow.
Then from that moment on the play is hijacked and becomes the retribution to the killers.
Mark Antony is the first and essential craftsman of that reversal of fate.
He manages to bring the popular crowd of Rome against the self-declared liberators.
And then the whole thing will have to be solved on the battlefield.
Brutus' brother will be lured into asking his ex-prisoner and freed soldier to kill him, which this one does with willingness because he can flee and be free after so many years of dependence.
Then all the members of the conspiration die one after another till the last one Brutus who manages to force a simple soldier to hold the sword on which he runs himself.
This is a typical cycle and construction for Shakespeare: someone disturbs the fragile equilibrium of society and society re-establishes its balance by eliminating every single member of the group that disturbed the peace of this society, Rome in this case.
The victors are those who were close to the first victim but not so close that they could have been eliminated at the same time as him.
If you listen careful to the play there are some tricky phrases that reveal more about Shakespeare's style.
"What trash is Rome?
What rubbish?
What offal?" Three questions, three negative words, three is the dooming number, the number of disquiet and disorder.
"Brutus is noble, wise, valiant and honest.
Caesar was mighty, bold, loyal and loving." That could be the perfect equilibrium of four plus four equal eight except that this balance is unbalanced by the antagonistic pair "is/was", and the order is important and means a rejection of the great man who has just been assassinated.
It is a second assassination.
And Brutus will give the logic of this construction by adding a fifth qualifying adjective, the fifth one of the diabolical pentacle, "ambitious", in a declaration that is the reversal of the tense line I have just pointed out: "As he was ambitious I slew him." It is obvious that this political assassination has no legal nor ethical foundation: it is the decision and the deed of a solitary man who decides all by himself that someone else has to die.
This is tyranny if tyranny does exist somewhere.
This play is probably less considered than Hamlet because there is no sentimental, emotional or simply personal element in it.
It is pure politics and as such it is austere and even cold, but Anthony and Cleopatra, or Macbeth, or King Lear have that "personal dimension that makes them "better".
The production of this play by the BBC is maybe slightly too slow.
They did a good effort for the setting to look grand enough not to be reduced to a sound stage, and for the crowds to be numerous enough to look like crowds, well at least large groups of people.
But they could and should have tightened up the rhythm of the play.
It is true too that the very difficult part of Brutus is maybe slightly too inward oriented, reserved or pacified.
Brutus is a fool who lets himself be fooled by jealous mediocre people who brandish the name of his ancestor who stood in front of Tarquin when his wife Lucretia was raped (and Shakespeare knew all the details since he wrote a narrative poem entitled The Rape of Lucrece) and by some other more or less superficial and light arguments.
Any sane general and any wise politician should have said no.
We know he did not.
But that's the shortcoming of the character and to render such an easily influenced person is extremely difficult and in this production they decided not to make him cynical but that might have been more credible or believable.
How could a fool like him become a general who was instated by the greatest general of the time, Julius Caesar himself?
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID