The alternate title for this post might be “What's in a nickname?”
In “The Alan Brady Show Goes to Jail,” The Alan Brady Show goes to a local prison for a performance for the prisoners. But several prisoners have been causing trouble, and their punishment is that they can't see the show. To get the necessary Dick Van Dyke Show chaos, Rob, dressed in a prison outfit as part of the performance, is mistaken for an actual prisoner and placed in a cell with the recalcitrant inmates.
Instead of telling the guard that there's been a mistake, they conspire to keep Rob with them, hoping to ruin the show for everyone else.
They also give him the nickname “Shakespeare”—because he's a popular writer and performer. But the sobriquet may give additional depth to another exchange in the show.
First, here are the relevant sections of the show:
“Shakespeare,” then, is a quick and easy nickname for this writer and performer that they only really know by reputation. But take a closer look at this exchange:
Prisoner: You ain't gonna be in that show.Rob: What does that accomplish?Prisoner: Justice.Rob: Justice?Prisoner: If we don't see the show, nobody sees the show.Rob: Well, that—fellas, that's not justice—that's . . . vicious! Well, I mean, you know, I mean, that's revenge.Prisoner: Gee, I always get them two confused.
Is it too much to think that there's something about turning to Shakespeare to help us understand the differences between justice and revenge?
Links: The Episode at IMDB.
Click below to purchase the entire run of the show from amazon.com
(and to support Bardfilm as you do so).
(and to support Bardfilm as you do so).
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