Alan Brady Might Play Hamlet Next in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“Three Letters from One Wife.” By Bill Persky and Sam Denoff. Perf. Dick Van Dyke and Ann Morgan Guilbert. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 4, episode 9. CBS. 18 November 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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I suppose I am becoming something of a completist here.  But let me explain the plot—and that will explain the single Shakespeare-related word in this episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Rob has written a more serious part for Alan Brady to play on a different show. Alan has many misgivings, and Rob worries for his job if the show doesn't go well. But Rob and Laurie's neighbor Millie mails a bunch of letters (from different pseudonyms) declaring how great the show was. But she mailed them before something happened to delay the broadcast.

Chaos ensues.

Later, the show is broadcast, and we join the watch party at the very end:

You can hear the chatter about how well Alan Brady did and how "He'll probably want to play Hamlet.” 

Again, it's not much, but it's Shakespeare. The character of Hamlet stands in for drama of a serious nature—contrasted with the lighter mode of comedy. That's not entirely fair, but that's what we get here! 

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Links: The Episode at IMDB.

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“Shakespeare” in Prison in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“The Alan Brady Show Goes to Jail.” By Bill Persky and Sam Denoff. Perf. Dick Van Dyke, Don Rickles, Robert Strauss, Ken Lynch, Arthur Bantanides, Vincent Barbi, and Al Ward. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 4, episode 8. CBS. 11 November 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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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? 

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Links: The Episode at IMDB.

Click below to purchase the entire run of the show from amazon.com
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Hopeful Allusions to Juliet and Romeo and Cleopatra and Caesar in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“Romance, Roses and Rye Bread.” By Garry Marshall and Jerry Belson. Perf. Dick Van Dyke, Rose Marie, Morey Amsterdam, and Sid Melton. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 4, episode 6. CBS. 28 October 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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In this episode, we have another crush story. Bert Monker, Deli Owner, has a serious thing for Sally Rogers, though he's been disguising it under a cover of comedy.

But things are brought to a head when he gives Sally a rose anonymously, causing speculation about a secret admirer.  

He also gives her a ticket to a play, cleverly keeping the other ticket in the pair so that he can surprise her at the theatre without actually having to ask her out on a date. Note: Bardfilm does not recommend this.

But it's the Shakespeare that interests us here at Bardfilm. Here's a clip that includes a scene from the beginning and a small segment from later in the plot—after Sally has gone home under the pretext of a headache so she won't have to see Bert:

Bert refers to his gift of the rose as "a little token of love for the Cleopatra [pronounced as Jimmy Durante would have] of Comedy from the Caesar of Sandwiches . . . to the Juliet of Jokes from the Romeo of Rye." 

The Romeo and Juliet connection is clear. But Cleopatra and Caesar? Is Bert showing an inaccurate knowledge of Shakespeare's couples? Or is he thinking of Cleopatra's love for Julius Caesar (which predates her love for Anthony and was between a younger woman and an older man)? Or is he thinking of the possibility of a relationship between Cleopatra and Octavius Caesar after Anthony dies in Shakespeare's play? Or is he not thinking of Shakespeare at all but remembering the 1963 film Cleopatra with Elizabeth Taylor? Later in the episode, he leaves the play early—perhaps he also failed to make it through the entire 1963 film (which runs an astonishing five hours and twenty minutes).

From other references in The Dick Van Dyke Show, we know the writers associate Anthony with Cleopatra, so we can deduce that it's not a slip on the writers' part. Perhaps it's simply the alliteration—"Anthony of Sandwiches" doesn't have the same ring as "Caesar of Sandwiches."

Later, Bert leaves the Caesar to the side, calling up a version of the balcony scene where Romeo brings Juliet soup.

The other point of interest (though not specifically of Shakespearean interest) is the avant-garde play. In the plot, Sally gives Rob the ticket, and he gives it to Laura. When she shows up, Bert is perplexed, and it leads to some humorous moments. The play itself is titled Waiting for an Armadillo—which must be a sly reference to Waiting for Godot. Although Waiting for an Armadillo has nothing to do with Shakespeare (Waiting for a Fretful Porpentine would have been a dead giveaway), I can't resist showing that scene:

Alas, there's no Shakespeare there that I can detect, but I find this attitude toward the off-off-Broadway play interesting. It will be a few years before we get Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, but it's a decade after Waiting for Godot. And the great Allan Sherman will release his "It's a Most Unusual Play" (a parody of the song "It's a Most Unusual Day") in 1965. 

In tracking down the date of that song, I stumbled upon a performance of the song on The Dean Martin Show in 1966. I know we're going further and further from Shakespeare (except for the line "Everybody wants to know / Where we found this handsome Romeo" in the dance number preceding the song), but here's that performance:

This mockery of avant-garde theatre seems to be part of the mid-1960s zeitgeist. Plays like Waiting for an Armadillo certainly had everyone talking—and, I think, rather nervous!

As a final note, I see that some of the lyrics from the song on Sherman's 1965 album My Name Is Allan: Allan Sherman Sings Great Movie Hits & Songs From The Cutting Room Floor have been changed for this performance. Compare these original lyrics with those sung in the performance above:

Original:

It's a play where something went wrong

’Cause it's five hours twelve minutes wrong.

If you sit there, my friend, from beginning to end,

Then your bladder better be strong.

Dean Martin Show Performance:

It's a play where something went wrong

’Cause it's five hours twelve minutes wrong.

If you sit there, my friend, from beginning to end,

Then your backbone better be strong.

Original:

There are people hitting people.

There's a couple in a cage.

There's neurotics, there's narcotics,

And the bathroom is right on the stage.

Dean Martin Show Performance:

There are people hitting people.

There's a couple in a cage.

There's neurotics, there's psychotics,

And the bathroom is right on the stage.

Next time, we'll try to stick to the Shakespeare. See you then!

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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).

Allusions to Two Female Romantic Leads for the Price of One in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“The Lady and the Baby Sitter.” By Bill Persky and Sam Denoff. Perf. Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 4, episode 3. CBS. 7 October 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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Early in Season Four, The Dick Van Dyke Show puts the names of two of Shakespeare's most well-known heroines into the love letter of a high school student.

Roger, the student, babysits for the Petries, and he develops a crush on Laura. Rob, not knowing the identity of Roger's beloved, advises him to speak his mind.

The letter is the end result of that advice. Rob expects it to be a rough draft for which he'll provide editorial assistance; it turns out it's the final draft and it has reached its intended recipient:

Among the icons of desirability, we find 50% from Shakespeare: Cleopatra and Juliet.

There's not much more than that as an emblem—Rob does not take on any Leontes- or Othello-like jealousy—but it's still Shakespeare!

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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).

The Quality of Mercy in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“Dear Mrs. Petrie, Your Husband is in Jail.” By Jerry Belson and Garry Marshall. Perf. Dick Van Dyke, Herkie Styles, and Jackie Joseph. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 3, episode 29. CBS. 15 April 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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Here, The Dick Van Dyke Show draws from a new Shakespeare play, putting Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet on the shelf for the time being.

The plot sends Rob Petrie off to catch an old friend's act at what I can only assume is an off-off-off-Broadway theatre. Once there, he gets drawn into the increasing chaos backstage. The performers are wandering in and out while an illegal game of craps is underway.

The title gives away the end—Rob ends up in jail. But, before he's arrested, he's approached by a performer who wants another chance to audition for The Alan Brady Show. And her big audition piece seems to be Portia's "The quality of mercy" speech from The Merchant of Venice—semi-sung to something of a dance number.

Here's the scene:

It's an odd direction to go, but I do appreciate the variety!

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Links: The Episode at IMDB.

Click below to purchase the entire run of the show from amazon.com
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An Intimation and Implication from Romeo and Juliet in The Dick Van Dyke Show

“The Life and Love of Joe Coogan.” By Carl Reiner. Perf. Dick Van Dyke and Michael Forest. Dir. Jerry Paris. The Dick Van Dyke Show. Season 3, episode 17. CBS. 22 January 1964. DVD. Allied Vaughn, 2023.

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In this episode, the Shakespeare is very subtle. In one line, we get an intimation of a famous line from Romeo and Juliet: "What's in a name? That which we call a rose / By any other [name] would smell as sweet" (II.ii.43–44). Joe Coogan's line here alludes to that line: "Maybe Shakespeare was wrong—maybe there is something in a name."

Joe's speech lets us know that the implied reader / implied viewer of a Dick Van Dyke Show episode would have enough familiarity with Juliet's speech to make the leap from "What we call things doesn't matter—it's the essence of the thing itself that we value" to "Actually, maybe if enough people value specific instances of something called by a general name, we will start to value the thing because of the name." The intimation of Shakespeare's line gives us a number of implications about its application.

Here's the scene:

We arrive at the point of realizing that there are a lot of adorable Lauras in the world—and then we find that we're not talking about Lauras in general or even about two distinct Lauras. It's the specific Laura who married Rob Petrie who's under consideration.

That immediately makes Rob become jealous and perceive Joe as a potential threat. Once Rob leaves, we learn that Joe is a priest (evidently a Roman Catholic priest) and is no threat at all.

I admire the subtle use of Shakespeare here and the way it takes us on intellectual wings of thought as it questions the unquestionable!

Note: If you want to get down in the weeds, it's the 1597 Q1 of Romeo and Juliet that has "name" as the operative word. Q2 (1599) has "word," as does the First Folio of 1623. But whether you're familiar with "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet" or "a rose by any other word would smell as sweet," the meaning is the same. After all, what's in a word?

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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).