'''Bard Boiled''' The students of Springfield Elementary have to put on a play about Shakespeare but won't listen to Director Lisa Simpson's directions...
== Plot ==
Springfield Elementary was holding a play on Shakespeare Bart was King Priam of Troy. Ralph was a Trojan soldier.
"Your majesty, the war against Troy has lasted seven long years!" said Ralph. "What shall we do?"
"Well, my brave soldier, if at first you don't invade, try Troy again!" said Bart. Everyone laughed at his gag.
However Lisa wasn't happy.
"Bart! Read the lines properly! You're ruining Troilus and Cressida!" Lisa yelled holding a script.
"I'm just livening it up!" said Bart. "Okay now for a little improve! Someone name a location!"
"My house."
"The Kremlin."
"Somewhere other than this dull play," said the audience.
Lisa frowned. "Who said that?! It's not dull!"
"I heard the video game arcade." said Bart. "Now name a reason why our director Lisa stinks."
"Hey!" Lisa yelled. "Look, if you don't read the lines properly we will do the entire play again from the beginning!"
Everyone groaned.
"Oh Homer, I'm so glad you're paying attention to our kids play!" said Marge.
However Homer was listening to the football. And oh god! Who's hair is that in front? It's! It's...
"Okay everyone take three!" said Lisa as they had to start the scene again... everyone moaned.
Suddenly Oscar had to interrupt. "Oh my god! Sideshow Bob is in the audience!" Oscar as Hector yelled.
"Nyaaaaaagh! Sideshow Bob!" Bart screamed and ran off stage.
"Oh thanks Oscar, there goes our king Priam!" Lisa yelled.
Marge and Homer glared at Sideshow Bob for turning up to watch Bart and Lisa's play.
Bob flashed them a dirty look and went back to plotting revenge on Bart etc.
"I could be king!" said Oscar.
"No! That's Bart's part. You're Hector." said Lisa.
"This is boring just start acting!" A parent yelled.
"Ugh! Next scene!" said Lisa.
...
'''Anthony and Cleopatra'''
Skinner was Mark Anthony and Mrs Krabappel was Cleopatra. However they too against Lisa's instructions to just follow the script for authenticity decided to play their roles as a bickering married couple.
They actually had fallen out earlier in the day over something.
"I can't believe he's late! This counselling was his idea!" said Edna as Queen Cleopatra.
Oscar as a stage hand felt the scene needed him blaring the theme tune to Cleopatra Coming Atcha!
(Cleopatra Comin' Atcha! Theme)
"Oz! Turn that off!" Lisa hissed.
"My people, lend me your ears." said Skinner as Mark Anthony. The audience threw plastic Vulcan ears on stage. "That's not what I meant."
Lisa winced.
"See? He has no respect for my needs!" said Cleopatra.
Mark Anthony and Cleopatra began to argue. Mark Anthony insisting he had to look after Rome because it was in a state i.e. Garbage in the streets and something about vomitiriuns.
Cleopatra ranted about him complaining about everything such as her sacred cats making him sneeze and her milk baths.
Mark Anthony argued that he was lactose intolerant.
"My pyramids are too pointy, he says!" Cleo ranted.
"You see why they call her Queen of Denial!?" Mark Anthony yelled.
"It's Queen of the Nile!" said Cleopatra.
Lisa sighed at their antics.
"Ooooh! Drama!" said Homer.
"Hmmmm! I think they're serious. They were bickering yesterday at Bart's parents evening..." Marge sighed.
"And to top it off he forgot my birthday!"
Then Mark Anthony bought Cleopatra an asp in a box.
"An asp! They're so difficult to defang!" said Edna as Cleopatra.
It bit her and she died. (Actually a motorised puppet gently nibbling Edna)
"So aside from the deadly venom how is it?" Mark Anthony asked.
"It's like everything in our relationship. It bites..." Said Edna as Cleopatra.
...
Lisa sighed. "Next scene..."
'''Julius Caesar'''
"Ah hoy hoy!" said Mr Burns as Caesar. The scene is a town in Rome. Smithers is Brutus, Skinner is Mark Anthony again, Homer is Caligula for some reason...
"Dad it's Cassius!" Lisa whined! "There is no Caligula at this point in Roman history!"
"Can I be Obelix instead...?" said Homer.
"No!" Lisa yelled.
Anyway eventually they got the scene started. Caesar and Brutus were walking the streets of Rome.
"Oh a penny!" said Caesar as he picked up a Roman coin. An ax flew past his head.
"D'oh!" said Cassius. His assassination attempt failed.
Then there was the Senate.
Julius Caesar asked Moleman what the weather was like.
"Hail, Caesar." said Moleman.
"Yes thank you. The weather please."
"Hail, Caesar."
"Yes, the weather!"
"Hail, Ceasar."
Eventually Caesar realised he was getting nowhere. "Okay now for lunch I fancy that lovely salad named after me! What's it called again?" said Caesar.
"Caesar." said Moleman.
"Yes what is it?" Mr Burns as Caesar asked.
"Caesar." said Moleman.
"Right that's it! Have him flogged!" said Caesar.
"Sir that's extremely painful! Have mercy!" said Brutus.
"Very well... kill him first!" said Caesar.
"Oh dear..." said Moleman...
Lisa winced. Caesar wasn't up there in cruelty like Caligula rand Nero. But he was unpopular enough that supposedly he got murdered.
Actually he was overthrown and exiled to a small island.
"Man that Senator is nuts." said Cassius.
"You said it Caligula." said Moe as a senator.
Lisa growled "it's Cassius!" Under her breath.
"No I meant that other senator!" said Cassius/Caligula pointing to an old horse that he made senator.
"Grrrrr! Next scene..." Lisa sighed.
...
Later Cassius and the other assailants were discussing their plan.
Brutus had other ideas.
Their plan involved throwing a lion at Caesar. It missed.
"Our school doesn't even have a license to have animals?!" Lisa ranted.
"That was my last lion!" said Cassius.
"Can we Christians go now or do you have other animals to feed us too?" Rod asked.
Much later the assassins discussed their next attempt to kill Caesar.
Brutus didn't want to and asked them to reconsider.
"No way Bluto!" said Cassius.
"(Popeye laughing)" Popeye laughed and ate an entire can of spinach.
Lisa face palmed.
"Brutus." Smithers corrected Homer.
"Brutus. We're gonna kill Caesar and Mark Anthony!" said Cassius.
"Hey!" said Mark Anthony.
"Um... I meant Mark um... Hamill." said Homer as Cassius.
Lisa facepalmed.
They somehow time travelled and killed Mark Hamill in his office.
"Nooooo!" Oscar cried.
"How was that even possible?!" Lisa yelled.
...
Mr Burns even felt the play got stupid so took a break to compose himself.
"But Mr Burns! You're in this scene!" said Lisa.
"Oh um... find a substitute..." said Mr Burns.
"Already have..." Oscar smirked.
Julius Caesar was now played by. Caesar from Planet of the Apes...
Oscar cracked up laughing.
"No! No! No!" Lisa slapped herself with her script frustrated.
"No Oz! Not him!" Bart winced.
Brutus asked Caesar I'd he'd spare some guy's life.
"Noooooo!" said Caesar like that bit in the new Planet of the Apes film with Draco Malfoy in it.
...
Cassius planned a surprise for Caesar at the baths. Caesar turned up.
They snuck up on him and stabbed him. But because Mr Burns was so thin they ended up stabbing each other.
"Guys no realistic gore, our special effects team can't handle that..." said Lisa.
"What's this lying around? Where's the confetti? The cake?" Caesar asked.
"Here." Cassius groaned holding a cake with two slices taken out of it."
"Where did you get that?!" Mark Anthony asked.
"I get hungry planning so I always carry a cake." said Cassius.
"Wait there's two slices missing!" Mr Burns as Caesar commented.
"Well I ate one but planning made me extremely hungry so I..." said Cassius.
"Don't say it." said Mark Anthony.
"Ate two, Brutus." said Cassius as. He died.
Everyone groaned.
...
"That was uh interesting... Next play..." said Lisa.
'''King Henry V'''
Frink was King Henry the fifth but kept ad libbing science into it with DNA modifications and death rays!
"Coooool!" said Hugo sat in the audience.
Lisa winced and groaned as it seemed everyone was ad libbing tonight.
The last straw was him hugging a teddy bear.
"Ah! Sweet glavin..." said Frink.
"D'aaaaaaawwwww!" Oscar dressed as Hector cooed.
"Professor..." Lisa sighed.
And him saying the French were barbarians that cut out your tongue!
They were actually just as civilised as the English at this time.
"We should have hired Lawrence Olivier..." Martin groaned.
Nelson glared at him for being a theatre geek.
Sideshow Bob seethed.
"These children and the towns folk are butchering the fine works of the immortal bard!"
Homer was sleeping with his eyes open thanks to help from a book that taught him to do just that.
And swiftly on to the next play!
== Plot 2 ==
'''Romeo and Juliet'''
Lisa was Juliet and Nelson was Romeo.
("We're still in a relationship?!" Lisa asked)
Yep! You're the director!
"Oh yeah,.. I must have casted Nelson as Romeo for a reason." said Lisa.
"Oh Romeo, swear not by fountain, swear not by the fence! Oh just stop swearing altogether you'll wake my parents!" said Juliet.
"I stubbed my (censor bleep) toe on your (censor bleep) garden gnome!" Nelson as Romeo swore.
Ralph Wiggum was narrating.
"This is a story of star crossed lovers etc..." said Ralph.
Then Oscar was a talk show host introducing the families. The Montagues and the Capulets.
"First up is the Capulets. Now our creator Matt for some reason wanted Jimbo to play the sixth Capulet but that was silly so instead Hugo will play Tybalt." said Oscar.
"He is not canon!" Matt yelled.
"Yes he is..." said Oscar.
Juliet was embarrassed as Lord Capulet was strangling Bartholomew Capulet for biting his thumb at him.
"I'll teach you to bite your thumb!" Lord Capulet yelled while strangling him.
"I was just biting my thumb!" Bartholomew yelled trying to breath.
Hugo as Tybalt was pulling faces.
"Tybalt don't pull faces!" said Marge as Lady Capulet.
"And the Montagues. Hey where are the rest of the family?" Oscar asked.
"The judge wouldn't give my family bail after Dad's check bounced now continue the story or I'll pound ya!" said Romeo.
"Now tells the story of forbidden love! Like that between Mr Ink and my giraffe, Spot." said Ralph holding a squid plush and a giraffe plush.
Oscar rolled his eyes...
There was the story which involved Nelson trying to get back with Lisa while in character. Jimbo and the gang killing each other and Lunch lady Doris as the Capulet Nurse maid.
Oh and in the actual play the the Capulets and the Montagues have the mother of all fights in the city of Verona after Bart as um... Juliet's brother got in a fight with Nelson as Romeo. Their families joined in.
"Like that huge stage fight on Jerry between Nazi Santa and the KKK and the entire audience!" said Oscar.
Cue The Simpsons and the Muntzes fighting. Lisa face palmed.
Then the Prince of Verona scolded them and told them to stop fighting.
"Stop this at once!" said Mr Burns as the prince of Verona.
So they stopped for now but forbade their children from seeing each other.
That wasn't good for Romeo and Juliet as they loved each other.
Lisa as Juliet and Nelson as Romeo whined to their parents. But their parents wouldn't budge.
So they had to be more sneaky.
Meanwhile in the Capulet palace, Hugo as Tybalt was trying to sew himself to Bart's character. He had bought a ball of thread and a needle on stage.
"Mom! He's at it again!" Bart whined.
Marge as um... Juliet's mother, winced.
Hugo as Tybalt tried to tackle Bart to the floor and chloroform him.
"Not during our school play Hugo!" Lisa yelled.
Hugo jabbered in a crazed mood.
...
Then as I said. The bullies taunted Nelson as Romeo because Juliet's parents wouldn't let her see him.
"You got more whipped then a meringue pie!" Jimbo quipped.
"Or more whipped than black people during the-" Oscar had to say something insensitive. But Bart hand gagged him.
"Well at least my girlfriend is real!" Romeo yelled.
"Kelly's real! She's just in uh... Canada..." said Jimbo.
"Uh... I doth not know who this Kelly is?" Lisa tried to remind them to stay in character and not mention real life girl friends.
The bullies laughed at Romeo.
He got mad and killed Jimbo's vaguely Italian character by stabbing him with a sword.
"Gah!"
Dolph trying to stop them got stabbed too.
"Urk!"
Kearney arrived late wondering what the hell happened.
Lisa getting ready for her scene winced.
Nelson met her at her balcony after stubbing his tie on her garden gnomes.
"A rose by any other name would still smell just as sweet." Nelson read his lines.
"Not if you called them stink blossoms." said Bart in character.
"Or crap daisies." said Homer.
"Guys stop ad libbing!" Lisa nagged.
There was also an Elder Capulet who was very old and I think he was Lord Capulet's father, So Grampa Abe played the role of him.
Elder Capulet snored loudly.
Lisa as Juliet cringed embarrassed.
...
Juliet faked her death so Romeo thinking she was really dead broke up with her.
"You jerk! I'm dead and you're breaking up with me?!" Juliet came back from the dead! Eek!
"Ah! Zombie!" Said Romeo.
"I was pretending to be dead so you'd poison yourself I'd find you dead and then stab myself! It was supposed to be the most romantic story ever!" Juliet ranted.
"I could stab you with my sword if you want." said Romeo.
"Forget it!" Juliet yelled.
"Ugh! Even in character you screw up our relationship Nelson!" Lisa yelled.
"So that means we're not getting back together?" Nelson asked.
Lisa growled.
Next scene!
'''Two Gentlemen of Verona'''
"A play within a play basically." Oscar explained as Shakespeare would often reuse settings from other plays he wrote. Lenny and Carl were two gentlemen trying to be polite to ladies but they just ignored them. They decided to go to Moe's because it was ladies night. They ended up with Patty and Selma as the merry wives of Windsor.
Homer laughed at his friends' misfortune.
"You two don't look very merry..." said Lenny.
"The Merry usually kicks in after a few drinks..." said Patty.
'''Hamlet'''
We already did this play in a previous episode. But it's Shakespeare.
Bart was lying in bed in a kingdom somewhere in Denmark. He has flags of Danish sports teams everywhere...
Bart was um Prince Hamlet. Or Simba...
"Narrator..." Lisa groaned.
Homer as the ghost of the king of Denmark arrived.
"Woooooooo! Hamlet! Hamlet!"
Bart as Hamlet woke up. "Dad?"
"Hamlet. I have returned from the graaaaaave!" said the ghost of the king.
"Looks like you returned from the buffet! Ha!" Bart as Hamlet laughed.
"Why you little!" Homer strangled Bart.
Lisa sighed annoyed.
"Okay where was I? Ah yes. Son I was murdered, merdereeeeeeed!" Homer wearing flour to look like a pale ghost groaned and wailed.
"By Whom?" Bart as Hamlet asked.
"By your uncle Claudius..." said Homer.
"Ie like Scar killed Mufasa..." said Oscar.
"Oz enough!" Lisa yelled.
Homer as the ghost of the King of Denmark wailed Asia he explained his murder.
Moe as Claudius poured poison in his ear and he died.
"So you want me get revenge?" Bart as Hamlet asked the ghost.
"Yes! Revenge! Reveeeeeeenge!" Homer was being overly dramatic.
"But how?" Bart as Hamlet asked.
"I don't know! Surprise meeeeeee!"
...
Hamlet had a soliloquy. Basically talking to himself about what just transpired.
Homer was on stage as the lights went down to focus a spotlight on Bart as Hamlet.
"Dad get off the stage! This is a soliloquy!" Lisa under her breath hissed at him to get off stage.
"What's that?" Homer asked.
"It's where a character is talking to themselves about their internal thoughts and monologues..." said Lisa.
"Oh... so Hamlet's cuckoo okay." said Homer.
Hamlet finishes his monologue.
"I will avenge you father." said Hamlet.
"Thank you son, now I must goooooo! D'oh! Jeez it! Sonnuva!" Homer tried to go through a wall...
"Can we remind actors playing spirits that they are not really intangible..." Lisa groaned.
Hamlet was talking to himself again.
"Hakuna Matata!" Oscar sang while playing a ukulele.
"Oz no!" Bart groaned.
A vaudeville hook yanked Oscar off stage.
"Huuuurk!"
Homer then went on stage again.
"Father you have returned? Why?!" Hamlet asked.
"It's cold out! Wear a sweater! A sweateeeeeerr!" said Homer as the ghost of the King of Denmark.
Lisa groaned exasperated.
Hamlet did not know what a sweater was as they haven't been invented yet. He put on a warm cloak and went to see his guards.
Horatio, Marcellus and uh I forget the other guard, were outside on the battlements.
"DOES HE LOOK LIKE A BITCH?!" Samuel L Jackson yelled.
"Narrator enough!" Lisa groaned.
Hamlet informed them of his vision of the spooky phantom.
...
The next day the Queen and Claudius had festivities and stuff on.
Hamlet was pacing about his bedchambers plotting some way to get Claudius to admit to killing the king.
"Hamlet are you dressed? The festival is starting! We have a jester!"
Hamlet headed down to the festival. Along the way he met Yorick his friend. Played by Milhouse.
Oscar was singing songs from Disney's the Lion King... "Hakuna Matata!"
Hamlet face palmed.
And Cecil Terwilliger was Laertes. He kept stealing the spot light.
"Hey! I'm the star of this play!" Bart as Hamlet yelled.
"Forsooth!" said Cecil as Laetres getting in the way.
Lisa gestures and the bullies ie that's Jimbo etc dragged Cecil off stage.
"Simba, Rafiki never told you... what happened to your father..." said Oscar talking like Darth Vader.
"Next play..." Lisa sighed.
== Plot 3 ==
'''Richard III'''
Krusty was King Richard III.
"Cooool! How did the school get Krusty?" said Bart to Oscar as they watched him perform off screen.
"Now is the winter of our discontent..." Krusty read his lines.
"The school had to agree to let him ad lib..." said Oscar as Krusty started telling jokes and portraying Richard as a powerful media mogul crushing rivals instead of a king.
Bart could see Lisa was disappointed.
"And now kids get ready for a Shakespearean themed episode of Itchy and Scratchy!" said Krusty.
Everyone cheered and sat down to watch Itchy and Scratchy on a TV.
The parents groaned as the kids were watching Itchy and Scratchy in Titus Andronicus.
It just devolved into mindless violence and gore which the kids loved. However Bart was a little disappointed.
"I like a good old violent episode of Itchy and Scratchy as much as the next kid, but this seemed a little directionless and just violent for the sake of violence..." said Bart still in costume as King Priam.
"Gah!" The Itchy um mice as uh slaves were chopping up Scratchy and his people etc.
Then Krusty put on a cowboy show but tried to ride on the horse which was a pantomime horse. (Two actors dressed up. In this case Grampa and Jasper.)
"A horse! A horse! My kingdom for two stagehands to play a horse!" said Krusty.
Suddenly Sideshow Bob appeared as Lord Richmond (as a rival comedian)
"Nyaaagh! Sideshow Bob!" said Bart jumping onto Oscar nearly squashing him.
"Kid relax, Bob's on license to appear in this play, that's all." said Krusty.
Bob's character explained Richard III's show was being replaced by a production of King Lear.
"Okay but whoever is playing King Lear better not upstage me!" said Krusty.
"Uh Krusty your performance at the gilded ladle was voted worst performance ever." said Oscar.
...
'''King Lear'''
Homer was King Lear. This time it was played accurately without ad libs and jokes, Krusty...
"Put the Queen in a bikini... Gahahahaha!" Krusty laughed.
Bart, Lisa and Maggie were his children Regan, Cordelia and Goneril. He asked them to explain how much they loved him. Maggie just stretched out her arms, Bart as Regan put on a performance with monkeys and stuff and showed off.
However Lisa as Cordelia honestly explained her love for her father.
"That's all! I've never been so insulted! Go to the room!" said King Lear.
"My room?" Cordelia asked.
"No the banishment room!" said King Lear.
"I didn't know we had a banishment room?" said Cordelia. The door led to a direct fall out of the top floor. Cordelia screamed as she fell.
Kent Brockman gave his opinion on the matter and got banished.
"You can't banish me, I'm emigrating!" said Kent.
"I have no idea what that is." said King Lear.
Kent was banished.
However he was right as Regan and Goneril began to mistreat their father and feed him junk food. When he questioned them about this Goneril was crying and Bart as Regan yelled at King Lear to change her diaper.
"Eeeew!" said Oscar as Maggie really needed changing.
King Lear ran off to find Cordelia and asked Kent and Krusty where she was.
He found her in the brambles dead.
"Oh god no!" He screamed. He recited his lines until.
"Hold up!" said Romeo. "She's just faking it like she did to me."
Cordelia sprung back to life. "Romeo?! You're not in this play?! How dare you interrupt! That's so rude!"
King Lear dropped her and stormed off somewhere.
...
The play ended with everyone asleep.
"They fell asleep! That's so rude!" Lisa yelled.
"My eyes are leaking." said Ralph.
Bart was smiling for some reason.
"Bart, why are you so happy?!" Lisa asked.
"Because while our parents were all sleeping I nicked their wallets!" said Bart carrying wallets.
"Bart! That's stealing!" Lisa explained.
"As long as they're sleeping it's a midsummer's night dream." said Bart quoting Shakespeare plays.
"Bart! You little puck!" Lisa scolded him.
"Lisa there's children present." said Bart. "Now who wants ice cream?"
The kids cheered.
Oscar drooled thinking about ice cream.
They ended up at an ice cream parlour called As you lick it. That's a pun on yet another Shakespearean play.
"Well the play was a flop but the ice cream was a good idea Bart..." said Lisa.
"Like I say, alls well that ends well." said Bart mentioning another Shakespeare play.
The End!