Shakespearean Comedy Bingo

Last summer I put together an Operetta Bingo sheet, scientifically designed to capture the most popular cliches present in light opera. Well, it just seemed obvious to apply the same process to Shakespeare's plays. Given the huge number of cliches present in Shakespeare, I thought it wise to break them down by genre. Today we look at the comedies. 

BINGO

Shakespearean New Year's Resolutions, part 2

Happy New Year to all my readers! Have you made any New Year's resolutions? These guys have:

2014 was an amazing year for Good Tickle Brain. I started the year with just a couple hundred followers on Facebook and Twitter and absolutely no plans to for this website to be anything but a display case for the rather obscure jokes running through my mind. However, thanks in part to websites like i09 and Buzzfeed sharing my stuff, I now have well over a thousand followers on each site, plus more on Tumblr and Instagram. The "Shakespeare fan with strange sense of humor" demographic is, happily, much stronger than I had anticipated, and I have really enjoyed meeting and interacting with like-minded Shakespeare geeks.

2014 was also a year for projects. I started the Weekly Tickle Brain e-mail newsletter, as part of my ongoing plan to take over the world with stick figure comics. I signed up for more social networking services than I had previously known existed. I also did some work for the excellent Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, which actually managed to cover my annual website hosting costs. So, if you appreciate being able to read Good Tickle Brain without any annoying ads popping up at you, thank the Birthplace Trust. 

I consider "breaking even" to be a fairly substantial achievement in the field of esoteric niche-market webcomics, but some of you out there have been kind enough to indicate that you would like to give me more money in exchange for material goods such as t-shirts, books, mugs, and posters. In 2015 I hope to make Good Tickle Brain merchandise available! If there is any product in particular that you would like to see, please do get in touch.

Unfortunately, working on these sorts of projects does take up a lot of time. In order to allow me to work on expanding Good Tickle Brain, I will be moving to a twice-a-week posting schedule, with new comics on the site every Tuesday and Thursday. The Weekly Tickle Brain newsletter will continue to go out on Mondays, and I will also be posting random stuff during the week on my various social media accounts, as usual. 

Too long, didn't read? Let me sum up:

  1. Thanks for supporting Good Tickle Brain in 2014!

  2. You're all awesome.

  3. New comics will be posted on Tuesdays and Thursdays!

  4. Shakespeare is awesome.

  5. Happy New Year!

Into the (Shakespearean) Woods, part 3

Today's comic concludes my cheerfully inept and haphazard Shakespeare/Sondheim Into the Woods parody (see part 1 and part 2). I've had a great time doing it and nobody has complained vociferously about it, so I might sneak in a couple more Musical Shakespeare parodies in the future.

Rosalind's song is based on On the Steps of the Palace, while Helena and her suitor's are singing a version of Any Moment.

The witches are singing Children Will Listen, and the final chorus is pretty much a re-hash of the opening chorus. This concludes my foray into Shakespeare/Sondheim crossovers! I hope you've enjoyed it.

I'm going to be taking the next two weeks off, in order to enjoy the holidays and get caught up on some long-overdue Tickle Brain projects. I hope to have comics up on Christmas and New Year's, and will probably be posting random stuff on Tumblr and Twitter (including my ongoing Shakespearean Advent entries) but will not resume regular comic updates until the new year. The very best holiday wishes to all of you!

If you want to make sure you don't miss anything over the holidays, sign up for my e-mail newsletter! All the cool kids are doing it. Well, my friends and family and a couple other people are, anyways. 

Into the (Shakespearean) Woods, part 2

Today I am unapologetically continuing my totally illogical and poorly-thought-out Shakespeare/Sondheim Into the Woods parody mash-up (begun in Monday's comic).

For those of you not familiar with Into the Woods, the first song is "Hello Little Girl" and the second is "Agony". Tune in again on Friday for one final Into the (Shakespearean) Woods comic, in which I will totally fail to neatly wrap up all the disparate plot lines. 

Into the (Shakespearean) Woods, part 1

As you've probably figured out by now, I love Shakespeare. I think Shakespeare's plays are super-fun. However, they are by no means the be-all and end-all (if I may borrow that phrase) of theatre. My many other theatrical loves include the musicals of Stephen Sondheim. I have thus spent a lot of time recently in sweet anticipation of the upcoming film adaptation of Sondheim's Into the Woods, a musical which emotionally traumatized me when I first saw it at the age of seven, but which I have since come to love. 

So, this week I am presenting a mash-up of Into the Woods and some of the many Shakespeare plays that involve people running... into the woods. I have no idea how this is going to turn out, so I apologize in advance if it's terrible. 

If you're not familiar with Into the Woods, I highly recommend watching the 1990 film of the original Broadway production, starring Bernadette Peters. You can hear the original inspiration behind today's comic's lyrics here. 

The saga continues in part 2 and part 3.

In other news, the seventh issue of The Weekly Tickle Brain e-mail newsletter is going out today! This week's issue features more of my Tumblr advent shenanigans and a seasonal recommendation for the world's best Shakespeare-themed holiday movie. If you haven't signed up yet, now's your chance! (Which is not to suggest that you'll never be able to sign up again, or anything...)