Halloween Costume Achieved

So for the past couple of years I’ve been talking about Shakespeare Halloween costumes, but never pulled the trigger on any of them.  I don’t want to get some generic “Romeo” costume from a store, but I don’t want to do something that nobody other than you folks would recognize, either.  (Amusing trivia — google “Romeo costume”, “Hamlet costume” and “Shakespeare costume” and the *same* costumes will show up again and again.  Argh!)

This year I had Hamlet on my brain.  I figured, “Black pants, black shirt with at least some kind of Renaissancy thing going on.  Fencing sword.  Carry around a skull.  Done.”  Harder to find than it looks.  I didn’t want to look like Steve Jobs talking to a skull.  Too soon.

Then, today in the costume store, it hit me – instead of going as Hamlet, I could go as …. Yorick.

There it stood, one of those “scary court jester” costumes, with the checkerboard pattern (what is the name of that?), the funny hat with bells, and a skull for a face.  Perfectoroonie.

If I can swing it, I’m going to get a stuffed Piglet doll and velcro him to my shoulders.  Get it?  He hath borne me on his back a thousand times? Piglet as Hamlet?  That’s funny, like, a dozen different ways.

I’m torn on whether to give myself a name tag that reads “A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy”, or to actually carry around a copy of Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace.  I’m thinking the nametag, though, because a) I’d likely put the book down at some point, and b) I’ve never read that book so I wouldn’t want people to think I want to discuss it. 🙂

Bonus Achievement #1: Dress up like this as I go around trick or treating with my children.  Print up the entire speech, sign it ShakespeareGeek.com, and hand it out to anybody that says “Who are you supposed to be?”  Drive up some free publicity, *and* appreciation of Shakespeare.

Bonus Achievement #2:  My wife’s already decided to break out her old “Renaissance maiden” costume from a previous Halloween, which if I’d pulled off Romeo, I was going to call Juliet.  But I’m thinking if I can convince her to carry a basket of weeds and maybe stick some seaweed in her hair we can call her Ophelia.  Nobody but me would appreciate the awesomeness of dead Ophelia and dead Yorick as a couple, but I’ll see what I can arrange.

I will take and post pictures of the final result!

EDIT : If I can’t figure out a way to make Piglet stay on my shoulders, I shall print out a big 8×10 of David Tennant (or Kenneth Branagh or Mel Gibson or Laurence Olivier…) and tape him to my back.  Same idea. 🙂