The Lion King, or The History of King Simba I - Summer of Shakespeare

sing it with me now nan Gong la baguette Eva vastu ganya ma dong YUM what you don't know the words The Lion King is considered the peak of the Disney Renaissance of the 1990 superbly animated a majestically scored it's the story of a young prince forced to grapple with maturity upon the untimely death of his father a wise King later the father appears to him as a spirit and the prince learned that his father's death was actually caused by his wicked uncle and so the prince Steel's himself and avenges his father the prince also has to comic relief best friends a strained relationship with his girlfriend a dotty advice dispensing courtier and at one point there's a gag involving a skull so naturally I thought it would be fun to look at all the obvious parallels between the Lion King and William Shakespeare's Hey hey Kyle long time no sing I heard through the magical two-way camera through which we can magically talk to each other that you're doing another Disney movie yeah so I thought why not continue our impeccable on-screen chemistry with yet another elaborate and incredibly time-consuming musical crossover uh-huh now look it's totally cool it's your show your channel feel free to shoot me down but I did make an entire album of Lion King parodies so just let me know I haven't wasted my time um guys ready yeah all right one two three four go something's rotten in the state of Denmark something's rotten in the state of getting look something's awesome oh so because the fish is right hey something's wrong in this Tony I actually did the research this time I learned everything about your arty pet interests I slog through every Shakespearean essay from Samuel Johnson to Marjorie Garber I memorized the entire play backwards and forwards I even learned how to speak fluent Danish just to be on the safe side and now I can safely say unequivocally that I am fully qualified to discuss all the obvious parallels between Disney's The Lion King and William Shakespeare's classic play the history of Henry the fourth parts one and two what yeah but but I come on I already did a Hamlet but I sorry Tony Lord I know I know everyone in their mother sees this movie as an adaptation of Hamlet but of all the other patients we've looked at this is probably the least like its source material yes Simba could be seen as a stand-in for Hamlet Mufasa is old Hamlet and scar as Claudius but Simba never pretends to be insane Oh bonkers scar doesn't poison Surabhi Simba doesn't maul Rafiki through a curtain Nala doesn't drown herself the animated lions that wood stood in for the key characters of Horatio Laertes important bra are nowhere to be seen Simba doesn't have Timon and Pumbaa executed in order to save his own skin or maybe he did live bait tell him that his commandment is fulfilled that Timon Krantz and Pumbaa Stern are dead and of course Simba lives he not only lives a continuous line of succession restores his father's dynasty and secures an heir Hamlet's if your call died right after killing Claudius letting a Norwegian invader take the throne without a fight good job Hamlet and in the original draft of the script scar wasn't even Simba's uncle instead he was a villainous baboon encroaching on the Lions territory what does that make you a monkey's uncle what's more Simba and Hamlet seem to have very different motivations Simba's far less introspective than Hamlet is and much more ready to enjoy himself Simba's many things but he's never the kind of lion to ponder his own mortality the way Hamlet did he does ponder mortality the great kings of the past are up there watching over us but he ponders it in a very specific context Hamlet is obsessed with death and what Simba obsessed with The Lion King is about kingship did doy that's the central theme of the film Simba is constantly being taught how to be king what it means to be king it happens to pass Kings the heavens open up and tells him you have forgotten who you are and summarizes his entire identity as you are mice Simba is the Lion King and nothing in the prior lands can be set right until Simba accepts that Hamlet's father doesn't really seem to give a damn whether or not Hamlet takes the throne he just tells him let not the Royal bed of Denmark be a couch for luxury and Damned and incest with no follow-up as to whether or not Hamlet should actually fill that royal bed himself likewise Mufasa somehow fails to mention that the last thing he saw before being trampled by wildebeests was his brother looking straight into his eyes saying an ironic one-liner and tossing him off a cliff no it's more important that Simba's stop around and accept his responsibility as heir apparent they're both afraid of responsibility but it's telling that Hamlet's fear manifests in a monologue about death while Simba sphere manifests in a song about hedonism to be or to not be all those arrows and slings go though actually Shakespeare did write a play about a young prince in line to throne that wasted his youth on pleasurable pursuits hanging out with a bunch of gluttonous layabouts back to Henry the fourth it's less well known than Hamlet and if you consider that the main story actually stretches across three and by some accounts four plays it's a grander story and if we're going to talk about Shakespeare's attitude towards kingship it's much more relevant Henry the fourth is not the main character his son Prince Hal is and house story arc is much closer to Simba's than Simba's is to Hamlet Hal starts out as a reckless kid abusing his privilege by hanging out in the bad parts of town getting mixed up with flatulent gluttons who enable his laziness and make from the monarchy you mean a bunch of royal dead guys are watching us Simba like Prince Hal is in danger of abandoning his responsibilities to the throne of the rock Simba's first song is all about the whimsical joys of the abuse of power an attitude to kingship that's shared by the villain I am a king I can do whatever I want and look how well that approach goes it's a simple lesson about the burden of royalty famously summed up and came to me the fourths famous line uneasy lies the head that wears the crown but both Simba and Hal come through proving themselves worthy of the throne slash rock how proves it by demonstrating that he understands the great burden of being king telling his father on his deathbed that should he wear the crown if any rebel or vain spirit of mine did with the least affection of a welcome give entertainment to the might of it let God forever keep it from my head and make me as the poorest vassal is that doth with awe and terror kneel to it Simba also has to learn the great burden of being king he demonstrates the understands that power by throwing his uncle off a cliff and letting hyenas eat him and then he roars and makes the plants grow back okay but even Henry the fourth isn't that close to the Lion King story can you feel Henry the fourth I'll work on it the Henry the fourth plays don't have a scar unless you count Northumberland and Hotspur but their relationship with Hal isn't anywhere near the this time it's personal deaths of the wrongs that scarred de Simba you could argue that Prince House main nemesis is Falstaff course Falstaff was a beloved character even Elizabethan times so words like nemesis or villain hardly fit him but still in order for Hal to become king he has to abandon Falstaff and he does publicly denying him in one of the most humiliating heartbreaking put-downs in the Shakespearean Canon I know the not old man thought thy prayers how ill white hair has become a fool and jester I have long dreamed of such kind of man so sir Pitt swelled so old and so profane but being awaked I do despise my dream for God doth know so shall the world perceive that I have turned away my former self so will I those that kept me company so yeah Disney decided not to have a three-minute monologue where Simba tells Timon and Pumbaa to themselves okay so it's not Harry the forth either but the Lion King definitely has some very Shakespearean tropes Simba is Hamlet esque Timon and Pumbaa are Falstaff e'en even scar is a bit macbeth ish he kills a king in secret chases the next in line of the country and then fails so bad at kinging that he breaks the ecosystem hell even the circle of life as philosophy is pretty into the classical idea of the great chain of being it's an idea that goes back to play though there is a great order to the universe a hierarchy of heavenly beings that's mirrored on earth through a hierarchy in nature and a hierarchy in humanity and lion ET a king's time as ruler rises and falls like the Sun one day Simba the Sun will set on my time here and will rise with you as the new king the son succeeds the father that's the natural order of things disrupting that order by say killing the king and taking the throne is a sin a sin only atoned for by the usurpers overthrow by a legitimate king scar and Simba Macbeth and Malcolm Richard the third in heavy the seventh Antonio and Prospero in The Tempest Claudius and well Hamlet tried but Fortinbras succeeded even Henry the fourths usurpation of Richard ii had to be set right by his successor his own son that's the Shakespearean circle of life the king is dead long live the king The Lion King could be seen a Shakespearean in this way it definitely sees itself as Shakespearean there is the direct video sequel which is obviously Romeo and Juliet and the mid coal which is quite clearly a riff on Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead but what if Lion King isn't Shakespearean at all what if it's biblical maybe Simba's more Moses than Hamlet a prince exiled from his home for murder having a vision of a great king and returning home to save his people or maybe it's neither Shakespearean nor biblical Hey ever heard of Kimba the White Lion no good then Disney has done their job yep nothing like Lion King this ain't nothing like that Lion King Osama Texas Chainsaw who is that japanimation thing I had no okay to be fair to Disney they borrowed a schmuck from themselves so they did from Osamu Tezuka apparently during production Disney animators jokingly called the movie Bam blit why did I just play those backed back okay collected so Shakespeare the Bible anime other Disney movies hey you notice how none of these things I mentioned are African yeah funny that story time this is an epic song by the grills of Mali four generations long ago in the city of neon II the great king Magan con Fattah heard a prophecy that he would father a great ruler should he take a plain wife heeding the prophecy the woman so Galan became his wife and bore him a child Sundiata a name which in the Mandinka language means the lion of so long as a child Sundiata was wise he was weak lame unable to walk and above all hated by the court vicious rumors hovered around him rumors that were spread by king patas first wife Queen mother sassouma Barrett a jealous spiteful and ambitious seeking to have her own son Asuma thrown over the crippled boy for a time her plans worked her rumours buzzed in people's ears and no one took the lame boy seriously until one day he rose and stood strong fearing her own sound of lose the throne sassouma Barrett a worked her Wiles and Hansard Miyata so long and his entire immediate family excited Sundiata met with many people's many cultures and became very wise as he grew into manhood he learned the ways of war the ways of peace and the ways of a rulership and as force Asuma Barret a her machinations were all for naught as the great city of neon II fell sapped by Samara Contech the sorcerer king who used his magics to subjugate Molly city-by-city Sundiata could stay in exile no longer he went across the lands he wandered and gathered a mighty army despite terrible odds they marched on the armies of Samarra content there was a great battle Sundiata army against American tastes terrible magics but against all odds Sundiata prevailed so Malraux the enemy of the people of Mali was defeated Sundiata returned to neon ii triumphant and there he founded a great dynasty a dynasty that would lead the great Mali Empire an empire of wealth and learning an empire of the great cities of Jenay and Timbuktu and let it be known that generations oh their lives to the reign of this great man Sundiata Keita the lion king of Mali ah so there's a lot there right young prince manipulated into exile by jealous family member Prince learns lessons in exile and returns to kick ass and take the throne the epic of Sundiata is a semi historical piece of oral history told at least since the 13th century and first written down in the 20th century and it's considered an important piece of national mythology in Mali as well as Senegal Gambia Guinea a most of West Africa actually and yes it's a West African epic poem and The Lion King is clearly set near Mount Kilimanjaro in East Africa but considering Disney decided to begin the movie with a song in Zulu while giving all the characters Swahili names it seems like they were going for a pan-african feel because Americans know nothing about African geography still the epic of Sundiata is worth mentioning because it has just as many if not more parallels to the Lion King than Hamlet does but I can't say if any of the Disney team actually knew the story of Sundiata any more like and say for sure that they were adapting Kimba the White Lion for all I know their point of reference to any African culture was National Geographic I guess my point is that adaptation is normally messy every artwork has multiple parents so what the hell does it mean to be based on anything so there's this quote going around the internet a while back you probably saw it the quote was when I saw you I fell in love and you smiled because you knew - William Shakespeare and countless trite tumblr post after trite tumblr post put that quote in Elliott little fonts and the - William Shakespeare and it's obviously not Shakespeare obviously it's not even in iambic pentameter it doesn't even rhyme but it does rhyme in Italian common TVD may know what I it - saw dat petty a loss ie that's a line from an opera by Giuseppe Verdi and line doesn't even stand out all that much a character says it in this series of overlapping musical dialogues but it's there it wasn't written by Shakespeare but by the Padua new British auto regal boy - who wrote it for Falstaff an opera based on the Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare going PVD main MRI hakusho deity pet day low side so obviously Shakespeare didn't write it but Shakespeare's existence allowed that line to happen so is it Shakespeare man kills his brother to steal his throne and the king's son avenge Asim is the Lion King Hamlet care for a young boy is forced into maturity by the murder of a parent is Bambi Hamlet orphaned child dealing with mental health issues manipulated into a self-imposed exile before returning home to feed an evil usurper is frozen The Lion King and by the transitive property is it Hamlet course that's ridiculous it's about this blond woman dealing with depression and a brunette sister what's up with her it's obviously melancholia do you want to see a gas giant we won't get pummeled by a gas giant Cheers is evil we don't need to create for it okay bye but you can take it further politician murders his way to the top while gleefully sharing his plans with the audience is house of cards root to the 3rd decent man tempted by the fruits of evil only to have it destroy him and his family is Breaking Bad Macbeth the sons and daughters of Great Houses vie for power while balancing their own needs against the reputation of their family names is Game of Thrones every history play Shakespeare ever wrote I won't go so far to say that every story about lovers torn apart by society is Romeo and Juliet but how many star-crossed lovers and fiction oh they're dead to them and what about The Fault in Our Stars or Band of Brothers Something Wicked This Way Comes passing strange North by Northwest the sound and the fury brave new world Infinite Jest their titles are all taken from Shakespeare none of them are direct out of patience but don't they all owe some debt to him Shakespeare stories like all great stories get told and retold adapted and re adapted and diffused into ideas into the basic building blocks of culture into values into turns of phrase it comes full circle every time you try to break the ice look in your heart of hearts and set your teeth on edge see a sorry sight and in one fell swoop feel dashed to pieces be fancy free and as merry as the day is long for forever and a day when you find yourself in a pickle are forced to lie low drink the milk of human kindness realize the game as a foot and get up in arms and go on a wild goose chase without rhyme or reason warned that that way madness lies our wonder if there's a method in that madness every time you give short shrift get hot blooded green-eyed or lily livered do foul play or fair play act to your heart's content make the beast with two backs or use any number of household words it's a foregone conclusion you're quoting Shakespeare the works informed so much of how we understand romance art or politics that if you look closely you can see Shakespeare everywhere okay not like everywhere it says a lot about us that we can think of a line King as Shakespearean more readily than we can think of it as African how we all know Hamlet more than we know Sundiata Shakespeare shows up in a lot of places but he's just one part of culture and oftentimes not the most important part he may have created the phrase but Shakespeare is not the be-all and end-all too often people and this includes me can be a bit myopic about the Bard he's a great artist but we can't treat him like he's the only artist every piece of artwork has a thousand different influences Shakespeare may be one maybe not but those influences are still there I think it's important to know what those influences are Shakespeare or otherwise the musical the space opera the war film the hero's journey these ideas have all been touched by Shakespeare but maybe not defined by him distill them across generations then just become ways of organizing our thoughts in other words stories know what our stories are for they define us and the rest is silence you are you guys waiting for disperse done with you get back to your cages it's my show now actually it's Kyle show

Channel: KyleKallgrenBHH

Views: 132,927

Rating: 4.9373002 out of 5

Keywords: Brows Held High, film, William Shakespeare (Author), Hamlet (Play), Simba (Film Character), The Lion King (Film), Kyle Kallgren, Henry IV Part 1 (Play), Henry IV Part 2 (Play), Kimba The White Lion (TV Program), Sundiata Keita (Monarch)

Id: judjEmaTJAs

Length: 22min 31sec (1351 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 10 2015