King Lear (President Trump) on the stormy heath: A prophetic parody

Triggered by an oblique reference comparing Donald Trump to  King Lear in yesterday's post, a song parody, I let my mind wander over the famous scene in Shakespeare's play, where the distracted, betrayed king, accompanied by his Fool, wanders  onto the lonely heath, convulsed by a thunderstorm. This is a drastic revision of Act III, Scene 2. As Karl Marx truly said, what begins as tragedy ends as farce.



The heath, stormy. Enter King (Donald Trump) and his Fool (Sean Spicer).


TRUMP
Blow, wind, and crack your cheeks! Rage, blow!
See, I can handle this. It's so tremendous!
And so I make America great again
By being here, by my executive orders,
Which I sign and then display to cameras.
I smite flat the thick rotundity
Of the law, of presidential norms I defy.

SPICER
Oh, nuncle, this is no place for a winner like you. No crowds to cheer you, to buoy you up and shout, to expand by many thousands in retrospect. Here's a night pities neither wise men nor fools. The dishonest media wouldn't be caught dead in it, though we can only wish.

TRUMP
I tax you not, elements, with unkindness.
Indeed, I have for long opposed most taxes
And paid as little as I could. You owe
Me nothing, clear? So go ahead. I'll take
What you have to dish out. It's not so bad
As what the Democrats and media have done.

SPICER
I told them all last week: The president means to say just what he's already said. Full stop.

      The codpiece justifies
The notions of the head.
      All questions of small size
Are better left unsaid.
     What he will do in time
Is just what he will do;
      The only sense is rhyme
And that's a mystery too.

Let Alec Baldwin and Melissa McCarthy make mouths in a glass.

Enter STEVE BANNON, disguised as JERRY FALWELL Jr.


BANNON
Alas, sir, are you here? This scary night
Resembles the Apocalypse to come,
May be the real thing, that end-times thing:
My dad predicted this if God's eternal reign
Were not prepared by great American rulers,
If white makes right were compromised
By dread mongrelization's triumph.

TRUMP
Am I the last trump, then, of prophecy?
Now will the gods, who shun the CGI
Effects of Hollywood, which scorns me,
Find out their enemies and mine?
Believe me, I'm a man more sinned against
Than sinning!

BANNON
                        Sir, no doubt you got that right.
So keep me close. Beware the son-in-law
And let the daughter mind her product line.
You are white Christians' friend, we have your back.
Hard by here is a hovel (not your brand).

TRUMP
No matter there. I'm flexible and tough.
So come, your hovel. I pray it does not leak.
I've had so much of leaking lately, friend,
My wits begin to turn. But where's my fool?

SPICER
Here, nuncle. Now I feel a song coming on, as cryptic as my daily briefings.

     He that had but little wit
When to high office he ascended
     Must grow new trouble bit by bit
Till both the storm and he are ended.

Exeunt omnes.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Actors Theatre Indiana romps through a farce — unusually, without a founder in the cast

Augusta Read Thomas: A rare focus on a living composer's new music highlights this season

DK's 'Divas A-New': What's past is prologue (so is what's present)