Shylock's Revenge Speech from The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare (read by Tom O'Bedlam)

There's a good article on the tradition of playing Shylock here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shylock

For a long time Shylock was played without any sympathy for his situation.  Then Edmund Kean (1789-1833) started to play him with compassion and that is now the accepted way.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmund_Kean

The first picture is Orson Welles, the last Edmund Kean

One famous actor always played him in a red wig instead of a black one.  Are there any ginger Jews?  There's no shortage of blonde ones - William Shatner, Goldie Hawn, Paul Newman etc.  Judas was traditionally portrayed with red hair.

Actually I looked this up.  About half of one percent of Jewish schoolchildren have red hair, more in some populations.  Esau, the hairy brother, had red hair too.
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/vie...

You can hear Orson Welles perform the speech here:
Video

And here Al Pacino:(much less sympathetic than Welles, angry more than hurt)
monologue of shylock

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