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Donald Trump Performs
Shakespeare’s Soliloquies
BY ARYEH COHEN-WADE
April 6, 2016
“Hamlet”
Listen—to be, not to be, this
is a tough question, O.K.? Very tough. A lot of people come up to me and ask,
“Donald, what’s more noble? Getting hit every day with the slings, the bows,
the arrows, the sea of troubles—or just giving up?” I mean, smart people, the
best Ivy League schools.
But I say to them, “Have you
ever thought that we don’t know—we don’t know—what dreams may come? Have you
ever thought about that?” Ay yi yi—there’s the rub! There’s the rub right
there. When we shuffle off this mortal whatever it is—coil? They say to me,
“Donald, you’ve built this fantastic company, how’d you do it? How?” And I say
one word: “leadership.” Because that’s what it’s all about, is leadership. And
people are so grateful whenever I bring up this whole “perchance to dream”
thing. So grateful.
And on and on with the whips
and the scorns of time and the contumely and the fardels and the blah blah
blah.
Then I see a bare bodkin and
I’m like—a bodkin? What the hell is this thing, a bodkin? Listen, I run a very
successful business, I employ thousands of people and I’m supposed to care
whether this bodkin is bare or not? Sad!
And when people say I don’t
have a conscience—trust me, I have a conscience, and it’s a very big
conscience, O.K.? And the native hue of my resolution is not sicklied o’er,
that’s a lie! If anyone tells you that the native hue of my resolution is
sicklied o’er, they’re trying to sell you a load of you-know-what. And
enterprises of great pith—listen, my enterprises are so pithy. So pithy.
Fantastic pith. But sometimes, hey, they lose the name of action, right? I
mean, it happens—it happens.
“Romeo and Juliet”
Quiet, quiet—shut up, over
there! What’s coming through that window? A light, it is the east, and
Melania—you know, people are always telling me, they say, “Mr. Trump, you’ve
got a wonderful wife”—Melania, she’s sitting right there. Stand up, sweetheart.
Isn’t she a beautiful woman, Melania? Gorgeous. I love women, they love me—and
I think we all know what I mean, folks! I’m gonna do so well with the women in
November. So well.
Melania’s the sun, is what a
lot of people are saying. Hillary Clinton? I mean, with that face? She looks
like the moon! She’s very envious, if you ask me, very envious, but can you
blame her? Visit Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue—which is the best street in New
York, by the way—I mean, who wouldn’t be envious? This moon, Hillary, is sick
and pale with grief when she compares herself to Melania, who is a very
beautiful woman, I have to admit.
Melania, she’s got a great
cheek, it’s a wonderful cheek, a bright cheek, everyone knows it, the stars
ought to be ashamed of themselves, ashamed. The brightness of her cheek would
shame those stars. As daylight doth a lamp! Look at this, folks, how she leans
her cheek upon her hand. If I were a glove upon that hand—first, let me tell
you, I think we all know what I would do, because I bought the Miss Universe
Pageant, very successful, so I know a thing or two about gorgeous women. And
all this stuff about the gloves, and my hands—I have great hands, O.K.? Gimme a
break.
“Julius Caesar”
Friends, Romans, folks—listen
up. The reason I’m here is to bury Julius. It’s not to praise him. It’s just
not. Brutus over there—we all know he’s a good guy, right? And he says Julius
was low-energy. Is it a crime to be low-energy? Well, maybe it is, maybe it
isn’t—who knows?
The point is, Brutus is a
good guy, all these guys over there, the ones who did this, they’re all good
guys—and Julius, Julius was my friend, a really terrific friend to me.
Julius—he brought a lot of captives
home to Rome, filled a lot of coffers. Really fantastic coffers. Does that
sound low-energy to you? And when the poor people, regular, hardworking,
everyday Romans, cried—Julius did, too. He cried. I saw it with my own
eyes—many, many times. But Brutus—Brutus says Julius was low-energy. And
everyone knows that Brutus is a good guy, right?
You all saw that on the
Lupercal, three times—three times—I tried to give Julius a kingly crown. And
you should’ve seen this crown—this was a great crown, O.K.? Very, very kingly.
And three times he said, “Nope.” Is this low-energy? Yet Brutus says he was
low-energy—and, sure, sure, Brutus is a good guy.
I’m not here to say Brutus is
lying, but I am here to speak what I do know. You all loved Julius once—so why
not be a little sad, now that he’s dead? Just a little sad.
I’m sorry to say that the
Roman Senate has been run by a bunch of morons for a long, long time. Morons! A
lot of bad decisions—these guys, they’re like a bunch of animals. It makes me
so sad. So sad. And I’m looking here at the coffin of my good friend, Mr.
Caesar. Just a minute. (He pauses to wipe a tear from his eye.)
So we’re gonna build a wall!
And who’s gonna pay for it? (The crowd shouts, “The Visigoths!”)
“Macbeth”
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and
yadda yadda, the days are going by—what I’m saying is this is gonna last a long
time, believe you me. Long. I see this candle, and I say—should I blow it out?
Should I? Because, when you
think about it, and there’s been some great polling on this, in fact there’s a
new poll out from the Wall Street Journal—which is a terrific paper, by the
way, they’ve won a lot of prizes—listen to this, they say blow out the candle.
They do, they say blow it out.
People come up to me and say,
“Mr. Trump, life is like a shadow,” and I’m like, “What? A shadow? I don’t get
it, and, listen, I went to Wharton, O.K.—the top business school in the
country. So I’m a smart guy, I’m a smart guy, it’s no secret.”
And what’s really interesting
is I like to talk, and tell a tale, and that tale is gonna have a whole lotta
sound, and a whole lotta fury, because that’s what the American people want to
hear! They want to hear some sound and some fury sent to Washington for once in
their lives, and, I mean, is that too much to ask? They want to hear me tell
it, and they can decide what it signifies, but I’m saying right now—it’s gonna
sound great, I guarantee it. Absolutely, a hundred and ten per cent, just
really, really great. O.K.?
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