Shakespeare Over Soccer?!

Yesterday afternoon, I had an interesting situation as I got tickets for a production of William Shakespeare's play "All's Well That Ends Well" before knowing that Turkey, my late father's homeland, was going to be playing the American national men's soccer team in Philadelphia which was also broadcast on ESPN-2 at the same time!

But, since America won the game 2-1 and I essentially pulled a "Benedict Arnold" by rooting for Turkey (well at least I'm not playing for another country unlike Italian-American Guiseppe Rosa from New Jersey who not plays for Italy but he scored two goals for them in a game against The United States!), I guess I could say it was perhaps for the best.

So, I thought I would list my ten favorite Shakespeare plays. I am certainly no authority on The Bard, so if you are an English professor at my alma mater Radford University in Radford, Va., or anywhere else, please pick on your own kind!

1. "Othello" (pictured)

2. "Macbeth" (love the Polanski film version too!)

3. "Hamlet"

4. "12th Night"

5. "King Lear" (wasn't that a Kurosawa film too?!)

6. "The Merchant of Venice"

7. "Richard III"

8. "Romeo and Juliet" (what's this with unhappy endings?)

9. "Rosencrantz and Guilderstein Are Dead"...........oh wait, that's a Tom Stoppard play.....make that "Taming of the Shrew"

10. "All's Well That Ends Well" (what else?!)

For more info on the production schedule of the American Shakespeare Center, one can log on to www.ASCstaunton.com or call 1-800-MUCH-ADO