How did I manage to live so long in Los Angeles and not know that there are free Shakespearean festivals?

In honor of the Bard, I give you this meme:

1. Name the first five lines of Shakespeare that come into your head. (Don’t cheat–write the first five that you think of, then check for accuracy later.)
— “He doth bestride the narrow world like a Colossus, and we petty men walk under his huge legs, to peep about to find ourselves dishonorable graves.” Julius Caesar

— “Get thee to a nunnery!” Hamlet

—”Do you not know that I am a woman? When I think, I must speak!” As You Like It

— “Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble.” MacBeth

— “But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east and Juliet is the sun! Arise fair sun and kill the envious moon….” Romeo and Juliet

(I apologize for misquotes.)

2. The last Shakespeare play you went to see on stage.

As You Like It

3. The last Shakespeare film homage or adaptation you watched at home or at the movies.

That may have been Ran by Akira Kurosawa. It’s based on King Lear.

4. What Shakespeare homage/adaptation/plays are on your to be read/to be seen list?

I would love to see Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead on stage. I keep planning to head up to the Theatricum Botanicum before the summer’s over to see any Shakespearean play too.

5. Name a favorite Shakespeare-inspired work.

Oh! Hmmm…All I can think of is the Arrested Development episode in which Tobias genderbends the roles in Much Ado About Nothing.

6. Why do you think Shakespeare’s plays are still popular?

I’m going to go with another person here and say: “Because they are wonderful. Why else?”

What does everyone else think?