"It's easier to do Shakespeare than Spelling, and I know that sounds crazy, because the challenge of Shakespeare is living up to Shakespeare, living up to that word, not failing, you know, where with Aaron Spelling it's like, just try to look good. Or maybe don't use Spelling there, that's bad. No - you can. He's dead"
About this Quote
Kartheiser is doing that actorly tightrope walk where confession and performance blur: he wants to sound reverent about “Shakespeare,” but he can’t resist puncturing the piety with a cheap-shot comparison that instantly reveals what he actually thinks the game is. The joke isn’t just “high art vs. TV.” It’s that prestige comes with a clearly legible standard, while commercial entertainment often comes with a softer, more cosmetic metric: hit your mark, look good, don’t rock the boat.
His line about Shakespeare being hard because you have to “live up to that word” is a neat inversion. The text itself can be brutally specific, but the cultural aura around Shakespeare is even more oppressive: you’re not only acting, you’re auditioning for a pantheon. That pressure becomes, paradoxically, a kind of clarity. Everyone agrees on the stakes.
Then he slides into Aaron Spelling as shorthand for glossy, efficient assembly-line television. The subtext is less snobbery than relief: in certain corners of the industry, the demand is not transcendence but deliverability. “Just try to look good” is a critique of a system that rewards surfaces, but it’s also an acknowledgement of how actors survive inside it.
The frantic self-editing (“maybe don’t use Spelling… No - you can. He’s dead”) is the tell. He knows he’s flirting with elitism and professional bad manners, and he turns the guilt into a punchline. It’s gallows humor as PR, and it lands because it’s honest about the hierarchy everyone pretends isn’t there.
His line about Shakespeare being hard because you have to “live up to that word” is a neat inversion. The text itself can be brutally specific, but the cultural aura around Shakespeare is even more oppressive: you’re not only acting, you’re auditioning for a pantheon. That pressure becomes, paradoxically, a kind of clarity. Everyone agrees on the stakes.
Then he slides into Aaron Spelling as shorthand for glossy, efficient assembly-line television. The subtext is less snobbery than relief: in certain corners of the industry, the demand is not transcendence but deliverability. “Just try to look good” is a critique of a system that rewards surfaces, but it’s also an acknowledgement of how actors survive inside it.
The frantic self-editing (“maybe don’t use Spelling… No - you can. He’s dead”) is the tell. He knows he’s flirting with elitism and professional bad manners, and he turns the guilt into a punchline. It’s gallows humor as PR, and it lands because it’s honest about the hierarchy everyone pretends isn’t there.
Quote Details
| Topic | Sarcastic |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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