It’s March and time for Madness. But here at the Bill / Shakespeare Project, it’s not about the round ball, but about the grand Bard (of Avon, that is!). We’re through our Elite Eight round, and here are the results:
On the left side of the bracket, both Romeo and Juliet (our #1 seed) and The Winter’s Tale (the #29 seed) defeated their opponents (Richard III and The Merchant of Venice, respectively) by identical 56% – 44% margins.
On the right side of the bracket, there were not as tight of margins. #11 seed Hamlet just killed #3 seed A Midsummer Night’s Dream 78% to 22%, and–in what I’d call an upset–#7 Much Ado About Nothing doubled up on #2 Macbeth, 67% to 33% (I call this one an upset not just because of the rankings, but because I would have thought Mackers would be more popular).
So our Final Four is set. Will the lovers from Verona survive, or will they exit, pursued by a bear? Will the melancholy Dane stand victorious over our bickering and bantering Beatrice and Benedick?
This round begins tomorrow morning, and will end Wednesday night at midnight… We’ll announce the championship round on Thursday, with voting beginning Friday!