An analysis of Shakespeare’s Works Influence on the TV Series Carnival Row

Abstract

From the beginning of cinema’s history -around the 20th century-, literature and the screen are closely connected. A large part of the first films was inspired by existing works, that is, the directors used literary tradition to develop the arguments of their cinematic productions (Frago, 2005). Shakespeare's influence on the screen was born with the cinema and it has been growing up together with the seventh art (Díaz, 2005). Also, as well as cinema, literature has been important for the production of TV series. The main purpose of this paper is to see if there is a possible influence of William Shakespeare's works on the current series Carnival Row (Chevarria & Beacham, 2019). With the analysis, we find that the series contains a large number of possible similarities and influences from Shakespeare on some characters, the setting and themes such as fantastic creatures, love, music, carnivalesque. Not to mention the fact that we also find some direct mentions to Shakespeare’s works in the series. These similarities and influences are relevant because, after more than 400 years of the existence of Shakespeare works, we can still find influences on today’s screen.