MovieChat Forums > Slings and Arrows (2003) Discussion > Cyril and Frank: modern age chorus

Cyril and Frank: modern age chorus

posted 16 years ago by mbphilly
5 replies | jump to latest

Cyril and Frank are basically the chorus or some kind of chorus for show, at least in season one. They don't have much back story except that they are veteran, entrenched thespians who have slugged it out with colleagues such as Geoffrey, Ellen, and Oliver. They provide some glue or feedback that saves the audience some guess work. They offer quirky, comical bits of insight of one character or another, and they always usher in and out each episode with an appropriate music hall style song, letting us know about the main goal in each season, the ongoing struggle to bring whatever Shakespearean work to the stage without going completely mad and selling themselves to mediocracy.

What doesn't kill you, can make you stronger or leave you crippled.
--Brenicus

[–] Elphie_all_Galindafied 16 years ago

Huh....I had never thought of that. I had always wondered what the point of them was (other than just being there) but that really makes sense.

~*~Would You Light My Candle?~*~
Founder of the APJLAA
To S&M

[–] chocpaw 16 years ago

I think that's a pretty cool interpretation.

For me, they loosely remind me of those two old groucy men from the Muppets who sit in the balcony.

[–] TheCornishOgre 16 years ago

They are my favourite characters - actually, that's hard to say with this show, there are just so many favourites...

[–] ltredinnick 9 years ago

Statler and Waldorf ARE the chorus in the Muppets 'verse, so good call on that

[–] malsperanza 13 years ago

I think nearly every main character in the company has a Shakespearean parallel, so I would call Cyril and Frank Shakespearean clowns--like the Gravediggers in Hamlet, or Jacques or Feste. They are both wise and comical, and they take life as they find it. They are old enough to look back and minor enough to comment on the grand tragic and comic drama being played out by the leads.

Of course Shakespeare's clowns *are* a form of Chorus, at least sometimes, so I'm not disagreeing with the OP.