Evil Nero

What made Nero turn evil? How could it have been avoided, if at all?

A Funny Thing - A Sexist Thing?

Is A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum a sexist movie or not? Explain your reasons!

Please respond to two of your classmates' posts as well!

"Casina" and "The Braggart Soldier"

A comic slave, imparting some frightening news to a prostitute and her young lover.
Roman wall painting from the Casa dei Quadretti Teatrali, ca. 50-75 CE.

Which one of the two plays do you prefer, and why? Discuss both what you like in the one and what you like less in the other play!

Paper Topic 1

Select one feature of the four films we have watched so far (Marcantonio e Cleopatra, 1913; Cabiria, 1914; Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, 1925; Cleopatra, 1963) and dicuss how it developed in the fifty years from 1913 to 1963, based on the evidence from these films.

Potential topics: acting style; portrayal of the Romans; portrayal of "the Other" (Carthaginians, Egyptians, Jews, Arab, black Africans); women's roles; use of the camera and editing technique; sets and props; costumes; stunts; action scenes; portrayal of sex and graphic violence; anything else that you can think of and that makes sense.

Please post a copy of your abstract below and comment on the abstracts of two different classmates, suggesting either evidence from the movies that would support their argument or alerting them to evidence that would seem to run counter to their argument so that they will have to respond to it in their papers.