Exhibit 1.2.3

Letter to an American Farmer: Shut Up

I can't say I ever had to read much colonial history in the past, but I've had to delve into a bit of it while studying the American Gothic. I've realized this: colonial Americans are the worst people to have ever existed at any time in the history (and presumably in the future) of this planet.

Here's what's wrong with them:

* They had names like Cotton and Prudence.

* Their definition of virtue seems to be basically don't act too smart or be poor or be Indian or die suddenly. If you do any of those things, you're a jerk.

* They believed moles and warts were for suckling the devil.

(This brings me to my theory that what happened to Enrique Iglesias's face was that he accidentally danced into a wormhole that took him back in time to the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the only way to avoid a good drowning was to remove his mole and call himself Prudence. It's a new theory).

* Whale oil doesn't make sense. You just boil whale and it turns into whale oil? Do all parts of whale produce oil equally? What do you even use it for in a pre-mechanical time? It's just weird, like if you boiled Ben Roethlisberger you'd get a big barrel of quarterback oil women would dab on their necks. Well, probably not women. Maybe you could trade it for some sleazy molasses though.

* And I think this is the heart of it: they seemed really bored. It's not exactly shocking when you read about all the housewives having been on opium because the alternative seemed to be to hang around the meeting house pondering where exactly your neighbors were hiding their devil teat.

Exhibit 24.6

It's Hard to Understand How Weird This Must Have Been

In my Shakespeare in Production edition of The Merchant of Venice they spend a paragraph talking about Edwin Booth as one of the first notable American Shylocks. Edwin Booth is John Wilkes Booth's brother, something I knew but didn't really think much about in the past because he never came up in National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets. Well, I went to the ever reliable Wikipedia to brush up on E. Booth up and came across this gem:

In an interesting coincidence, Edwin Booth saved Abraham Lincoln's son, Robert, from serious injury or even death....The exact date of the incident is uncertain, but it is believed to have taken place in late 1864 or early 1865, shortly before Edwin's brother, John Wilkes Booth, assassinated President Lincoln.

To recap: the most famous actor of the era saved the life of the president's son then the actor's quasi-famous brother killed the president.

It's impossible to put this in a contemporary context. It'd be like if terrorists took over a plane with the president's daughters on it only to have Sylvester Stallone save them. Then, months later, an aggrieved Frank Stallone shot the president.*

Who would even cover that story? TMZ? Honestly, I think it would end the internet. We'd all walk outside blinking and muttering to ourselves. Nothing would make sense. From this point forward I think history textbooks should have a chapter on the Lincoln assassination called: "Seriously, this was bizarre."

*Yes, I'm writing that screenplay. Yes, Frank Stallone is attached.