I recently rediscovered this valuable contribution to zombie literature that I wrote during National Sketch Writing Month last year:
EXT. GRAVEYARD - MORNING A GRAVEDIGGER is preparing a new hole. HAMLET and HORATIO sneak up upon him. The gravedigger pulls out a skull. GRAVEDIGGER (to Hamlet) A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was? HAMLET Nay, I know not. GRAVEDIGGER A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a' poured a flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was Yorick's skull, the king's jester. He hands the skull to Hamlet. HAMLET (regarding skull) This? GRAVEDIGGER E'en that. HAMLET Let me see. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy... (suddenly realizing something) Wherefore is it not on his body? HORATIO What's that, my lord? HAMLET D'ost thou wonder that his head misses its trunk? GRAVEDIGGER Like a tree, indeed, it 'twere chopped off with an axe. HAMLET Felled like a tree in a forest? But wherefore would a man do such a thing? GRAVEDIGGER A woodcutter needs lumber, my lord. HAMLET Nay, clown, I meant Yorick. His skull is apart from his body. GRAVEDIGGER Every man's skull is a part from his body. HAMLET Pah! Your jokes are lifeless as the men around you. (re: skull) He was a most beloved jester. It grieves me to see him thus. Wherefore is it so? GRAVEDIGGER Why sir, this fellow died twice. HORATIO Every man dies once. How does a man die a second time? GRAVEDIGGER He comes back from the grave. I do it each night, but any other man returns home from the grave, and it follows that he is undead. HORATIO Undead? GRAVEDIGGER Not quite dead. But not so much alive. HAMLET Speak plain, I pray you. GRAVEDIGGER He was a zombie. HAMLET Not Yorick? GRAVEDIGGER E'en so. HAMLET Holy shit! HORATIO Your words, my lord! HAMLET Words, words, words! My old friend was a zombie? How come I never heard about this? HORATIO You were in Wittenberg. HAMLET And I missed a zombie outbreak!? HORATIO A huge zombie outbreak. We nearly died in a sea of bodies, the floating undead. HAMLET I thought something smelled rotten in the state of Denmark. GRAVEDIGGER Tis the remains of the zombies. They overran the city. We could only kill them by removing their heads. HAMLET 'Swounds! The walking dead! GRAVEDIGGER Trust no man you see who once were in the ground. HAMLET My father, the king, hath died not four months ago. HORATIO It slipped my mind! We hath seen him nights on the watch. He spoke with the prince. GRAVEDIGGER Aye, your father is a zombie! HAMLET Fuck me! He told me to kill Claudius. GRAVEDIGGER So he can feast on his brother's brains, I suspect. HORATIO Oh! But fast, here comes Polonius. HAMLET My lady's father? I hath slain him in the queen's bed chamber. HORATIO And now he seeks revenge! Enter zombie Polonius, slowly moving. POLONIUS Uggghhh. Argghh. Mmmmmmm. Ughhhhh. HAMLET Eat my balls! That's a fucking zombie! There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than our dreamt of in my philosophy! POLONIUS Ugggh. GRAVEDIGGER They should have cut off his head. And the head of his daughter, too, a gentlewoman drowned this fortnight. The gravedigger exits. HAMLET Ophelia is dead? HORATIO No longer, it seems. Ophelia's rising. She is a zombie too! HAMLET I really hate my life. (soliliquizing) To be or not to be, that is the question. Or somewhere in between, apparently. For to die is not the end I thought it was. E'en if I take my life, I'll be back for misery most undead. To die? To sleep? (he shakes his head) To sleep perchance to be awoken as a zombie! That would be horrible. Eating bugs and brains and having maggots all over. This gives me pause. Enter GERTRUDE, CLAUDIUS and LAERTES with swords. We hear zombies moaning in the distance. LAERTES Be careful, there are zombies all over the castle! GERTRUDE I can't take it! She drinks from a wine cup. HAMLET Good madam! CLAUDIUS Gertrude, do not drink! She dies. HAMLET The dread of something after death! He cuts off Gertrude's head. Zombies surround them. LAERTES (lunging at zombie) Have at you now! Laertes wounds the zombie Polonius. It bites him. LAERTES (CONT'D) I am slain! Here I lie. Only to rise again. Hamlet cuts off Laertes' head. HAMLET Sleep well, Laertes. Polonius bites Claudius. CLAUDIUS O, yet defend me, friends; I am but hurt. HAMLET (he looks at Claudius) And now I'll do't. And so he goes to heaven. He cuts off Claudius' head as Claudius bites him. HAMLET (CONT'D) O, I die, Horatio. The rest is silence. Hamlet dies. HORATIO Now cracks a noble heart. He decapitates Hamlet's corpse. HORATIO (CONT'D) Good night sweet prince: And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! Why does the drum come hither? He stands up as we hear drums sound. Enter an AMBASSADOR. AMBASSADOR The sight is dismal; And our affairs from England come too late: The ears are senseless that should give us hearing, To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd, That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are undead. Where should we have our thanks? HORATIO Not from his mouth. I have cut his head off to prevent him from becoming a zombie. Enter ZOMBIE FORTINBRAS. FORTINBRAS Urgggh. Agggh. HORATIO Let's get out of here. AMBASSADOR You said it! EXIT, PURSUED BY A ZOMBIE.
BP Coffee Spill
We came up with this idea during a writers’ meeting for the sketch show Beneath Gristedes. We liked it so much we decided to make it right away and shot it on Memorial Day. Pete Schultz and Brandon Bassham did a great job directing and editing it, and the whole cast was hilarious and fun. Except the guy carrying the tray of coffee. He was a huge asshole.