Anonym (2011) quotes

Director
Roland Emmerich.

Cast
Rhys Ifans.
Vanessa Redgrave.
David Thewlis.

The theory that it was in fact Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford, who penned Shakespeare’s plays. Set against the backdrop of the succession of Queen Elizabeth I and the Essex rebellion against her.

Politics? My play has nothing to do with politics. I-i-i-it’s just a simple comedy.
– Ben Jonson
It showed your betters as fools who’d go through life barely managing to get food from plate to mouth were it not for the cleverness of their servants. All art is political, Jonson, otherwise it would just be decoration. And all artists have something to say, otherwise they’d make shoes. And you are not a cobbler, are you Jonson.
– Earl of Oxford

My lord, I… I am not worthy of this charge. I betrayed you.I told them of your…
– Ben Jonson
I have made it my life’s work to know the character of men, Jonson. I know you. You may have betrayed me… but you will never betray my words.
– Earl of Oxford

You are the soul of the age… Undeniable perfection that plagued my soul.
– Ben Jonson

You, your friends, your blasphemous theater have brought nothing but ruin and dishonor to this family.
– Anne De Vere
Ruin? Dishonor? My lady, you, your family, even I, even Queen Elizabeth herself will be remembered solely because we had the honor to live whilst your husband put ink to paper.
– Ben Jonson

Plays are the work of the devil – born from a cesspool of plague, whoredom, thievery, fornication, and heresy.
– Robert Cecil

Though our story is at an end, our poet’s is not; for his monument is everliving. Not of stone but of verse. And it shall be remembered. As long as words are made of breath. And breath of life.
– Prologue

All art is political, Jonson. Otherwise it would just be decoration.
– Earl of Oxford