Chapter, verse on the curse

That black cloud hanging over your head may have sinister origins

By GREG PEARSON
gpearson@journalsentinel.com

Posted: July 9, 2007

Harry Potter is spending his summer casting spells, while Capt. Jack Sparrow is battling pirate curses and cursed pirates. Potter's work is often other-worldly, and Johnny Depp's travails as Sparrow seem oh-so-17th-century.

But there are curses in our world that survive in these post-pirate times. Just ask the Chicago Bears, football player LaDainian Tomlinson and any actor who's ever faced the prospect of uttering the title of a certain Shakespearean production.

Curses on everyone

Theater folks refer to Shakespeare's "Macbeth" as "The Scottish Play" out of fear that uttering the name will bring them misfortune.

Which curse is the worst?

A search of the Internet finds alleged curses on everything from sports teams to Academy Award winners to U.S. presidents elected in years ending with a zero. What curse do you believe in and why? Forum: Post your thoughts

Here's a look at some of the curses that live on these days and whether they're more truth or legend:

"Macb----"

Shakespeare's play about royal family dysfunction is one of the world's best-known creations. Just don't mention its name to anyone you might know who works in theater.

The common theory is that the play's witchcraft seeped into the real world, creating a potential curse on future actors and audience members alike.

It's theater legend that the name of this play cannot be spoken ("The Scottish Play" is the most common substitute), or else bad things will happen. And we're not talking about a flubbed line or two.

The theater world is filled with tales of folks getting sick, equipment crashing to the stage and actors and audience members dying.

Before this year's production of "Macbeth," Milwaukee Shakespeare marketing director Kristin Godfrey published a newsletter with some of the history of the star-crossed play. Her report included such tidbits as this: "The 1988 Broadway production starring Glenda Jackson and Christopher Plummer is said to have gone through three directors, five Macduffs, six cast changes, six stage managers, two set designers, two lighting directors, 26 bouts of flu, torn ligaments and groin injuries."

I'm a believer: Don't tell Paula Suozzi, Milwaukee Shakespeare's artistic director, that there's no "Macbeth" curse.

She's one of the enforcers of the don't-say-the-name rule in the company's office, which has a red curtain that divides space.

"If you're on the rehearsal side of the curtain, you can't say that name," she said.

At a recent board meeting, two board members broke the rule.

"All of us that work here said, 'Ahhhhh,' and our eyes got big."

She and others demanded the board members go through the only known antidote for the curse.

"You have to go outside, turn around three times, spit, curse and knock on the door and ask to be let back in," Suozzi said.

Suozzi said a person connected with this winter's Milwaukee Shakespeare production of "Macbeth" was not a firm believer in the curse. One day, she had a car accident on the way to the theater.

"I said, 'Are you done saying the name of the play?' " Suozzi said. "She said, 'I'm done, and I'm done driving in the snow, too.' "

Curses-schmurses: "Some people believe it, some don't. But everyone knows about it," Suozzi said.

Curse-ability rating (scale of 1 to 10): 8. You don't mess around with the big guy of theater.

Sports Illustrated covers

This long-brewing jinx is simple. If a player or team is on the magazine cover, misfortune awaits.

The magazine isn't shy about the topic. It devoted the cover of its Jan. 21, 2002, issue to the jinx, complete with a picture of a black cat and the headline "The cover that NO ONE would pose for." Alexander Wolff's accompanying story calculates that 37.2% of SI covers up to that point - 913 of 2,456 - led to misfortune ranging from a bad week at the plate to, in a handful of cases, death.

The magazine's Web site (sportsillustrated.cnn.com/features/cover/2002/jinx/main) provides a decade-by-decade look at cursed covers.

I'm a believer: In 1957, a cover pictured Oklahoma University's football team, which had won 47 games in a row, with the words, "Why Oklahoma is unbeatable." Oklahoma lost its next game.

The NFL's Chicago Bears and NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers - losers in the last two major pro sports championships - both had players on the Sports Illustrated covers just days before their seasons ended in losses. (Of course, believers in the curse will ignore that the champions, the Indianapolis Colts and San Antonio Spurs, were on the cover the previous week.)

And Packers fans probably still haven't forgiven Sports Illustrated for its 1989 cover declaring Tony Mandarich "the best offensive line prospect ever." The Packers used the second pick in the draft to select Mandarich, who was a flop with the team.

Jeff Grotenhuis, a Slinger resident and physical education teacher at Kewaskum Middle School, is a believer. In a letter published earlier this year in Sports Illustrated, he bemoaned the string of success that teams from the state of Florida have had this decade.

Grotenhuis offered a simple solution. He suggested SI put an aerial photo of Florida on its cover in an effort to jinx every team in that state.

"Us poor folks in Wisconsin have had one title in football, 11 years ago," said Grotenhuis, referring to recent history. "Those Florida people have had enough championships."

Wolff, the writer of the 2002 cover-jinx story, said there's some logic to all this. Players and teams on the cover are on a roll, which is why they get selected. Sooner or later, they're likely to cool off.

Wolff also said age seems to be a factor. Veteran pro players on the cover may handle the attention better than younger athletes.

"I was struck with the number of college basketball and football teams that collapsed after being on the cover," he said.

Milwaukee has a special place in SI lore. Milwaukee Braves slugger Eddie Mathews graced the first cover on Aug. 16, 1954. He suffered a hand injury a week later.

Curses, schmurses: Peyton Manning was a January cover boy shortly before Super Bowl XLI. Since he was on the cover, Manning's team has won the Super Bowl in which he was named most valuable player, and he has attended the Kentucky Derby, waved the green flag to start the Indianapolis 500, hosted "Saturday Night Live" and dined at the White House along with Queen Elizabeth II. We should all live such a cursed existence.

Curse-ability rating (scale of 1 to 10): 6. There's enough here to make one worry. If you're a cover boy or cover girl, you might want to run for cover.

Madden NFL

The video game, which emulates pro football action, has been one of the hottest sports games on the market. It also has a hot curse - the player selected for its cover each year has a bad habit of getting hurt. Recent victims have included Atlanta's Michael Vick, Philadelphia's Donovan McNabb and Seattle's Shaun Alexander.

I'm a believer: Fans of the NFL's San Diego Chargers started an online lobbying campaign to keep the team's best player, LaDainian Tomlinson, off the cover of Madden NFL '08, which will be released in August.

Their worries are over. The game's creator picked Tennessee quarterback Vince Young for this year's cover.

The San Diego fans are taking no chances, though. The Web site (www.saveltfrommadden.com) now says: "Soon to be redesigned to save LaDainian Tomlinson from Madden '09!"

Curses-schmurses: "I don't know that we believe in the curse. The players don't believe in the curse," said Chris Erb, director of marketing for EA Sports, which makes Madden.

Pro football is a violent sport in which most players get hurt at some point during the season, so the odds are solid a player picked for the cover just might get banged up.

"We've had a run of bad luck the last couple of years," said Erb, "But as Shaun (Alexander) said, 'Do you want to be hurt and on the cover (of Madden), or just hurt.' "

Erb doesn't mind the curse-related talk, but he'll be happy to see the streak broken.

"No one's a bigger Vince Young fan than I am this year," he said. "I have a bottle of champagne in my office that I will open when our player has a big, complete year."

Curse-ability rating (scale of 1 to 10): 5. The toughness of the sport negates the Madden run of bad luck. Even so, Young just might want to make sure his shoulder pads are firmly in place.

King Tut's tomb

The curse of King Tut's tomb took life soon after a team led by Howard Carter discovered the pharaoh's grave in Egypt.

Talk of the curse was fueled by the death of Lord George Carnarvon, who died in 1923, months after the tomb's discovery. Carnarvon had worked with Carter and helped finance his efforts to uncover Tut's tomb.

Carnarvon's death was caused by a combination of a mosquito bite and a shaving cut that led to an infection. Stories of others dying soon after entering Tut's tomb became worldwide legend.

I'm a believer: It doesn't matter that this curse might date back thousands of years if the young pharaoh had anything to do with putting it in place while he was still alive. In the 21st century, Carter Lupton still gets asked about it.

"It's a topic that always comes up," said Lupton, the Milwaukee Public Museum's vice president of museum programs and an expert on Egyptian archaeology and all things mummy. And recent movies such as "The Mummy" series starring Brendan Fraser only feed into the legend of cursed tombs, he said.

Curses-schmurses: Don't count Lupton among the believers.

"There is no curse. . . . There are no unexplained deaths," he said. "As I say when I give a lecture, 'In a way, it's true; everybody who's ever been in the tomb will die.' "

Where did all this curse talk come from? Lupton has a modern-day explanation - blame the media.

"I hate to say it. It was the newspaper reporters."

Lupton explained that the discovery of King Tut's tomb drew worldwide coverage.

During the digging, Howard Carter gave scoop after scoop to the Times of London. This sent reporters from other publications scrambling for anything fresh, and the idea of the curse eventually crept into their copy, Lupton said.

Lupton pointed to the best argument against the curse: Howard Carter, the leader of the expedition, died at 64, more than 16 years after discovering the tomb. The two men who did the autopsy on Tut's remains also survived for years.

Curse-ability rating (scale of 1 to 10): 2. It's time to throw some dirt on this moldy curse.