A Ham in a Role is a 1949 Warner Bros. Looney Tunes short starring the Goofy Gophers along with an unnamed dog who is based on stage/film actor John Barrymore.

[7] The cartoon draws heavily from the works of William Shakespeare, with its gags relying on literal interpretations of lines from Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Richard III, and Romeo and Juliet.

Artist and writer Lia Abbate writes, "A Ham in a Role certainly wins a place among the best of them for the sheer amount of highbrow entertainment and lowbrow slapstick it packs into its short length, and the brilliant way in which these opposing dynamics match up.

In the cartoon's standard running time of six minutes, we are treated to a greatest hits of William Shakespeare with no less than ten of his best quotations.

And for each spate of speechifying, there is an equal moment — more, really — of inspired physical gags... You don't have to know a word of Shakespeare to enjoy all this great slapstick.