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Winter's Tale
Feb. 11th, 2004 03:52 pmLast night I went to the preview performance of The Winter's Tale (Shakespeare) at Brandeis. I've never read the play, and this was my first time seeing it, so I was rather excited.
[Plot spoilers ahead! Arrr!]
The play itself is of a king gone mad with jealousy over his pregnant wife's supposed indiscretions with his (visiting) best friend, king of Bohemia. Despite all protestations otherwise, he will not be swayed in his goal to avenge himself. Even a message from Apollo himself (through the oracle) is tossed aside, with grievous results, as his wife and son both die. He recovers his wits, but it is too late, all is sundered, his counselor fled with his friend. Meanwhile, the newborn daughter he'd cast out grows up in Bohemia, foster daughter to an old shepherd, is the beloved of the prince. His father disapproves, they flee to Sicily, and she is restored to her rightful place. Also, the wife turns out to not be dead after all. All are amazed. All are happy. And so goodnight.
Except that the plot was a bit unsatisfying around the not-dead-after-all wife. And some major interactions were told over by servants chatting, rather than direct showing (why did Shakespeare do it that way?). And the rogue who cheats everyone says he's reformed and that's that, which just annoys me. Still, it's an interesting play, with lots of lovely turns of phrase.
As for this production, there were some weak spots. The set, lighting, sound, and costumes were all pretty good. ( more details than you're interested in about those )
However, the show went on too long (I got the impression that the script wasn't abridged at all). It dragged particularly in the second half, with the music and dance numbers (about which more in a moment). The plot is not so complicated that the show needed to last until 11.30 pm (ish). Not a good decision by someone or other.
And then there's those music and dance numbers. The music was more horrible, with one actor miked to sing (no one else was, so it was very noticeable, not just for the volume difference, but also because the quality of amplified sound is very different, too). Unfortunately, it was someone whose voice was not up to the task. We sat cringing through his song, hoping it would end soon. Again unfortunately, he had multiple songs, making us wince and wonder why we couldn't get on with things. His singing was the focal point of a group singing piece, too. Just horrible.
There were a couple of dance scenes, all in Bohemia. The first one had some African dancing, with appropriate music. It was almost ok, but in the end, the white women looked ridiculous. I know, it's a racist statement, but the black women dancing had presence and pride, and the white women lacked, somehow. Technically, they were pretty good, but there wasn't enough time to get the right attitude, or something. I found myself watching the one or two excellent dancers and trying not to watch the rest.
The dance of men dressed as satyrs at the sheep-shearing feast had similar issues, though to a lesser extent. The costumes were great, all of them in horns and leather and hairy breeches enhanced with huge plastic penii. And they were enthusiastic and almost there, but there were enough moves that didn't quite extend enough, or strut enough, etc, that it wasn't what it could've been.
Some of the actors were not quite spot on, either. And there was that annoying spotlight.
I had a good time, but it's frustrating to have so many things be so obvious to do better. I'm surprised by it, too, because usually the quality of performances at Brandeis is quite high (even if I don't like the play itself).
[Plot spoilers ahead! Arrr!]
The play itself is of a king gone mad with jealousy over his pregnant wife's supposed indiscretions with his (visiting) best friend, king of Bohemia. Despite all protestations otherwise, he will not be swayed in his goal to avenge himself. Even a message from Apollo himself (through the oracle) is tossed aside, with grievous results, as his wife and son both die. He recovers his wits, but it is too late, all is sundered, his counselor fled with his friend. Meanwhile, the newborn daughter he'd cast out grows up in Bohemia, foster daughter to an old shepherd, is the beloved of the prince. His father disapproves, they flee to Sicily, and she is restored to her rightful place. Also, the wife turns out to not be dead after all. All are amazed. All are happy. And so goodnight.
Except that the plot was a bit unsatisfying around the not-dead-after-all wife. And some major interactions were told over by servants chatting, rather than direct showing (why did Shakespeare do it that way?). And the rogue who cheats everyone says he's reformed and that's that, which just annoys me. Still, it's an interesting play, with lots of lovely turns of phrase.
As for this production, there were some weak spots. The set, lighting, sound, and costumes were all pretty good. ( more details than you're interested in about those )
However, the show went on too long (I got the impression that the script wasn't abridged at all). It dragged particularly in the second half, with the music and dance numbers (about which more in a moment). The plot is not so complicated that the show needed to last until 11.30 pm (ish). Not a good decision by someone or other.
And then there's those music and dance numbers. The music was more horrible, with one actor miked to sing (no one else was, so it was very noticeable, not just for the volume difference, but also because the quality of amplified sound is very different, too). Unfortunately, it was someone whose voice was not up to the task. We sat cringing through his song, hoping it would end soon. Again unfortunately, he had multiple songs, making us wince and wonder why we couldn't get on with things. His singing was the focal point of a group singing piece, too. Just horrible.
There were a couple of dance scenes, all in Bohemia. The first one had some African dancing, with appropriate music. It was almost ok, but in the end, the white women looked ridiculous. I know, it's a racist statement, but the black women dancing had presence and pride, and the white women lacked, somehow. Technically, they were pretty good, but there wasn't enough time to get the right attitude, or something. I found myself watching the one or two excellent dancers and trying not to watch the rest.
The dance of men dressed as satyrs at the sheep-shearing feast had similar issues, though to a lesser extent. The costumes were great, all of them in horns and leather and hairy breeches enhanced with huge plastic penii. And they were enthusiastic and almost there, but there were enough moves that didn't quite extend enough, or strut enough, etc, that it wasn't what it could've been.
Some of the actors were not quite spot on, either. And there was that annoying spotlight.
I had a good time, but it's frustrating to have so many things be so obvious to do better. I'm surprised by it, too, because usually the quality of performances at Brandeis is quite high (even if I don't like the play itself).