Monday, February 15, 2010

For the Love of The Bard


A week ago I had an opportunity to see Shakespeare's Twelfth Night performed at Trinity Repertory Company. I was really excited to see this play because ever since being introduced to Shakespeare as a junior in HS, I have always loved him. When I had an opportunity to study Shakespeare a little more in college, I jumped on the chance and spent two semesters reading his plays and studying his life. And I've even read a few books about his life and times just for fun. Hey, I'm weird like that.
I thought this play was very well done. The time period had been changed to a vaguely Victorian setting, which seemed to work quite well. I was afraid I wouldn't like that since I'm a bit of a traditionalist, but I didn't mind it at all. The set design, by Eugene Lee, was ingenuous and even included a pool of water on stage and rain falling from the ceiling.

The acting was also superb, especially Fred Sullivan, Jr. as Sir Toby Belch. Sullivan played the jolly, bawdy drunk to perfection. Stephen Thorne was also excellent as Sir Andrew Aguecheek, the bumbling, comedic and ridiculous sidekick to Sir Toby. The role of Sir Andrew required a lot of physical comedy and Thorne mastered it. So much so that in one scene one of my seat mates wondered if perhaps Thorne has actually gotten a bloody nose or if it fact that was part of the play.

The icing of the cake, however, was that I had an opportunity to attend a book club style discussion of Twelfth Night and Trinity's production of it the following day at one of the libraries where I work. The discussion was led by two young women who are part of Trinity's Education Department. One of their jobs is to bring the theater experience out into the community. It was fascinating to hear about the reasons that the Director, Brian McEleny (who also played the role of Malvolio), made the choices he did with this production. One of the discussion leaders is a Shakespeare scholar and I learned a bit more about Shakespeare's efforts to keep religion and politics out of his plays and she even explained some of the jokes that were meant to be digs at Shakespeare's contemporary playwright, Ben Johnson. Fascinating stuff (for a nerd like me). As much as I enjoyed the play, being able to participate in such a lively discussion with two people so intimately involved with Trinity and so knowledgeable about Shakespeare added a whole other layer of enjoyment and understanding for me. I hope I have more opportunities like this in the future.

4 comments:

Sandy said...

I think Twelfth Night was the first play I ever saw at Trinity. It was probably when I was a sophomore in HS. I remember how much I enjoyed just seeing a live performance.

Confessions From A Work-At-Home Mom said...

I took a Shakespeare class in college, and Twelfth Night was my favorite. It's so witty. But I've never seen it on stage! I need to put that on my to do list.

~Elizabeth
Confessions From A Working Mom

strokeofliving said...

Ya know, I've never seen The Twelth Night. I do recall reading it in high school.

The Beverly Hills library has a book store with donated books. Rather than giving books away, books are monumentally discounted for the public. Nothing over $3.00 for a single book. Years ago I found all of WS's works in paperback and bought them all for a total of, I think, $7.00 [50 cents here, 75 cents there] I'm glad to own everything to pass on to the next generation.

Does your local library [or does either of the libraries where you work] have a similar type of bookstore?

Unknown said...

I've never read Twelfth Night, but I'd love to see it. I enjoy Shakespear, and I've heard great things about Trinity Rep.

 

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