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Keats and Yeats are on your side, but you lose
I wish to register a complaint with the universe that I had no idea that Eddie Shields—the beautiful Gaveston of the ASP's Edward II—was playing Christopher Marlowe in a local stage adaptation of Shakespeare in Love until tonight, otherwise known as too late. I know it's my own fault for not reading the arts section and I appreciate that other Boston-area directors have recognized his obvious affinity for Marlowe; it bodes well for his appearances in future. But I would have liked to be able to take advantage of this one!
I spent the afternoon with my cousins and Fox for the first time since before Arisia. It was good. Assorted links.
1. Dr. Kate Lister debunks the Victorian vibrator myth, with entertaining commentary and horrifying illustrations: "Once you have moved past the fact that the doctor and patient strongly resemble escapees from Area 51 . . ."
2. My brother and his family are planning to drive across Canada next summer. I have commended them to the stone dragon of Alberta.
3. This entire issue of poetry from Aotearoa/New Zealand is very good, but at the moment Kate Camp's "Gulls," Nina Powles' "Some titles for my childhood memoir," Tim Upperton's "The Truth about Palmerston North," and Gregory O'Brien and John Puhiatau Pule's "Song of the coral brain" and "Canticle of the hydrosphere" are especially sticking with me.
4. I feel that I should not discover people by their obituaries, but I think I need to hear the music of Coco Schumann.
5. I know people with this aesthetic: Ruth Maddison, "Women's dance, St Kilda Town Hall, Melbourne, 1985."
I spent the afternoon with my cousins and Fox for the first time since before Arisia. It was good. Assorted links.
1. Dr. Kate Lister debunks the Victorian vibrator myth, with entertaining commentary and horrifying illustrations: "Once you have moved past the fact that the doctor and patient strongly resemble escapees from Area 51 . . ."
2. My brother and his family are planning to drive across Canada next summer. I have commended them to the stone dragon of Alberta.
3. This entire issue of poetry from Aotearoa/New Zealand is very good, but at the moment Kate Camp's "Gulls," Nina Powles' "Some titles for my childhood memoir," Tim Upperton's "The Truth about Palmerston North," and Gregory O'Brien and John Puhiatau Pule's "Song of the coral brain" and "Canticle of the hydrosphere" are especially sticking with me.
4. I feel that I should not discover people by their obituaries, but I think I need to hear the music of Coco Schumann.
5. I know people with this aesthetic: Ruth Maddison, "Women's dance, St Kilda Town Hall, Melbourne, 1985."
no subject
As for the production, well, I have a lot of thoughts about the adaptation of the script (about which I kind of want to make a post of my own but may or may not get around to, given that I haven't done it yet). But as far as this specific production goes...hm. It was fine but not dazzling? Some miscellaneous thoughts:
I'm not sure whether or not I like the aesthetic they went for of deliberately anachronistic/mashed-up costuming -- though, as they noted in the program, it certainly is congruent with the script being deliberately mashed-up in that way.
Marlowe was quite good, Henslowe was good (and OMG, that actor has looked approximately the same age for 20 years...), Fennyman was fun. Will did a fine job but apparently didn't leave all that strong an impression on me?
Viola was somehow completely generic. Like, she did a fine job, but she was indistinguishable from any woman on TV or in the movies. I'm not sure to what extent that's partly the fault of the script, vs. the directing/acting alone.
I was not keen on the directorial choice to make Ned Allyn an over-the-top histrionic ham. It meant that in his couple of moments of seriousness -- which are extremely effective in the movie -- he wasn't able to drop down into seeming like a real human being, and so those moments lost their weight.
I was annoyed by the fact that the fight scenes -- which were really quite extended -- were choreographed with no real sense of the difference between prop weapons/characters who only knew stage combat, and real weapons/characters who actually knew how to kill people. There are at least two fights where someone with a real sword charges into a rehearsal and starts fighting actors who have to retaliate as best they can, but it all just looked the same.
no subject
The vest among other things suggested it.
(I rather seriously want to see this actor as Mephistopheles now. He was a really fine Gaveston.)
There are at least two fights where someone with a real sword charges into a rehearsal and starts fighting actors who have to retaliate as best they can, but it all just looked the same.
I can see that being very difficult to parse if you can't see the difference!
I didn't even know a stage version existed, so I would love to see the post of your own about the differences between the two versions. I saw the film when it came out, and remember enjoying it, but I barely watched any movies then.