tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4224339414541882902024-03-16T14:49:46.220-04:00Cleveland CentennialDavid Hansen, playwrightpengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.comBlogger1419125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-2772090737207600022024-03-16T10:00:00.001-04:002024-03-16T10:08:59.831-04:00I Hate This (a play without the baby)<iframe width="500" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0YtDhploEDc" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe><div><br /></div>Performed by James Alexander Rankin<br />
Directed by Chennelle Bryant-Harris<br />
Written by David Hansen<div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj0dX_KUw6cAFHb3QFyUPmd9MXvC-oBrzdVLH9D6iCIlvvFI2PJWQrlfVwP6R9KBb3e1Kc4etRczu_6N3drSaGoPTGSRTiiVroOWVqcihOhRz54gdTvg6qmOfpQ0uKoQZxtqcCbFqJWT3Yrncz5YV_azMoe7wINR5OjXPVfxiI_nhVm2q_aq6gmqsvu=s8192"><img border="0" data-original-height="5464" data-original-width="8192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj0dX_KUw6cAFHb3QFyUPmd9MXvC-oBrzdVLH9D6iCIlvvFI2PJWQrlfVwP6R9KBb3e1Kc4etRczu_6N3drSaGoPTGSRTiiVroOWVqcihOhRz54gdTvg6qmOfpQ0uKoQZxtqcCbFqJWT3Yrncz5YV_azMoe7wINR5OjXPVfxiI_nhVm2q_aq6gmqsvu=w640-h426" width="500" /></a></div><br /><div><div style="text-align: center;">Production Photography by Cody York</div><div><br /></div><div>Filmed by Ananias J. Dixon<br />
Sound Design by Angie Hayes<br />
Light Design by Robert Peck<br />
Assistant Lighting Desiner, Jack-Anthony Ina<br />
Original Music by Dennis Yurich<br />
Video Projection Design by Joshua D. Brown<br />
Edited by Hannah Twining<br />
Post-Production Audio by Brian Chismar</div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEinZTUpEkk9y0kLVJgy5V2oLNxoTVwJFtGqo9AjhY_JU8HAh6zoL8vjZcobUShcHx2fMcljsPJqwmwrMOuL_gfr7hfbcHL6OhZoHuI8aV0KBVC8pehg7DkVh0efhsrWTtw-UpCpCQaWTh0FHaMWS3PrdZu8-lKG2AZYc75BQtD8dd_LJOU1-WhaVkC3=s8192"><img border="0" data-original-height="5464" data-original-width="8192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEinZTUpEkk9y0kLVJgy5V2oLNxoTVwJFtGqo9AjhY_JU8HAh6zoL8vjZcobUShcHx2fMcljsPJqwmwrMOuL_gfr7hfbcHL6OhZoHuI8aV0KBVC8pehg7DkVh0efhsrWTtw-UpCpCQaWTh0FHaMWS3PrdZu8-lKG2AZYc75BQtD8dd_LJOU1-WhaVkC3=w640-h426" width="500" /></a></div><br />Executive Producer, Daniel Hahn<br />
Producer, Sheffia Dooley<br />
Director of Production, Penny Zalatel<br />
Production Stage Manager, Julie Wagner<br />
Production Assistant, Emily Raber<br />
<br /><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Hate-This-play-without-baby-ebook/dp/B07FK2RXPX">Play script available from Amazon.</a></div></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-22599411710036601842024-02-17T00:00:00.013-05:002024-02-17T09:32:56.784-05:00The Dark Room (workshop)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgINL1O4keLT-dIq5kcx_c334HknzCO0vgNoUafRxihePA1ERWaLNC44It6mE7Ibv_N1JBcXa-YLx5LMNX0m46fQggWzo5JMItSzgcD4W3BtaRulodh4Vx_gB4xNP8RFPD0K-d6jBjEFha-eU2RN5vcc3pp8FaAAFAr8MyJKtykg_ib4hyphenhyphenmJwgJOTN8FoM/s1183/418421806_10101530611379711_6529770459571227230_n.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1183" data-original-width="1183" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgINL1O4keLT-dIq5kcx_c334HknzCO0vgNoUafRxihePA1ERWaLNC44It6mE7Ibv_N1JBcXa-YLx5LMNX0m46fQggWzo5JMItSzgcD4W3BtaRulodh4Vx_gB4xNP8RFPD0K-d6jBjEFha-eU2RN5vcc3pp8FaAAFAr8MyJKtykg_ib4hyphenhyphenmJwgJOTN8FoM/s320/418421806_10101530611379711_6529770459571227230_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Self w/Katherine Nash (Jan 2024)</i></td></tr></tbody></table>So, the thing is, right … I’m kind of between writer’s groups right now? It’s not that I’m afraid of commitment, I just haven’t found the right ensemble of people to be with yet.
<br /><br />
One great advantage of being a member of a writers’ group is that it creates for you a deadline. If you are on your own, you set your own timeline for creation. If you meet with colleagues – once a week, once every two weeks, once a month – you may be expected to produce a certain number of pages. And so you have a responsibility outside of yourself, you have homework.
<br /><br />
Twenty or so years ago, my wife invited me to join her writers’ group. They met at the Case Campus Arabica (now The Coffee House at University Circle) and it was with this ensemble that I began work on what became <i><a href="http://davidhansen.org/i-hate-this/">I Hate This (a play without the baby)</a></i>. Sharing individual scenes from a larger work, as I was composing it, this was a new experience to me. It was a supportive ensemble and extremely rewarding.
<br /><br />
Some years later, after this team had amicably parted ways, I tried starting a writers’ group on my own, which lasted two weeks. We had infant children and I wasn’t in the right place to be managing anything that would take up so much time outside of work. I didn’t want to run a writers’ group, you know? I wanted to be in one. I’d just ended a theater company, I still wanted to create things, I was done with running them.
<br /><br />
By 2008, I had been invited to join the (former) <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/search/label/Playwrights%27%20Unit">Playwrights’ Unit</a> at the Cleveland Play House, and that was when my work started to take off. We were required to bring ten pages every two weeks, and that’s when I really started writing them plays. I developed well over a dozen full length plays and several more short works before the Unit folded nine years later.
<br /><br />
Since that time I have been a much more consistent writer, continuing to write plays on my own time. When a draft is complete, I will host a private reading to hear how it sounds and to receive comments. What I do miss, however, is receiving feedback as the work progresses.
<br /><br />
So I have been going to the <a href="https://www.cptonline.org/performances/seasons/2023-2024/the-dark-room/">Dark Room</a>.
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The Dark Room is like an “open mic” for playwrights, to hear their work read aloud. It started about twenty years ago, a program of the (former) Cleveland Theater Collective, an organization created to foster and support collaboration between all area theaters.
<br /><br />
Management and maintenance of the Dark Room was turned over to Mindy Childress Herman in 2007, John Busser signed on to co-manage two years later, and they have shepherded the program ever since, in various sites on the campus of Cleveland Public Theatre. It’s a free event, the second Tuesday of the month folks gather to have their work read, to read the works of others, or just to witness.
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRoK1SSVCx0e9Lymr61dhbvzSKduIrojG6IeW0_EznijoUNZIbDPRWwmehPMXIFfTnY5yVhkFjI_JgG1cnuaE64Ed2vYctokg3A0ZAEimZsO5u1jEYI81-ypzaVRiZcwVFhP9Rf3n1rqJJBhyphenhyphenamV5YqGxdD8jEej3OnBEk4d10CB9QqfeIJtus2Bo9vHA/s2200/Photo%20Feb%2014,%208%2011%2008%20PM.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2200" data-original-width="2200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRoK1SSVCx0e9Lymr61dhbvzSKduIrojG6IeW0_EznijoUNZIbDPRWwmehPMXIFfTnY5yVhkFjI_JgG1cnuaE64Ed2vYctokg3A0ZAEimZsO5u1jEYI81-ypzaVRiZcwVFhP9Rf3n1rqJJBhyphenhyphenamV5YqGxdD8jEej3OnBEk4d10CB9QqfeIJtus2Bo9vHA/s320/Photo%20Feb%2014,%208%2011%2008%20PM.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Paul Manganello (Feb 2017)</i></td></tr></tbody></table>I’ve had the Dark Room as a repeating date on my Google calendar for years without ever attending. I mean, I had attended a couple of times. I can even remember them. I read a piece from <i><a href="http://davidhansen.org/and-then-you-die/">And Then You Die (How I Ran a Marathon in 26.2 Years)</a></i> in 2008. In 2017, I brought an actor from Michigan I was working with and he read a new work. But I didn’t make it a habit. I live in Cleveland Heights, it’s a Tuesday, I have kids, and so on. And I already had a writers group.
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You know that list of things you say you’ll get to, but never do? Since our youngest headed off to school, I have found myself actually doing those things. And one of those things is the Dark Room.
<br /><br />
There’s this thing I’ve been working on, I won’t go too far into it, it’s inspired by a lot of recent discoveries I’ve made, about my family, about my life. I got an idea for a structure, a family story told in reverse chronology. So I’ve been bringing pieces to the Dark Room since November, to read them in actual chronological order, to hear how folks respond to them, and the response has been pretty positive.
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Better than that, however, has been listening to the other works. It's a good time! And the community, this Cleveland theater community, folks I see sporadically — or every fucking day on Facebook but that’s not the same, you know? I’ve grown accustomed to, or made myself accustomed to the familial solitude mandated by the quarantine, and I’ve always had a degree of social anxiety, anyway.
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But sweet are the uses of community. I am glad for such company.
<br /><br /><i>
Special thanks to Mindy and John for their contributions to this post.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i><a href="https://www.cptonline.org/performances/seasons/2023-2024/the-dark-room/">Cleveland Public Theatre presents the Dark Room the second Tuesday of every month (except September).</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-60866777111827810392024-02-11T00:00:00.004-05:002024-02-11T13:36:48.310-05:00This Is Not The Play (workshop)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIO9MNaFkl95Vx6PJOoeyUlb79SkGHmj2mHv604NzbWXtvcViMDMM-SqRyvKlAZg1_x7-SLk4Tw-A-m3drlSTiM399qmFl2TjCYnYqgFxEDDMKnbmzJEAher8ACcGi-hs2q_4AT92dgAeEwaQN0AcHo2EbVjLKf-v1PPoPaLj8SuuI7VKHeZ-nP9Iuzi8/s2667/Photo%20Jun%2013%202023,%2012%2039%2023%20PM.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2667" data-original-width="2667" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIO9MNaFkl95Vx6PJOoeyUlb79SkGHmj2mHv604NzbWXtvcViMDMM-SqRyvKlAZg1_x7-SLk4Tw-A-m3drlSTiM399qmFl2TjCYnYqgFxEDDMKnbmzJEAher8ACcGi-hs2q_4AT92dgAeEwaQN0AcHo2EbVjLKf-v1PPoPaLj8SuuI7VKHeZ-nP9Iuzi8/s320/Photo%20Jun%2013%202023,%2012%2039%2023%20PM.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>One year (it was 2008) we were conducting a summer camp for CMSD middle school aged kids, and each member of our team chose one discipline to focus on; we had our dance captain, visual art instructor, music director, acting coach. I was to teach creative writing. I had never taught writing before in my life.
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In preparation, I requested only two supply items; a Moleskine for each camper and an inexhaustible supply of pens. Yes, the kids could have used spiral bound notebooks, or even lined, loose-leaf paper. But I figured it this way, if they were going to take writing – <i>during the summer</i> – seriously, I wanted them to have something special to write in.
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It was a good experience. We played with rhetorical devices. A “ya mama” joke is just a metaphor, right? We flipped that and wrote metaphors about ourselves, comparisons which could be amusing in their grandiose self-confidence. "I'm so cool they put me in lemonade." We also wrote poems and other bits of prose.
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Of course, for some campers the time we spent together was torturous. Some people just don’t want to write, they definitely don’t want to write during summer vacation. I don’t blame them. Some were so resistant to the idea of writing I just sent them to work with another one of the instructors. It was a camp, it was supposed to be fun.
<br /><br />The company I work for has been hosting a different <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2013/06/camp-theater.html">summer arts camp</a> in another part of greater Cleveland since 2010, but I never considered suggesting I teach writing again until last year. We made it elective; there was time mapped out for visual arts, you could do that or you could write. I didn’t want to have a single person engaged in the writing workshop who didn’t want to be there.
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It was just a one hour block. I began our second day of camp making the offer; anyone who wanted to write instead of do art, even if it’s just one person, I would be happy to work with them. Most chose art, I got six people. That was perfect.
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We found an area of quietude, camp can be pretty noisy with kids from elementary to high school all over the place. It was a relief in the late morning to be able to concentrate with our small cadre. We sat around a table in the house of the auditorium, the lights were dimmer than the brightness of the stage. I played instrumental jazz on my phone, or noise for focusing from an app I'd discovered.<div><br /></div><div>My lesson plan was mostly the same each day, and inspired by the daily writing ritual I had employed to create the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/search/label/Short%20Play%20Project">short play project</a>. Unlike with my solitary, quarantine era writing, however, each brief writing period with the campers included the opportunity for a debrief and reflection.
<br /><br /><b>1. Free Write (10 min.)</b><div><i>Debrief:</i><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><i>
How was that?</i></li><li><i>
What did you discover?</i></li><li><i>
What surprised you?</i></li></ul><b>2. Single Word Prompt (10 min.)<br /></b>They were asked to choose one from three suggested one-word prompts.*<br /><i>
Examples:</i><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>
Darkness - what we can’t see</li><li>
Normal - what does that mean to you?</li><li>
Frozen - a moment in your life you wish you could freeze and preserve and keep</li></ul>Similar debrief questions, adding, "Would you like to share what you wrote about?"<br /><br /><b>3. Dialogue (10 min.)<br /></b>
Choose a central question inspired by your response to the previous prompt.<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Create dialogue between two characters, no names, no specific gender, no stage directions (Unless you feel any of these things are necessary, then go ahead. It’s your work.) </li></ul>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgt1CJEz1I7sD_S92K8LcTFewX4BaZtbbV35x7C6BRmvxm6iDCzCLDvtJE2c77vN3_JhgWVdCvUvr7EYy9dg2Aw8DITOtiIosx_GtVaBEUCGogG65FhosZ23MeUpV95MMFQdsuAiIhyphenhyphenG8XuKSgc6dJnk8b7gJSqGVrtc-weCDf88dhyjzrhkOrILbhDXRE/s3024/Photo%20Jun%2022%202023,%2010%2013%2030%20AM.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgt1CJEz1I7sD_S92K8LcTFewX4BaZtbbV35x7C6BRmvxm6iDCzCLDvtJE2c77vN3_JhgWVdCvUvr7EYy9dg2Aw8DITOtiIosx_GtVaBEUCGogG65FhosZ23MeUpV95MMFQdsuAiIhyphenhyphenG8XuKSgc6dJnk8b7gJSqGVrtc-weCDf88dhyjzrhkOrILbhDXRE/s320/Photo%20Jun%2022%202023,%2010%2013%2030%20AM.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Sharing the work, al fresco.</i></td></tr></tbody></table>That was the first lesson. The next day, when we broke into these groups, I made it clear that if you changed your mind and would rather create visual art than writing, that was cool. And also that if anyone else wanted to try the writing, that would be cool, too.<br /><br />
To my delight, we pretty much had six people each day for the rest of camp. Five were committed, the sixth was usually someone new who tried it out once, maybe twice.
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From the second day forward, the third ten minutes could be for creating something new from that day’s chosen prompt, or campers could continue or rewrite something they had previously written.
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By the end of the first week we had a name for the writing group. Early on, when I proposed writing from a prompt, one of the campers asked, “Is this the play? Are we writing the play?”
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“This is not the play,” I told them, which struck them as amusing, the way I said it. It became a daily reminder about the free writing periods. “This is not the play.”
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We also wrote some poems, we read our work aloud. I encouraged them to choose one piece to polish, type up and share with the rest of the middle and high school age campers, and to get other kids to read and perform their new scripts.
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During our last session together, at the end of camp, we talked about submissions, competitions, their writing aspirations. We recently announced the dates for this year’s camp. I’m looking forward to it. I think there will be writing.
<br /><br /><i>*Source: <a href="https://thinkwritten.com/365-creative-writing-prompts/">Think Written | 365 Creative Writing Prompts</a></i></div></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-15507168042254438262024-02-04T00:00:00.038-05:002024-02-07T08:54:40.868-05:00The Toothpaste Millionaire (book)<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeCmbyRcYObrN7ZZtUtfVReMnTIDXciG8npYmZiBe6pIGZuRyi9SmZkfrjIsC6T-emHLpbdlQqhYjmMMwMJhD-Xl4xqQGub4nq5o8Bpab5lySa6j6UMqf7ZnHzg4hA5YSsFtfw4c2h7hIzzr27ylkPfdXF-J-LbGfCx1wdlH7_4q4tRijZTwA_0gfkaVQ/s350/cfc1493a14b6e4062f5e81c3166a4a7d365e851b.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="350" data-original-width="264" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeCmbyRcYObrN7ZZtUtfVReMnTIDXciG8npYmZiBe6pIGZuRyi9SmZkfrjIsC6T-emHLpbdlQqhYjmMMwMJhD-Xl4xqQGub4nq5o8Bpab5lySa6j6UMqf7ZnHzg4hA5YSsFtfw4c2h7hIzzr27ylkPfdXF-J-LbGfCx1wdlH7_4q4tRijZTwA_0gfkaVQ/s320/cfc1493a14b6e4062f5e81c3166a4a7d365e851b.jpg" width="241" /></a><i>The Toothpaste Millionaire</i> by Jean Merrill was published in 1972, and it was a book I treasured when I was in elementary school. It is the story of an intrepid sixth grader from East Cleveland who creates and successfully markets a <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/09/how-to-make-toothpaste.html">new brand of toothpaste</a>.
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I’ve always loved stories of independent young people making their own way through the world. Also, from a young age I was fascinated with <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/09/acapulco-gold-book.html">making and selling</a> things. Growing up, the corner counter in our kitchen had been transformed by me, so many times, into supermarkets, post offices, computer warehouses, medical centers, greeting card stores, that my parents and brothers just casually referred to that counter as my shop.
<br /><br />
“Where should I set this stack of magazines?”
<br /><br />
“Put them on Karl’s Shop.”
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They used to call me Karl.
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I saw the ABC After School Special adaptation of <i>The Toothpaste Millionaire</i>, maybe not when it first aired in 1974, but surely upon one of its many reruns, and that further inspired my interest in the original text.
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKmeDdqEgMYMOMiP6Jjk74kLYP63lma6sjkWMOLYNXcefjIVpzUwWyrtwZIjJxtSweVnpsOoxkt8pQfTORT-yYm3hamRbL0FCyXggouE8tXoYn96dkezkIS-rrGFPZd4AUTkgdC9taXHdA58N2HPLnqVuLeorQ0x-0LEVncKlLGlGtBsb7gm23nv3BHJw/s2324/The_Atlanta_Journal_Tue__Nov_26__1974_.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2324" data-original-width="1497" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKmeDdqEgMYMOMiP6Jjk74kLYP63lma6sjkWMOLYNXcefjIVpzUwWyrtwZIjJxtSweVnpsOoxkt8pQfTORT-yYm3hamRbL0FCyXggouE8tXoYn96dkezkIS-rrGFPZd4AUTkgdC9taXHdA58N2HPLnqVuLeorQ0x-0LEVncKlLGlGtBsb7gm23nv3BHJw/s320/The_Atlanta_Journal_Tue__Nov_26__1974_.jpg" width="206" /></a></div>Another thing that compelled me was the setting, East Cleveland. We Clevelanders do love it when people recognize and acknowledge our existence. Jean Merrill, who died in 2012, spent some of her early years living in the Cleveland area where her father was employed by Republic Steel. Most of her childhood, however, was lived in upstate New York.<br /><br />
Like a lot of folks, I think Merrill had heard of “East Cleveland” and assumed it was the name of a neighborhood on the east side of the city of Cleveland, and was unaware of the particular transformation that was taking place in the inner-ring suburb of East Cleveland just as she was writing this brief novel.
<br /><br />In any event, I have now written a stage adaptation of <i><a href="https://talespinnercle.org/">The Toothpaste Millionaire</a></i> for Talespinner Children’s Theatre, and it absolutely takes place in <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/07/caledonia-memories.html">East Cleveland</a>, circa 1970. Last week we held the first official reading, and it was an evening of pure joy. Both then and also at a private reading I held late last year, it was delightful to hear a room of adults laugh from dialogue which was intended for an elementary school audience. I think anyone from the age of eight and up will be engaged, amused and inspired by the story of Rufus Mayflower and his friends when it hits the stage in May.
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Source: The Toothpaste Millionaire, 35th Anniversary Edition, Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006
</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>This post was updated on February 6, 2024, and now includes information about Jean Merrill which was generously provided by her estate.</i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-17237741240692820912024-01-14T00:00:00.005-05:002024-01-14T20:21:53.123-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part XII)<div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtqI6pqhCGj-kTH8LRFHk5JAUBeF37V9i18Fi6Pm8ZaiiYgJpRBp9I2-Cv-fPoUyMMfqW7cKlvR2Sj3-pXSTFDTngXumyNotYtLFrkjYE0s1OQAWCri7KA-ElVodaVT3FU_5O_5y2RZYznD4-2ie73MDlgYSvke_e5lvEkfJBMy10jKngzps4Jg9HX8gk/s365/tn-500_glt0326171953.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="365" data-original-width="365" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtqI6pqhCGj-kTH8LRFHk5JAUBeF37V9i18Fi6Pm8ZaiiYgJpRBp9I2-Cv-fPoUyMMfqW7cKlvR2Sj3-pXSTFDTngXumyNotYtLFrkjYE0s1OQAWCri7KA-ElVodaVT3FU_5O_5y2RZYznD4-2ie73MDlgYSvke_e5lvEkfJBMy10jKngzps4Jg9HX8gk/w320-h320/tn-500_glt0326171953.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Gertrude & Hamlet<br />Laura Perrotta, Laura Welsh Berg<br />Great Lake Theater, 2017<br />Photo: Roger Mastroiann</i>i</td></tr></tbody></table><i>"What then? What rests?"<br />- Hamlet, III.iii</i></div><div><br /></div>To conclude, I have seen more live stage productions of <i>Hamlet </i>than any other play by Shakespeare, except for perhaps <i>As You Like It</i>, which is a shame because, as G.B. Shaw said, “It is not as I like it.” But the latter is more commonly produced than the former at a rate of at least ten-to-one.
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There are, of course, the recent stage productions of <i>Hamlet </i>adapted for television and much beloved by my contemporaries, those starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Paapa Essiedu, Andrew Scott or David Tennant. Oddly enough, I have never made the time to watch any of those. The fact is, I love to hear Shakespeare in a theater, live or filmed, but have little patience for him on the small screen.
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I can think of three downright terrible live productions of <i>Hamlet.</i> I haven’t made mention of any of them in this series of posts, but I will say the principal sin of each of these productions was a lack of inspiration. Hamlet is such a weird play, the man himself such an odd character, you can’t just decide to “do” Hamlet. When you aim at a king, etc.
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A couple years ago <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2022/04/on-solo-performance.html">I recounted my experience</a> thrilling to Clayton Jevne’s <i>One-Man Hamlet</i> at the Minnesota Fringe (<a href="https://youtu.be/Y6MMlO-_QJU">you may watch the entire show online</a>) and I am still smarting that I did not make time to see the Israeli Cameri Theatre troupe perform the play entirely in Hebrew when they visited Cleveland in 2008. I have yet to see <i>Hamlet </i>performed in another language, but I know the text so well that I think doing so would be a fascinating thing to do. I will not pass on another such opportunity.<br /><br />
If I were to elevate one Hamlet that I have enjoyed above all others, that would be Laura Welsh Berg at Great Lakes Theater in 2017. This was not a gender-concealed retelling, like <a href="https://youtu.be/oz7aoVcRI58?si=szkqzUKsX0q_it_f">the Asta Nielsen film</a> or my <a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2024/01/hamlet-me-part-xi.html">Beck Center production</a>, Berg was playing Hamlet as a man, in Elizabethan dress and on a stage design to evoke the Globe. It was the most “traditional” production of <i>Hamlet </i>I’d ever seen, and it was a revelation.
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg33j4lCcwB9dBsm6kTnOEvDcwc0Ub7_sPUxBp_vn9oAIOL8cNDx4ot4F0IQSXwNicubWByMi-cgC1GrLsVtwhayaDlxo-eOhIAKQbhmKq2bUC1AqgtPEM9M3jm81vF0s41kZ3F-9LqVpoU7kNKb2fIkPNry7vPPdkiXKOxynG_O8xz9kgnm9F-92SqVG0/s278/download.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="278" data-original-width="181" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg33j4lCcwB9dBsm6kTnOEvDcwc0Ub7_sPUxBp_vn9oAIOL8cNDx4ot4F0IQSXwNicubWByMi-cgC1GrLsVtwhayaDlxo-eOhIAKQbhmKq2bUC1AqgtPEM9M3jm81vF0s41kZ3F-9LqVpoU7kNKb2fIkPNry7vPPdkiXKOxynG_O8xz9kgnm9F-92SqVG0/w208-h320/download.jpg" width="208" /></a></div>While I do not agree with what Edward P. Vining characterized as feminine “weaknesses” in the Dane’s psychology, I have found that Hamlet’s transparent misogyny becomes something quite else when communicated by a woman. Disappointment instead of derision. Empathy instead of anger. Berg powerfully embodied all of the grief and rage and condescension Hamlet holds for his father, his uncle, Polonius, while also making the “nunnery” and “closet” scenes, in which he traumatizes first his lover and then his mother, truly affecting for all parties.
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Recently, I read the script for the new play <i>The Motive and the Cue</i> by Jack Thorne. Inspired by the books <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/02/letters-from-actor-book.html">Letters From an Actor</a></i> by William Redfield and <i>John Gielgud Directs Richard Burton in "Hamlet"</i> by Richard Sterne. It is an imagined dramatization of the rehearsal process for that 1964 Broadway production.
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I find that this script is most successful at describing to an audience just what it is a director does – and what they should not do – as the legendary though cash-poor Gielgud endeavors to shape the performance of the besotted but powerful Burton in a role that he, Gielgud, knows all too well, or perhaps much too well, while Burton struggles to make the role his, Burton’s, own.
<br /><br />It's a play I'd like to attend. Better still, I'd like to play Gielgud. I think I could. And anyway, no one ever asked me to play Hamlet.pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-2498793889696241232024-01-07T00:00:00.013-05:002024-01-14T09:01:20.680-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part XI)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW_hzZRyzCX_bU7bIhtpamZ-Fw4j27kdh7hPVa6_1L8JT68DsTSJn_FVTtxDhvavGI2kAhTswk8UWd0lWirGI5hr882McyPypwDpafQLtKm_6mR2qaXm8tM4StuTh0R2PPazHLLAxv7A69uM6uNmAWmvpDBXsdLgiRgjAGtkhFFC29H6hfcScYYtkuC0A/s429/hamlet_poster.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="429" data-original-width="282" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW_hzZRyzCX_bU7bIhtpamZ-Fw4j27kdh7hPVa6_1L8JT68DsTSJn_FVTtxDhvavGI2kAhTswk8UWd0lWirGI5hr882McyPypwDpafQLtKm_6mR2qaXm8tM4StuTh0R2PPazHLLAxv7A69uM6uNmAWmvpDBXsdLgiRgjAGtkhFFC29H6hfcScYYtkuC0A/w210-h320/hamlet_poster.jpg" width="210" /></a></div>Edward P. Vining was a Union Pacific executive in the 19th century and a part-time thinker. He independently developed a unique theory regarding the three extant versions of William Shakespeare’s <i>Hamlet</i>: The First Quarto of 1603, the Second Quarto of 1604 and the First Folio of 1623.
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Vining believed each subsequent version was a revision of the one previous, each an improvement upon its predecessor on the way to an ultimate, perfect vision of <i>Hamlet </i>which the Stratford man either did not complete or that has been lost to history.
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That’s not the unique bit. No, Vining’s grand theory focuses on what he perceived as an increasing “femininity” in the character as these draft progress, as the Dane becomes ever more thoughtful, emotional, and hesitant to act. Soft, if you will.
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That Vining's theory is entirely misogynist goes without saying. What is interesting, from a narrative standpoint, is how Vining suggests it was possible that Hamlet was born female, that it was kept a secret, and that she was raised to pass as male. Vining set this all down in his book <i>The Mystery of Hamlet: An Attempt to Solve an Old Problem</i> (1881).
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Vining’s theory may have been lost to history, but that it was elevated by Danish film star and producer Asta Nielsen, who used his theory when deciding to play the title role as the premiere offering from her new production company, <i>Art-Film</i>. This 1921 silent film version is quite possibly the best adaptation of Shakespeare’s <i>Hamlet </i>ever made.
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXbxE_Wq9qzR7RrrNiU9k6HnGumSK4XaW5-31el1zO4LfVQs81LhSB1GrK7rOR6KFRqQEcm91MpD6qGgY5IOtusw3NmjF3V6C9_ApoYEgQZNAJnhZWOG-ZCdoXu89VsXaScG_uGhfdZL0-d8CakmcuelTACj8SdjQPUE6PNg7dnWe9jKo4K5KofR15WyA/s1319/MV5BMGNmZWEwZjctNzUyYS00MGUyLTgyZjItZDYxMGZlZTU2ZmZhXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjU4NzU2OTA@._V1_.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1319" data-original-width="1319" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXbxE_Wq9qzR7RrrNiU9k6HnGumSK4XaW5-31el1zO4LfVQs81LhSB1GrK7rOR6KFRqQEcm91MpD6qGgY5IOtusw3NmjF3V6C9_ApoYEgQZNAJnhZWOG-ZCdoXu89VsXaScG_uGhfdZL0-d8CakmcuelTACj8SdjQPUE6PNg7dnWe9jKo4K5KofR15WyA/w200-h200/MV5BMGNmZWEwZjctNzUyYS00MGUyLTgyZjItZDYxMGZlZTU2ZmZhXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjU4NzU2OTA@._V1_.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Asta Nielsen in "Hamlet"<br />Art-Film, 1921</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Here’s the thing: We know "Young Hamlet was born" on "that day that our last King Hamlet overcame [Old] Fortinbras." A gravedigger tells us so. (HAM V.i) But what if word traveled faster than the old Danish King, and that it was reported that it was he who had been slain? To secure the throne in a time of war, the new mother, Queen Gertrude, announces a son! By the time Old Hamlet returns, the lie has been widely accepted and is held as truth. The girl is raised a prince, only her mother and father aware of the deception.
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This is all prologue. The question then is how this all affects her, Hamlet’s, relationships with Ophelia, Horatio, her mother, the new king Claudius, everyone? In 2006, I directed another production of <i>Hamlet </i>at Beck Center for the Arts, inspired by Nielsen’s film, and starring Sarah Morton in the lead, supported by an outstanding company of local artists.<br /><blockquote><i>
“Since Hansen is experienced and demonstrably astute, there are no embarrassments here and much to appreciate. Most to be appreciated is his shrewd casting of the lady Hamlet. Sarah Morton is a palpably enchanting stage presence – smart, wry, covertly vulnerable and hesitantly self-confident. Properly attired, she's also tall, thin and still tomboyish enough to get away with the physical aspects of the evening's masquerade."</i> - Damico [2]</blockquote><p></p><blockquote><i>"Oozing misery and nerves, Morton plays a Hamlet pierced by grief and drunk on death. She handles the language flawlessly, and several of her scenes are the best I've ever seen </i><i>–</i><i> her death, and the "nunnery" scene with Ophelia (a sensitive Rachel Lee Kolis)."</i> - Eisenstein [3]</blockquote><p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPzwfOfCXYzAjk5iKQzIETEI1UWczqsCcek45vJXcpulFT5-MS3X0QM4rHnziDzZ8jfZWrhbaIpo1NVdWHBFBXYCh5Ssu6mo00i5bkcYkDZyCJhmqtOHVde1Crs8l9I385AuxXacU-3L013W8DOvZt6XMj9BQPG0JtHJxyN_M9Ee4_nZtE9g0t2sa5sls/s300/Picture%208.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPzwfOfCXYzAjk5iKQzIETEI1UWczqsCcek45vJXcpulFT5-MS3X0QM4rHnziDzZ8jfZWrhbaIpo1NVdWHBFBXYCh5Ssu6mo00i5bkcYkDZyCJhmqtOHVde1Crs8l9I385AuxXacU-3L013W8DOvZt6XMj9BQPG0JtHJxyN_M9Ee4_nZtE9g0t2sa5sls/w200-h200/Picture%208.png" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Hamlet & Horatio<br />Sarah Morton, Nick Koesters<br />Beck Center, 2006</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table>One of the original aspects of this adaptation, one highlighted in Nielsen’s film, is the love triangle between Hamlet, Horatio and Ophelia. Each love goes unrequited and misunderstood, until the final moments of the tragedy. In the 1921 film, Horatio cradles the dead Hamlet and, in an unintentionally comic moment, discovers her breast. In our 2006 version, Hamlet instead chooses to “out” herself:<br /><blockquote><i>
“In the final scene, a dying Hamlet places a kiss on Horatio's lips, revealing her true feelings. It's a poignant moment In a credible production of the fiendishly difficult, challenging play, one that keeps the integrity of the language and drama intact.”</i> - Heller [1]</blockquote><div style="font-style: italic;"><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2024/01/hamlet-me-part-xii.html">To be concluded.</a></i></div><div style="font-style: italic;"><i><br /></i></div>
<i><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SqHtkY9jllM?si=2LLOeaCeBUCD8o5N" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe></i>
<div style="font-style: italic;"><i><br /></i></div><div><a href="https://youtu.be/oz7aoVcRI58?si=evhwgiVsTx4mFIIB"><i style="font-style: italic;">The complete "Hamlet: The Drama of Vengeance" starring Asta Nielsen and directed by </i><i>Svend Gade & Heinz Schall (1921)</i></a></div><div style="font-style: italic;"><i><br /></i></div><i>Sources:</i><br />[1] <i>"Review: Hamlet" by Fran Heller, Backstage, 10/16/2006</i><br />[2] <i>"Shakespearean Mélange a Trois: A Bardic Orgy of Drag, Gender-bending and Shaky Celibacy" by James Damico, The Free Times, 10/4/2006
</i><div>[3] <i>"Hamlet @ Beck Center" by Linda Eisenstein, CoolCleveland.com, 10/1/2006</i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-85490013114396665362023-12-28T00:00:00.004-05:002023-12-28T10:03:33.629-05:00Hamlet & Me (Pre-Show Announcement)<p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSF3ykBToNEIKoaKqMIrheYbhpTSW9Q8VsBgx8a3OI0QExRTNQpvKqwq9aTQVHYwheyLCgVg8RU8_Ots_JofNcENTSSTm1TQN-O5JZOErClQpBJT_2-Duorp3ubK9tISoqH1pTxDKc215kaVgoM1Z_sOFNT8pLa_IqZ8KrdTytvOaQxNkd5pVkmB1RuHE/s459/backstage.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="459" data-original-width="459" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSF3ykBToNEIKoaKqMIrheYbhpTSW9Q8VsBgx8a3OI0QExRTNQpvKqwq9aTQVHYwheyLCgVg8RU8_Ots_JofNcENTSSTm1TQN-O5JZOErClQpBJT_2-Duorp3ubK9tISoqH1pTxDKc215kaVgoM1Z_sOFNT8pLa_IqZ8KrdTytvOaQxNkd5pVkmB1RuHE/w320-h320/backstage.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Tom Cullinan, Brian Pedaci & me<br />Backstage at the Brick Alley Theatre</i></td></tr></tbody></table>I was the youngest of three boys, my eldest brother is seven years older than I am, so I got a lot of shit. But my brothers weren't the kind of bullies who beat me up, in fact they never laid a hand on me. <p></p><p>No, they were all poncy geeks and their friends were, too. The abuse that was heaped upon me was mental, literate snark. I would be mocked for existing, and god forbid I actually did or said anything stupid because I wouldn't only be ridiculed for the moment, there would be callbacks that went on for years.</p><p>As a result, I have always been extremely defensive about being made fun of, to the point of being no fun at all. I cannot take a joke, or at least I could not until I met my wife Toni who fills me with such confidence that I became a different person. This is true.</p><p>However, allow me to share a moment from my past when I was a complete noodge and ruined a great joke because of my insecurities. When we started Bad Epitaph Theater Company, I was determined that we present ourselves as professionally as possible. </p><p>That included, for example, that the program include the UK model of company bios, where they are not third person narratives but a list of previous work. Some grumbled, but I wasn't about to provide the audience a dozen paragraphs that all begin the same way, <i>"So-and-so is thrilled to be part of this production!"</i></p><p>I also insisted upon a pre-recorded pre-show announcement, which was not the convention at the time. I provided sound designer Walter Mantani with this text to be played right before the show begins:</p><p></p><blockquote><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Good evening. Bad Epitaph Theater Company welcomes you to the Brick Alley Theatre. We hope you enjoy our performance, which will begin momentarily. First a few announcements. The production will last approximately three hours, with two, ten minute intermissions. Stage fog will be employed during the performance, and a firearm will be discharged onstage during the Second Act. Performers will be using the aisles for their entrances and exits. Please refrain from getting up or leaving the auditorium until an intermission. Out of courtesy for those around you, please refrain from having conversations during the performance, and if you have a cough or sore throat, you might like to take the time now to unwrap any throat lozenges or candy. Please take a moment and turn off any cellphones or pagers. Thank you for your attention, and enjoy the show.</i></span></blockquote><p></p><p>Yes! We had content advisories in the twentieth century. Anyway, it was important information and Walter has such a beautiful, stentorian voice, I wanted it to be his, and not mine.</p><p>That recording was not played for the final dress for our first production, <i>Hamlet</i>, however. Instead, they played an alternate version. It was a joke, but I didn't think it was funny and was very direct with Marian, our stage manager, that it never be played again, that under no circumstances should it ever be played before any performance.</p><p>I mean, of course she wouldn't. <i>It was a joke. For the company to enjoy.</i> If it happened today, I would howl with laughter. At the time I took it all too seriously. Because I thought I was being made fun of.<br /><br />So, anyway, here it is! I posted this on YouTube years ago, and people love it, it's gotten over eight thousand views which for me is a lot. Have a listen <i>... and enjoy the show!</i></p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/C9-ra5AWKV0?si=sDxQvZA9Mt5ZU0gD" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-15641294199156182212023-12-27T00:00:00.012-05:002024-02-09T08:09:10.717-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part X)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEish27qEdYSfhexuJUa_x0tZRxbeyWaKtFTEHtGuOxWWGpSucMzS3isMquQSPD5oxfBXmC85GKe_Y1Yt2NSKMJruX5yGC6ELG1XmkktwlJfjQvl4wArDQn31jaGGa5DlQZIded0zELTK3x44D_F8kVvP9nVvpM9olqwQP0UcrHVPFjJpQ4rv18sh1kciDk/s1164/Players.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="873" data-original-width="1164" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEish27qEdYSfhexuJUa_x0tZRxbeyWaKtFTEHtGuOxWWGpSucMzS3isMquQSPD5oxfBXmC85GKe_Y1Yt2NSKMJruX5yGC6ELG1XmkktwlJfjQvl4wArDQn31jaGGa5DlQZIded0zELTK3x44D_F8kVvP9nVvpM9olqwQP0UcrHVPFjJpQ4rv18sh1kciDk/w400-h300/Players.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Player Queen, Player King<br />Lee T. Wilson & Pandora Robertson<br />"Dumb Show" choreographed by David Shimotakahara<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div>Twelve years ago, Cleveland said good-bye to its last full-time theater critic. <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2011/07/tony-brown.html">At that time</a>, I expressed concern over the larger implications of that vacancy. Love critics or hate them, they write theater history.</div><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsEK1TdTZPS9yR-juIfDFUETsyU8rfJnxhCWMIjFFgFZdnUMpl6wSZ7ZP4CyxFlvyE4nYUlpbD1gUXhRjQafGLFC8HwuUFynjfP_AYHOdOUxYuK9pV3PVFQwjLvpRyc5WpcJhDc-qfM35fPwwColA1bSo2bTvHdJO7t89b0rmZWWBiNBDE6cSReSArpFI/s821/claudius.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="821" data-original-width="821" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsEK1TdTZPS9yR-juIfDFUETsyU8rfJnxhCWMIjFFgFZdnUMpl6wSZ7ZP4CyxFlvyE4nYUlpbD1gUXhRjQafGLFC8HwuUFynjfP_AYHOdOUxYuK9pV3PVFQwjLvpRyc5WpcJhDc-qfM35fPwwColA1bSo2bTvHdJO7t89b0rmZWWBiNBDE6cSReSArpFI/w320-h320/claudius.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Thomas Cullinan & Brian Pedaci</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Upon the <a href="https://www.americantheatre.org/2023/12/20/peter-marks-singing-off-from-his-post">recent announcement</a> that Peter Marks is stepping down from his position as critic for the Washington Post, New York Times critic Jason Zinoman <a href="https://www.americantheatre.org/2023/12/18/one-reason-theatre-is-in-crisis-the-slow-death-of-criticism/">expressed a similar lament</a>.<br /><blockquote><i>
“The historical record will also suffer. Losing this spot in my opinion matters more than losing a film or book critic because theater is ephemeral. My memories of shows I saw in DC as a kid have faded. The only thing that keeps them alive is the archive of reviews. Reviews mean that theater art lives forever and can keep getting discovered.”</i> - Jason Zinoman on Facebook 12/18/2023
</blockquote>Looking over my journal for <i>Hamlet</i>, I was shocked at how much direct communication I had with members of the print media over that period; calling them on the phone, accosting them in public. It was 1999, and promoting your show exclusively online was not yet a thing. We had a website, yes, but we could only drive people to that through our print advertisements!
<br /><br />
No mass theater email lists, no NEOPAL, no social media, none whatever.
<br /><br />
Ours was a new theater company and we needed coverage, in print, on paper. Plain Dealer Theater Critic Marianne Evett wrote a preview piece, mentioned our fundraiser in her column, and reviewed the show.
<br /><br />
I harangued the guy who wrote a weekly theater round-up for the weekly Free Times to include our events in his column, and was simmering with rage those weeks he said he didn’t have the space. Without coverage, we didn’t yet exist.
<br /><br />
But they did cover our work, the critics did come to see our independently produced show. They all came on the same night, which was terrifying for me, what if the power went out? In that space it was entirely possible. But the lights stayed on, as did the heat (another concern) and we were reviewed by the Plain Dealer, the Free Times, and Scene Magazine.
<br /><br />
Over the past ten days, I have described several productions of <i>Hamlet</i>. This is how the historical record describes ours.
<br /><br /><i><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFlvxjwjHCO9ruNHwg4Bzw7lTl2_l5B2jd8ho1TKbyuvzR0FsBTd5OYCTk2-tVJoSgwweTkiq9JCLBFNLkzlNd5OiqwK43SQkj17H3tSss58J1vM0NqZWxwbvBsqUpv5RiyIAGLOpVENMEZJnd6tGojoWWEXo2oFF7sbtPV6KJ2IfC74GH04JarHohyIc/s768/Polonius.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="768" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFlvxjwjHCO9ruNHwg4Bzw7lTl2_l5B2jd8ho1TKbyuvzR0FsBTd5OYCTk2-tVJoSgwweTkiq9JCLBFNLkzlNd5OiqwK43SQkj17H3tSss58J1vM0NqZWxwbvBsqUpv5RiyIAGLOpVENMEZJnd6tGojoWWEXo2oFF7sbtPV6KJ2IfC74GH04JarHohyIc/w200-h200/Polonius.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jay Kim, Jason Popis<br />Gary Jones Christine Castro</i></td></tr></tbody></table>
David Hansen – Cleveland's champion of twentysomething madcap intelligentsia; founder of the antic subversive Guerrilla Theatre (sic) and the edgy Night Kitchen – has happily sought new horizons with his Bad Epitaph Theater Company.</i> [5]
<br /><br /><i>Hansen, Thomas Cullinan and other BETC co-founders Alison (Garrigan), Brian Pedaci and Sarah Morton met at Dobama's Night Kitchen, where the quintet discovered compatible tastes and aims. As maturing, ambitious theater fanatics invariably do, they concluded, "It was time to take the next step." </i>[3]
<br /><br /><i>
The group's creative esthetic will be expressed through an unslavish fidelity to texts and a reasonable respect for what's valuable in traditional performance practices. "People coming to us," (Hansen) cautions, "expecting some wild, shocking interpretation will be disappointed."</i> [3]
<br /><br /><i>
The Bad Epitaph Theater Company will present their very first production, "The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," opening April 9 at the Brick Alley Theatre.</i> [1]
<br /><br /><i>
Directed by Hansen, Hamlet features Thomas Cullinan as you know who, Alison (Garrigan) as Gertrude and Brian Pedaci as Claudius, supported by a 13-member ensemble.</i> [1]
<br /><br /><i><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNx3ph4mkZlJfbHi-04BDZ1FBx6tihgZ4QflI_XSTK7KYDKJvnDbIjV4ZO0G7wgAe-K0SdvtdqLxG-kWVfKUSr4OGJj08zmKW8iMybv_CjKsQRLfGQ7x5M6ix-62XqISLXeVvx7ledaAJcx3ifWhsw79YwQUi0-WaxdzwD1eLeyk4OI-c9mJL6SHjNEDM/s779/gertrude.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><i><img border="0" data-original-height="779" data-original-width="779" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNx3ph4mkZlJfbHi-04BDZ1FBx6tihgZ4QflI_XSTK7KYDKJvnDbIjV4ZO0G7wgAe-K0SdvtdqLxG-kWVfKUSr4OGJj08zmKW8iMybv_CjKsQRLfGQ7x5M6ix-62XqISLXeVvx7ledaAJcx3ifWhsw79YwQUi0-WaxdzwD1eLeyk4OI-c9mJL6SHjNEDM/w200-h200/gertrude.jpg" width="200" /></i></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Alison Garrigan, Tom Cullinan</i></td></tr></tbody></table>
You’ve got to admire the guts of a new theater company giving birth to its baby with a whack at "Hamlet."</i> [4]
<br /><br /><i>
A judicious cutting of the script (reduced by a sixth and shaped into three acts that average an hour each), primarily reliant on following the narrative’s progression with an emphatic clarity, occurring in stripped-down, unspecific, but modernized setting and dress. </i>[4]
<br /><br /><i>
Featuring an eclectic and dynamic cast, more grounded in Stanislavsky and psychological realism than in plumy vowels and exalted emoting, Hansen's "Hamlet" emphasizes fast-paced storytelling over poetry and pathos, yielding a robust, energetic production.</i> [5]
<br /><br /><i>
The production… is a good one, given clear and thoughtful direction by David Hansen. The publicity has labeled it “in-your-face,” but in fact, the interpretation is straightforward and not at all confrontational or experimental. And the production shows how potent the play can be on its own, with the simplest possible set and costumes.</i> [6]
<br /><br /><i>
Using modern dress, ingenious economy, and performers who know how to captivate a wide variety of audiences, this interpretation reproduces in spirit the immediacy and vitality that the original cast production likely flaunted.</i> [5]
<br /><br /><i><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghKpJz3WiUZy_92OZRxMIeE4jQ8xsuTVfPx0d3tPJxEQdEKEoHwR_-CWUKgkgSrYuPu8o15hapBvOc7wkegTj72Eh3HQjlNaeI0oca2qVJtxO2EfTT9qDkCm_1JtUSjeqGarNKpyFyyJFz8BXV9u9254Qmx1Xuh6aW6bgGp-YDL4tRHfaloNjmC3w7k6U/s497/Ophelia.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="497" data-original-width="497" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghKpJz3WiUZy_92OZRxMIeE4jQ8xsuTVfPx0d3tPJxEQdEKEoHwR_-CWUKgkgSrYuPu8o15hapBvOc7wkegTj72Eh3HQjlNaeI0oca2qVJtxO2EfTT9qDkCm_1JtUSjeqGarNKpyFyyJFz8BXV9u9254Qmx1Xuh6aW6bgGp-YDL4tRHfaloNjmC3w7k6U/w200-h200/Ophelia.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Christine Castro</i></td></tr></tbody></table>
It’s a decided relief and pleasure to report that the Bad Epitaph Theater Company’s most respectable production of the hallowed classic not only justifies a touch of audacity, but, much more crucially, earns the genuine anticipation of the group’s next, hopefully less historically perilous, project.</i> [4]
<br /><br /><i>
The guiding force here is clearly director Hansen, who demonstrates a well-defined and knowledgeable understanding of the play, apparent in the production’s major strength — its sharply etched, thoroughly lucid story line.</i> [4]
<br /><br /><i>
Hansen propels his three and a half hours without a single traffic jam. </i>[5]
<br /><br /><i>
We seem to be reviewing posters lately, so I must say that if (Thomas) Cullinan acts half as well as he looks as the all-in-black modern-dress Hamlet, well, he ought to be dynamite. </i>[1]
<br /><br /><i>
Cullinan immerses himself in the complex role, pacing it well and letting you see the fluctuations in Hamlet’s moods. His terror at meeting with his father’s ghost (a strong performance by Hansen), his easy banter with Polonius or the spies Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, his anguish in confronting his mother </i><i>– </i><i>all add up to a moving performance.</i> [6]
<br /><br /><i><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv0DwTAY20wYpGy5HZ5In9G-LX60i4NEQ_1LdihvQ3dFp6nVfzkemY2oJo96f8Hi4YkTu2h0By7hdPoTbvQphA70RneGeQ5C0o9QJ6L-OP7ydixulGCQdaLANKfLflHqqKDBTsyM5gZY_rD-070FHQewQv2J8POINxCyvBdCIzgnJBXOH4xhfxaavInTY/s768/Horatio.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="768" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv0DwTAY20wYpGy5HZ5In9G-LX60i4NEQ_1LdihvQ3dFp6nVfzkemY2oJo96f8Hi4YkTu2h0By7hdPoTbvQphA70RneGeQ5C0o9QJ6L-OP7ydixulGCQdaLANKfLflHqqKDBTsyM5gZY_rD-070FHQewQv2J8POINxCyvBdCIzgnJBXOH4xhfxaavInTY/w200-h200/Horatio.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Marie Andrusewicz</i></td></tr></tbody></table>
Cullinan is first of all the right thirtyish age — not too callow to have had the required depth of experience nor too old, which would upset the balances of various character relationships. The blond actor’s unmarked features additionally generate a still boyish, brooding self-interest — not to say self-indulgence — that perfectly suits this most unheroic hero. Intelligent, word-obsessed, the often petulant eternal student is caught in an endless analysis of his own inaction until he’s forced to erupt in a violent release. The appealing Cullinan has these aspects well in hand and delivers a secure and sustained characterization. </i>[4]
<br /><br /><i>
This is a family drama, whose anguish builds throughout the evening. When Cullinan’s Hamlet dies, having finally brought about his vengeance on Claudius at the cost of so many other lives, you feel genuinely moved, touched, as you should be, by the waste of a promising young life.</i> [6]
<br /><br /><i>In a fearsome performance of finely carved detail that delineates a blighted soul, Brian Pedaci effectively evokes that vital something that is rotten in the state of Denmark.</i> [5] <i> Pedaci is suitably conniving and slimy as Claudius, who has killed his brother, the old King Hamlet, married the queen and seized the throne. </i>[6] <i>Pedaci’s Claudius is commendable and particularly strong in his devious calculation.</i> [4]
<br /><br /><i>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSk3GHgpKgkHejsae24l2o_KVjcFCiha7u1zeMEma3OyONsyFiOERRO9784fN3Jns8rQ6mImlfh6QH5EL9ktY4hi7nIXsApP73dX-OoOj6SB1XSr3_i2diGzUopRcXNZm9Lh4ILsh5QKG_bGiHieZBt6cWmbSPpWJUV0Via0_7mwhitK5rhAav4Z5DROY/s1152/Ghost.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1152" data-original-width="1152" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSk3GHgpKgkHejsae24l2o_KVjcFCiha7u1zeMEma3OyONsyFiOERRO9784fN3Jns8rQ6mImlfh6QH5EL9ktY4hi7nIXsApP73dX-OoOj6SB1XSr3_i2diGzUopRcXNZm9Lh4ILsh5QKG_bGiHieZBt6cWmbSPpWJUV0Via0_7mwhitK5rhAav4Z5DROY/w200-h200/Ghost.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>David Hansen</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Alison (Garrigan) is also very good as Hamlet’s mother, Queen Gertrude. Looking beautiful and rather lost, she rises to the emotion-filled confrontation with her son in which she learns of her new husband’s treachery.</i> [6]
<br /><br /><i>
As Ophelia, Christine Castro is touchingly and authentically sweet. </i>[4] <i>When Ophelia flips her lid, she pistol-whips the entire court with her flowers. As her petulant big brother, Laertes, Jay Kim is boyish, brash, and impetuous.</i> [5]
<br /><br /><i>
Some unconventional casting provides new insights into the play. Gary Jones is a stout, vigorous Polonius, a bustling middle-aged snoop rather than an old busybody. Marie Andrusewicz is quietly effective as Hamlet’s loyal friend Horatio; Pandora Robertson gives the Player’s speech histrionic force; and Dawn Youngs has exceptional presence as Rosencrantz, Hamlet’s treacherous schoolmate. </i>[6] <i>Allen Branstein's gravedigger combines the best bits of Samuel Beckett and Walter Brennan.</i> [5]
<br /><br /><i>
The Brick Alley (Theatre) is exactly that – a former alley roofed over and made into a building with a long, narrow theater space. Hansen and set designer Gunter Schwegler have put stages on each side, one backed by the building’s brick wall and the other by black and gold hangings. A walkway runs between them, with the audience seated across both ends. </i>[6]<div><i><br /></i></div><div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1sbunUq-B3PcELKlI8OV3HkL7ZgYBV0escSV3Lf1iDP5HUJyiBPnKlzLDYx122ll-7_lsRVj6AsMeu8USSdr7D35aRDoazrE_5rPCYdeV470YRSorU_XHGkBYPbWNhjtsNQY1q2ND4LzG5fVz6Vebp-2sfhjCeeDJTwAmLLAfOOZdcjWlsFI8fLLgepQ/s551/gravediggers.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="551" data-original-width="551" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1sbunUq-B3PcELKlI8OV3HkL7ZgYBV0escSV3Lf1iDP5HUJyiBPnKlzLDYx122ll-7_lsRVj6AsMeu8USSdr7D35aRDoazrE_5rPCYdeV470YRSorU_XHGkBYPbWNhjtsNQY1q2ND4LzG5fVz6Vebp-2sfhjCeeDJTwAmLLAfOOZdcjWlsFI8fLLgepQ/w200-h200/gravediggers.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pandora Robertson,<br />Allen Branstein</i></td></tr></tbody></table><i>The result might look unconventional, but its flexibility and intimacy adds to the emotional immediacy of the show.</i> [6] <i>Schwegler and Jennifer Linn Wilcox’s scenic and lighting designs nicely adapt to the Brick Alley’s unusual two-sided arena space.</i> [4]
<br /><br /><i>
For the academically inclined, yes, the language survives … an ideal introduction for untested Shakespeare neophytes and, for those suffering from overexposure, a perfect way to rekindle an old flame with a sweet prince. </i>[5]
<br /><br /><i>
Bad Epitaph, which takes its name from Hamlet’s words to Polonius about the company of actors who have just arrived at Elsinore (“After your death, you were better have a bad epitaph than their ill report while you live”), is clearly a company worth having around. </i>[6] </div><div><br /></div><div>Three professionally written reviews for one storefront theater production in Cleveland. Those days will not come again.</div><div><br /></div><div><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2024/01/hamlet-me-part-xi.html">To be continued.</a></i><br /><br />
[1] “Happier notes” by Larry Gorjup, Free Times, 4/1/1999<br />
[2] Calendar Listing, Editor, Scene Magazine 4/9/1999<br />
[3] “…and the melancholy Dane” by James Damico, Free Times, 4/7/1999<br />
[4] “Heavy Decisions: Of Hamlet and The Old Settler” by James Damico, Free Times 4/14/1999<br />
[5] “Quite the Mischievous Boy: In Bad Epitaph Theater's production of Shakespeare's hit, it's dog eat dog in Denmark” by Keith A. Joseph, 04/15/1999<br />
[6] “Company’s debut delivers potent version of Hamlet” by Marianne Evett, Plain Dealer, 04/17/1999
</div><div><br /></div><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wjMoxKyey4g?si=h3f2u1Ab7nqiUzDO" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-37295627519715576682023-12-26T00:00:00.004-05:002023-12-27T16:11:13.633-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part IX)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl1wD4Bxk9Mj4mOxZjzuLZj2ILQyCZ6TyyhsumV106WL5BloxSIamRYJF1Z_vojGLxmXjiXT9US6rW0jQQ_x1Jk7VvzG9VlukqmL7a66HX17Ofl7vmCzgvJuCdNpw2YrIfaeOwxAI7JMZtQQsYbGpiEceS62hwVwkhvWa0h1wTKsVAgRoKyqVis15qR8Q/s604/Free%20Times%20Cover.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="487" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl1wD4Bxk9Mj4mOxZjzuLZj2ILQyCZ6TyyhsumV106WL5BloxSIamRYJF1Z_vojGLxmXjiXT9US6rW0jQQ_x1Jk7VvzG9VlukqmL7a66HX17Ofl7vmCzgvJuCdNpw2YrIfaeOwxAI7JMZtQQsYbGpiEceS62hwVwkhvWa0h1wTKsVAgRoKyqVis15qR8Q/w323-h400/Free%20Times%20Cover.jpg" width="323" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Newspaper prop graphic for "Hamlet"<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999<br />Design: Timothy Smith<br />Photo: Anthony Gray</i></td></tr></tbody></table><b>Notes for first production meeting of “Hamlet”
<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company<br />November 11, 1998</b><br /><br /><i>
The concept of this production, at its most basic, is to present it as what it is. A troupe of actors in a brick warehouse in Cleveland in 1999, putting on HAMLET.
<br /><br />
We will not be commenting on the words, or bending them to fit meanings that aren't there.
<br /><br />
However, we will be presenting the characters as though they are present in our world today,
our audience will be treated to this spectacular story couched in images that are familiar. Kings in suits, guns for swords, local newspapers, beer, etc.
<br /><br />
Most concepts are museum pieces, even at their most inspired. It is exciting to take audiences to strange, distant or ancient lands. But for this production, we want them to feel it is happening now, and not only now, but here.
<br /><br />
With a contemporary American attitude, while maintaining the dignity of royalty, the fear of the supernatural, and all the sorrow and madness which never will be out of style.
<br /><br />
As for Hamlet, I use myself as a guide. A man of thirty, with a past full of ideals and a future full of nothing. He talks about the past as a golden era (which it may not have been) and speaks of the future not at all. We stand on the brink of the Millennium (excuse me) and we don't know what's ahead but we sure know what's behind.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-x.html">To be continued.</a></div>
<br /><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ox5IPYPj8yc?si=lCsck8ySb2lzDnyt" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-83180173775240352642023-12-25T17:10:00.008-05:002024-01-14T09:05:58.361-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part VIII)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCNWSoNDQihTCfXCXADfFox-8rHsS0sGcfvLdDiJf3NrZa5V-EaH1q3FjrY0mC2zCuZoQulUgVGD6GVhlPGc33DejbcoOx4D7AqiXffnV5cXsq89HotAgW6K1VsaZNjCpqQQXUb2qECqapVSQm92iYFcCxawUfL2JlFwfTeGiPAo10niJHo88mgZhlZrc/s1920/Screenshot%20(918).png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCNWSoNDQihTCfXCXADfFox-8rHsS0sGcfvLdDiJf3NrZa5V-EaH1q3FjrY0mC2zCuZoQulUgVGD6GVhlPGc33DejbcoOx4D7AqiXffnV5cXsq89HotAgW6K1VsaZNjCpqQQXUb2qECqapVSQm92iYFcCxawUfL2JlFwfTeGiPAo10niJHo88mgZhlZrc/w400-h225/Screenshot%20(918).png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Hear the sentence of your movèd prince."<br />Courtney Brown, Xanthe Tabor, Rich Weiss,<br />Suzanne L. Miller, David Hansen (Mr. Hansen does not appear.)<br />"The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet"<br />Guerrilla Theater Company, 1994</i></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div><div>By the time I turned thirty, I had performed in only two Shakespearean productions, three if you count a pre-recorded voice-over.</div><br />
Junior year at Ohio University, I played Friar John in <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>, who has three lines. For the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2012/04/romeo-and-juliet-1994-rehearsal-notes.html">Guerrilla Theater production</a> I directed, I played the prince, but my voice came from on high, as though from a public address system. This meant, of course, that I needed not be present for every performance.
<br /><br />
I later learned this conceit was also employed by John Gielgud in the 1964 Broadway production of <i>Hamlet</i>, arriving as the Ghost in the form of a massive shadow in the shape of a helm.
<br /><br />
A video recording of the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/02/letters-from-actor-book.html">Gielgud/Burton </a><i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/02/letters-from-actor-book.html">Hamlet</a> </i>was released in the mid-90s, and I spent the summer of 1998 watching that several times and taking notes.
<br /><br />
Having decided to direct a Shakespeare, you need to decide what version of the play you wish to see and hear, and then cut the script to fit your conception.
<br /><br />
Stealing edits from others provided my primary education. The cuts from our college production of <i>R&J</i> were the basis for my production. We had taken a paperback and spent a rehearsal having the cuts dictated to us as each of us crossed out the lines in pencil, so I had them all, not just the cuts for my one scene but for the entire play.
<br /><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPBdEgjUNEcd0MqCw8AgIfuDGA0C42uLWls52bxongEVRL82UareHOT0CdYGiQdU3V4aZLuGFZL5nXKxHRCgCcpyp7_l35hlMq3OWd0usFudVUG_Qmbm-c80DygXiH7f38vv7jQ2Uk9Pz9I-FCDJ_Yyww8WG9RsQ83dNur1HTDOyWPQPoU3lVoR_Cdm8M/s244/hqdefault.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="244" data-original-width="244" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPBdEgjUNEcd0MqCw8AgIfuDGA0C42uLWls52bxongEVRL82UareHOT0CdYGiQdU3V4aZLuGFZL5nXKxHRCgCcpyp7_l35hlMq3OWd0usFudVUG_Qmbm-c80DygXiH7f38vv7jQ2Uk9Pz9I-FCDJ_Yyww8WG9RsQ83dNur1HTDOyWPQPoU3lVoR_Cdm8M/s1600/hqdefault.jpg" width="244" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Mark me."<br />John Gielgud, Richard Burton<br />(Mr. Gielgud does not appear.)<br />Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, 1964</i></td></tr></tbody></table>In the time before personal computers, this was really the only way to do it. Today I can make the edits on my laptop and provide the company with a show-ready document. But then they wouldn't have the physical script, to see what was eliminated as well as what was kept. That's fine if you don't want your actors requesting to have lines restored, but what if you do?<div><br /></div><div>I had opinions about what additional material I wanted for my production of <i>Hamlet</i>, and what additional lines I wanted to cut, but using <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-i.html">this Burton production</a> as a guide gave me great confidence to have something to begin with.
<br /><br />
And in the case of <i>Hamlet</i>, who better to steal from than Gielgud? He was his generation’s Dane, surviving audio recordings are a testament to the style, grandeur and pathos he lent to the role, for decades and in numerous productions. It’s a shame we only have a film version of Olivier’s <i>Hamlet </i>and not his.
<br /><br />
I watched the 1964 video, making the same cuts as Gielgud made, and in this way learned about which versus a great person of Shakespeare believed were not as necessary as others. Then I cut just a little deeper. Cutting the text is the director’s first pass at directing their actors, before you even know who those actors may be. You can change the motives and intentions of a character by eliminating certain lines of thought and exposition, or what other characters have to say about them.
<br /><br />
I was greatly influenced by <a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-vi.html">Pennington’s book</a> to strip away centuries of assumptions about the characters and established tropes of performance. The goal was to focus specifically on the words they say as written on the page, and not the ways they have been said by others in the several productions I had already seen.
<br /><br />
Is the Queen correcting the King for getting the names of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern wrong, or is she changing the order of address to lend their names equal weight as a form of flattery? <i>Because that is what the King and Queen are trying to do at that moment, convince old friends to betray him. </i><br /><br />
Does Hamlet know he and Ophelia are being listened to when he asks, “Where is your father?” or is that another way of inquiring, “Where is your keeper?” <i>Because that is in keeping with everything else Hamlet is saying at that moment, you need looking after.<br /></i><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ9UDxDZ2iV1NHst9wZaTyLcY-3bqQ7VygHtpOLY0yWqbkz01XuUZOwkaJrz0jYBhz9_QDiK2NJoqaQ2H9XTIR3GrSWdWPmnDHX_1RETDr5OK6H36gycfOo4nm8-xuGEexD2ttFaJiy_U-F6EhpVO7DziYpmps6oPXX4hsjRKNK1vT4w60-VGBTrRU1Zc/s3499/gertrude.jpeg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3499" data-original-width="2441" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ9UDxDZ2iV1NHst9wZaTyLcY-3bqQ7VygHtpOLY0yWqbkz01XuUZOwkaJrz0jYBhz9_QDiK2NJoqaQ2H9XTIR3GrSWdWPmnDHX_1RETDr5OK6H36gycfOo4nm8-xuGEexD2ttFaJiy_U-F6EhpVO7DziYpmps6oPXX4hsjRKNK1vT4w60-VGBTrRU1Zc/w223-h320/gertrude.jpeg" width="223" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Alison Garrigan, Tom Cullinan<br />Promotional Photo for "Hamlet"<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999<br />Photo: Anthony Gray</i></td></tr></tbody></table>There are motivations for these deliveries which are clear and obvious, and then there are those which try to think a step ahead of the playwright and detract from the matter at hand.
<br /><br />
I did entertain the notion of having Hamlet echo one of the King’s lines from the first scene after the stabbing and the poisoning; “So much for him.” This I did not do, though I did have Tommy punch Brian in the face on the line, “Follow my mother.”
<br /><br />Like “Welcome to Earth.” If you know, you know.<div><br /></div><div>By fall I had my cut. <i>Hamlet </i>might go quite swiftly in three acts, with two intermissions, like this:</div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Act One</b>: In which Hamlet goes from "I don't know what to do" <i>(Too, too solid flesh)</i> to "I know what to do!" <i>(The play's the thing.)</i></li><li><b>Act Two</b>: In which Hamlet puts on a play, murders the wrong guy, gets exiled to England, and finds he hasn't accomplished anything. <i>(How all occasions do inform against me.)</i></li><li><b>Act Three</b>: In which all occasions literally inform against Hamlet and he dies just as he has evolved into a person who might indeed have made a good ruler. </li></ul>The rest is silence.</div></div><div><br /></div><div><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-ix.html">To be continued.</a></i></div>
<br><iframe width="500" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5wOuZ9QTpxU?si=3ygquKkHK0n0icEv" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-40757216407571862232023-12-24T00:00:00.002-05:002023-12-25T17:43:05.188-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part VII)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLbzJeOJOhllPJSomWywsuzVFk4QRRCgClHv3_VmDsEIANlJv4gR7Me9o3w8gebJCmfdUT_mPK7-U9-3jYs7jE6fBTUdSXUKh0IRRgLGPxqBGYrg68RpbqItTbp_k7Ei8lr3IyCkxjkxxhh2quIbcJpBvlyuZVHocKcgKZoq_6ceGdilfo7OrwN9koLk/s1316/hamlet.gif" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1316" data-original-width="862" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLbzJeOJOhllPJSomWywsuzVFk4QRRCgClHv3_VmDsEIANlJv4gR7Me9o3w8gebJCmfdUT_mPK7-U9-3jYs7jE6fBTUdSXUKh0IRRgLGPxqBGYrg68RpbqItTbp_k7Ei8lr3IyCkxjkxxhh2quIbcJpBvlyuZVHocKcgKZoq_6ceGdilfo7OrwN9koLk/w263-h400/hamlet.gif" width="263" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Thomas W. Cullinan<br />Promotional photo for "Hamlet"<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999<br />Photo: Anthony Gray</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Tom Cullinan and I met when he auditioned for a show at <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2012/07/in-night-kitchen-1970.html">Dobama’s Night Kitchen</a>. Having spent some time living in Chicago, he was returning home, so he told me, to look after his mother following the death of his father.
<br /><br />
I sat in the house, he sat on a singular chair on the stage, wearing a long coat and, in my mind’s eye, smoking a cigarette. Was he? It is hard for me to imagine that he was not.
<br /><br />
The audition in question was for a long-form improvisation inspired by MTV’s <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-realistic-world.html">The Real World</a></i>. As I had scant experience in improv, and that his resume said that he had, and in Chicago of all places, I was intimidated. But I have also always scorned men in dusters who smoke during auditions, and so we sized each other up and decided to become friends.
<br /><br />
Besides, the fact that I was seated in the position of authority, evaluating him in a theater space he had practically grown up in, I had to respect his <i>équanimité</i>. He became an invaluable player in our late night adventure.
<br /><br />
Over the next couple years we would grow close, but not too close. It was good to have a new partner in theater, someone I hadn’t gone to school with, someone with a broader experience than I had, an entirely different creative toolbox. Someone to push me out of my carefully guarded comfort zones.
<br /><br />
I asked him to direct my first play, <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2011/10/vampyres-1997.html">The Vampyres</a></i>, about a goth coffee house. He suggested we visit New Orleans at New Year’s Eve. You know, as “research.” Goodness, I never would have dared.
<br /><br />
Yes, we spent many evenings drinking and smoking, primarily at <a href="https://www.lacavebar.com/">La Cave du Vin</a>, and elsewhere. Tommy was the toastmaster, the speechmaker. I was always uncomfortable before crowds, he lived to be there. I asked him to be Best Man at our wedding.<br /><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaFs0S2U5JltBKBuXkl-WYQ9kwJ-g0GHRv6s_HDn2VAd7fXrxQrhum4-BIj4QjRy7y5ZST5N9eioh1PZl2OkoTsQLzhRJKYpxRrHf2FSU3xbd5pW0r_qxmnqmfzEby8jtgtJjAMGQm5P6uYT6Hrlk_WExEQbX8OtozE_ncEOGt8KOcKA7PVXi53Mh2HU/s469/claudius.gif" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="469" data-original-width="324" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtaFs0S2U5JltBKBuXkl-WYQ9kwJ-g0GHRv6s_HDn2VAd7fXrxQrhum4-BIj4QjRy7y5ZST5N9eioh1PZl2OkoTsQLzhRJKYpxRrHf2FSU3xbd5pW0r_qxmnqmfzEby8jtgtJjAMGQm5P6uYT6Hrlk_WExEQbX8OtozE_ncEOGt8KOcKA7PVXi53Mh2HU/w221-h320/claudius.gif" width="221" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Brian Pedaci, Tom Cullinan<br />Promotional photo for "Hamlet"<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999<br />Photo: Anthony Gray</i></td></tr></tbody></table>However, it was he who made getting too close impossible. I would invite him out for a private evening, just the two of us, and he would bring along one or two. There was a crisis in my relationship with Toni and he simply did not let me talk to him about it. He spoke too quietly in bars. He was pretentious – and not in the same way I am pretentious.
<br /><br />
He was complicated. We’re all complicated, but Tommy was really complicated.
<br /><br />
My time as Public Relations Director at <a href="https://www.dobama.org/">Dobama Theatre</a> was coming to a close. I’d never worked anywhere for three whole years and I was anxious to move on. I loved my time there, but I was turning thirty and feeling constrained, I guess. I had no idea what was happening next, what I did know was that I had a burning desire to create an epic, independent production of <i>Hamlet</i>, and I knew who I needed to build the company around.<br /><blockquote><i>
My man is Tom Cullinan. The reasons for him are plentiful. I love him. I can work with him. He is an experienced actor with just the right everyman quality to his personality, but also the right amount of class, charisma and charm. And guile. And romance. And because he’s not perfect.
</i><br /> - December 23, 1997</blockquote><p><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-viii.html">To be continued.</a></i> </p>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-75274921696553573512023-12-23T00:00:00.006-05:002024-01-21T20:42:34.834-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part VI)<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefxtXVpPFLhaqIDKlwF4Mtz055RH8pz5jZ49oHA-2HHEuNuuHKSelOJ54QfcoUrAdk_4d2F215RDY9g6OETTWKgYMG0KNDb_sGrGvOOFo7lu_SkdptV6O_CDhddkVthcksR9eWjrMWBi4hdGYalteC4I6JY0b8rWzWVFA9OMg835NdVdJBA3en3JFUmQ/s1000/31pqX3rhfrL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="641" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefxtXVpPFLhaqIDKlwF4Mtz055RH8pz5jZ49oHA-2HHEuNuuHKSelOJ54QfcoUrAdk_4d2F215RDY9g6OETTWKgYMG0KNDb_sGrGvOOFo7lu_SkdptV6O_CDhddkVthcksR9eWjrMWBi4hdGYalteC4I6JY0b8rWzWVFA9OMg835NdVdJBA3en3JFUmQ/s320/31pqX3rhfrL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg" width="205" /></a></div>Twenty-six years ago today, I decided that I was going to (somehow) direct a production of <i>Hamlet</i>. The following are contemporary accounts from my late twenties, about two books that were major inspirations in the development of my thoughts.</div><b><div><b><br /></b></div><i>August 4, 1996
<br /></i></b><i><br />
Yesterday, Dad presented me with a recently written book called "Modern Hamlets." It's pretty cool. It is a succinct look at a dozen 20th century actors who have played Hamlet, and how they set about performing the soliloquies.
<br /><br />
At first I thought this emphasis on the soliloquy was precious. Why so specific, what is the point? A few chapters in and I see how, by zooming in on the soliloquies in specific, and not each performance in general, we get a brief distillation of each actor's Hamlet.
<br /><br />
Reading this, reading how the great acting men of this century tackled what some feel is theater's greatest role (if not play) makes me long for directing Shakespeare. "<a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2012/04/romeo-and-juliet-1994.html">Romeo & Juliet</a>" was difficult, "Hamlet" would be more so, but I would like to try.
<br /><br /><b>
January 26, 1997
<br /></b><br />
I can tell you this; thanks to Kenneth Branagh, no one ever has to produce an uncut "Hamlet" ever again. He has done it, he has done it on film, and regardless of what records it broke in the Guinness Book of World Records (first uncut Hamlet on film, longest Shakespeare on film) he has proven without a doubt that producing unabridged it is unnecessary.
<br /><br />
However, <a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-v.html">Branagh's film</a> highlighted all of the stuff that is normally removed. For example, everyone removes Fortinbras and everything to do with Norway (see: the Mel Gibson 1990 film) which robs the story of its depth. Branagh even turned Polonius into a much more political, scheming man, instead of just a doddering old fool, which was infinitely more complex and interesting, and still just as funny.
<br /><br />
However, the Broadway 1995 production (<a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-iii.html">Ralph Fiennes</a>) kept all of these elements while still paring down the text. It is hard work, cutting down Shakespeare the right way. But it is also rewarding.
<br /><br /><b>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrFN3T6aUXkIufjFtuKL0Sen4YF8pKH-YwGHHFn6LI1sq6Ymum0-5Lvdfv6OT9_JTWeR8YUfWxfjcq-9_x6nvKHpm0vlqMRQPEgLMkJDnCK-oZ2Jxw1PeSvtoT5B5Slg_ZCt4U5YIK7uAWnedTfCsDXSkmjmKSQSjEtKWQqhjNnYCOxq5KejNj1ASehO4/s1000/51sGUuNU4QL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="662" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrFN3T6aUXkIufjFtuKL0Sen4YF8pKH-YwGHHFn6LI1sq6Ymum0-5Lvdfv6OT9_JTWeR8YUfWxfjcq-9_x6nvKHpm0vlqMRQPEgLMkJDnCK-oZ2Jxw1PeSvtoT5B5Slg_ZCt4U5YIK7uAWnedTfCsDXSkmjmKSQSjEtKWQqhjNnYCOxq5KejNj1ASehO4/s320/51sGUuNU4QL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg" width="212" /></a></div>June 24, 1997
<br /></b><br />"Hamlet: A User's Guide" by Michael Pennington. I got it in England and read it very fast; another amazingly helpful text on the subject of what is most probably going to be my next Shakespeare.
<br /><br />
My next project should be called the "Bad Epitaph Theater Company." I can't remember at what point in my life I came up with that one, it's old, I know it is, I don't know who talked me out of it, but if I start with a production of "Hamlet" (and there hasn't been one in this city since 1991) that would be a good name.
<br /><br />
Anyhow, Pennington has done this play a dozen times, in most of the leading male roles, even Fortinbras, and has quite a bit to say about the subject.<br /><br /><b>
December 23, 1997
<br /></b><br />I have finally decided to direct "Hamlet." Pennington reminds us that no one decides to produce this play without having already decided who is playing the main character. I didn’t believe this to necessarily be true until now. I have chosen a Hamlet, and now am obsessed with producing it.</i><div><br /></div><div><b>Sources:</b></div><div><i>"Modern Hamlets and Their Soliloquies" by Mary Z. Maher (Iowa, 1992)</i></div><div><div><i>"Hamlet: A User's Guide" by Michael Pennington (Limelight Editions, 1996)</i></div></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-vii.html">To be continued.</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-24871921806217731212023-12-22T00:00:00.006-05:002024-01-14T09:53:08.616-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part V)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi78rfSok1o2poZVyaopuPiZdqVqZJ0YqXmYfpBm2fl7lYxFWE8BIv1Hqer844Xczt5MIphFNGo59Wjfu5ng388x_9Idd98FvJgEu7DxiI-1hRW7wvoZPEK6bviIE2TCBB_3SvGn7WVIX3nO9Ugu2b8yMW3XtdNYqF12gWG5g6LJFFA6083nkZFoDgaHxg/s400/jacobi-branagh-christie.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi78rfSok1o2poZVyaopuPiZdqVqZJ0YqXmYfpBm2fl7lYxFWE8BIv1Hqer844Xczt5MIphFNGo59Wjfu5ng388x_9Idd98FvJgEu7DxiI-1hRW7wvoZPEK6bviIE2TCBB_3SvGn7WVIX3nO9Ugu2b8yMW3XtdNYqF12gWG5g6LJFFA6083nkZFoDgaHxg/s320/jacobi-branagh-christie.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"It's me. Hi."<br />Derek Jacobi, Kenneth Branagh, Julie Christie<br />Hamlet, 1996</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Look. I come to bury Kenneth Branagh’s <i>Hamlet</i>, not to praise it.
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But how can you argue with success? It’s a brightly colored production with manically animated set pieces and swirling camerawork – <i>Hamlet </i>as an action film, which is fine! The character has long been described as a man who cannot decide, who is unable to “take action.” But he does! He’s always on the move! And Branagh makes him vital and exciting, not brooding and torpid.
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I visit schools all over, have done so for years, and if there is a film version of <i>Hamlet </i>most shown in these schools, this is positively that one.
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However, in the act of presenting the complete text, a four-hour endeavor, the entire undertaking feels rushed, under-rehearsed and not carefully considered.
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Watching the film for the first time in a recently renovated <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2017/03/the-flick-2017.html">Centrum Theatre</a> on Coventry, I was impressed by the first soliloquy, “O, That this too, too solid flesh …” Not for the rendition itself (which is fine) but how long the take is. Branagh delivers the piece without a cut, and then the scene continues unbroken as Horatio, Barnardo and Marcellus enter to share the news of the ghost.
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Long, uncut takes like this allow an actor to display the range of their stagecraft, and it’s like watching a good play, up close. Take for example Claudius (Derek Jacobi) seducing Laertes (Michael Maloney) into committing acts of treachery. It’s a great scene from the play, and one usually cut to the bare facts.
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Unfortunately, as the film goes on these long takes feel like a method to rush the filming along. For the “rogue and peasant slave” soliloquy, which should be one of the high-points of any production, Branagh thrashes about with his limbs, frantically gawping as he trashes a map room. It may be emotionally appropriate, but the director in me wanted him to try it again. I was led to believe the whole production was so big he decided that there wasn’t time to get it right.
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwCdZIbsxDCxDXUhdZ9gHu9qrar-LbjwDW24PrJkx0AgTCIvWOU_BhS3f-aa4fXM5DRKmvb2dzIAc67SfJVsXvN3JLmsUHL_eukGeUpWxi7qRJ2r4gL360XoNRlja-cqf8GGILX3Z79T6u7_pGDxhCGPzH8GlwyBLeQDqVjj-Kofgxp1DnL8Cs1CUJY2w/s194/images.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="194" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwCdZIbsxDCxDXUhdZ9gHu9qrar-LbjwDW24PrJkx0AgTCIvWOU_BhS3f-aa4fXM5DRKmvb2dzIAc67SfJVsXvN3JLmsUHL_eukGeUpWxi7qRJ2r4gL360XoNRlja-cqf8GGILX3Z79T6u7_pGDxhCGPzH8GlwyBLeQDqVjj-Kofgxp1DnL8Cs1CUJY2w/w320-h320/images.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Other crimes, in no particular order:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>
Scary, scary Brian Blessed</li><li>
Sexy Dane sex</li><li>
Rapier javelin</li><li>
Smushed Ophelia face</li><li>
Christ pose exit</li><li>
Jack Lemmon
</li></ul>And perhaps most egregious, the speech “How all occasions do inform against me” is depressing, not rousing. It is not “St. Crispin’s Day.”<br /><br />
As my father once told me, “If you aim at a king, you must kill him.” That summer I had already started to fantasize about staging some future production of <i>Hamlet</i>, and I would take my time in conceiving it.
<div><br /></div><div><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-vi.html">To be continued.</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-20843140001732409302023-12-21T00:00:00.003-05:002023-12-22T09:37:26.220-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part IV)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoxtEvHdWK2BW9saoCfem0ptPifs_-yPGQpSN8WlmFXEiY0qsQ1HkwfisHq6A8NG42Jy5f3VjH3uBHp_GsYOKmYqz_kbEado2-pcYH1QJ2ny0kcvMtmyUtefqojXCTo3kf3nbyDYIAwhp3IKzpqnn6BdCfK8nXkCpSpC_X-wEdZrCJ-QidY1e5FbhDq2k/s460/henry-v-kenneth-branagh-1391011548-view-1.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="460" data-original-width="460" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoxtEvHdWK2BW9saoCfem0ptPifs_-yPGQpSN8WlmFXEiY0qsQ1HkwfisHq6A8NG42Jy5f3VjH3uBHp_GsYOKmYqz_kbEado2-pcYH1QJ2ny0kcvMtmyUtefqojXCTo3kf3nbyDYIAwhp3IKzpqnn6BdCfK8nXkCpSpC_X-wEdZrCJ-QidY1e5FbhDq2k/s320/henry-v-kenneth-branagh-1391011548-view-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Brian Blessed & Kenneth Branagh<br />Henry V, 1989</i></td></tr></tbody></table>At the age of 26, <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2010/08/macbeth.html">Orson Welles</a> directed and starred in what is generally regarded as the best film ever made, <i>Citizen Kane</i>. That was in 1941.
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At the age of 26, Kenneth Branagh directed and starred in what is generally regarded as the best adaptation of Shakespeare to film, <i>Henry V</i>. That was in 1989.
<br /><br /><i>Side note: At the age of 26, I directed my first Shakespeare, Guerrilla Theater Company’s production of "<a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2012/04/romeo-and-juliet-1994.html">Romeo & Juliet</a>" and lots of people liked it. That was in 1994.</i><br /><br />
An independent film, and therefore not widely distributed, I believe I first saw Branagh’s <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/07/this-band-of-brothers.html">Henry V</a> </i>in early 1990, and we all lost our shit.
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Recently acolytes to the genius of Shakespeare we, the magnificence and success of this movie heralded nothing less than a renaissance of Shakespeare on film, which indeed came to pass. Whether or not you choose to credit Branagh with this achievement, 1990s cinema (and beyond) was fairly awash with Shakespeare, including Franco Zeffirelli's <i>Hamlet </i>(1990), Oliver Parker’s <i>Othello </i>(1995), Baz Luhrmann’s <i><a href="http://daddyrunsfast.blogspot.com/2023/09/kiss-me-and-kiss-me-til-im-dead.html">Romeo + Juliet</a></i> (1996), <i>Twelfth Night</i> (1996), <i>A Midsummer Night’s Dream</i> (1999) and Michael Almereyda’s <i>Hamlet </i>(2000) as well as adaptations like <i>10 Things I Hate About You</i> (1999), <i>O</i> (2001) and <i>She’s the Man</i> (2006).
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Branagh’s next cinematic Shakespearean outing solidified his reputation among Gen X aged theater nerds. <i>Much Ado About Nothing</i> is a bright and goofy take on what has become one of my very favorite of the Bard’s scripts, and this time Branagh expanded upon his acclaim by casting a number of high-profile American actors including Denzel Washington, Keanu Reeves and Michael Keaton.
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This is one of the truly impressive things about Branagh; great actors and movie stars want to work with him, a trend which continues to this day as his Poirot adaptations pop with familiar names and faces.
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Even before <i>Henry V</i>, Branagh had staked his reputation with his Renaissance Theatre Company. Like Welles before him and his Mercury Theatre, the work began onstage. Branagh directed and starred in stage versions of <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>, <i>Twelfth Night</i>, <i>As You Like It</i> and others as well as classic works by other playwrights. He also produced radio adaptations for <i>R&J</i>, <i>King Lear</i> and <i>Hamlet</i>, all of which I acquired and listened to on cassette.
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I could go off on how his audio adaptation of <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> inspired me to direct a production myself, or how I read that John Gielgud was unhappy with how Branagh insisted on recording <i>King Lear</i> (Gielgud played the lead) with scant rehearsal. This last detail will be relevant later.
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcneW_g_jW6hXt6z9o4NJlTpyPgla6zjqjTk9x8JtLRkaVYf7kOl5J3n_nXR3PGJ9hEiP3ZZjVuTzZu36CrVR1QT4WcW1JtXFoUy8BYCi2bpLFd0b0Q-xHULFAmP_XJZje7yhkfXfB5Q2d44DGnhMvQhofNKQdRI2KLsd7rkVeUnAh-65vKDKgUlEA2Fs/s349/attori-1.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="349" data-original-width="349" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcneW_g_jW6hXt6z9o4NJlTpyPgla6zjqjTk9x8JtLRkaVYf7kOl5J3n_nXR3PGJ9hEiP3ZZjVuTzZu36CrVR1QT4WcW1JtXFoUy8BYCi2bpLFd0b0Q-xHULFAmP_XJZje7yhkfXfB5Q2d44DGnhMvQhofNKQdRI2KLsd7rkVeUnAh-65vKDKgUlEA2Fs/s320/attori-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Michael Maloney (center) & ensemble<br />In the Bleak Midwinter (1995)</i></td></tr></tbody></table>For his third Shakespearean outing onscreen, I had hoped Branagh would choose, well, absolutely any title but <i>Hamlet</i>. <i>Much Ado</i>, for all the adoration heaped upon it, is not great. There is a lot of mugging and eye-rolling meant to indicate to an American audience which lines are meant to be funny, and before that he had directed the modern noir mystery <i>Dead Again</i> (1991) which is unintentionally hilarious. I didn’t think he was yet a good enough director to summit the Dane.
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When it was announced that Branagh’s <i>Hamlet </i>would feature the complete text, entirely unabridged, it was clear he was pointing to the bleachers. It was clear he wouldn’t be merely directing <i>a Hamlet</i>, he wanted to make <i>the Hamlet</i>. I was very worried.
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In 1995, Branagh wrote and directed <i>In the Bleak Midwinter</i> (US title: <i>A Midwinter’s Tale</i>) a brief, black and white comedy about the company of “am-dram” performers putting on a holiday production of <i>Hamlet</i>. It’s a silly and delightful piece of work, full of inside baseball for thespians, and Branagh doesn’t even appear. His surrogate is the film is Michael Maloney, who opens the film with the monologue about the anxiety of acting as a profession, a performance which is all the more enjoyable when you realize Maloney is doing a spot-on impersonation of Kenneth Branagh.
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Midwinter is a celebration of the act of creation, a love-letter to theater artists everywhere, and in its way, I felt the film was an apology for the grotesque and unhappy excesses of his <i>Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein</i> (1994). Maybe Branagh's <i>Hamlet </i>would be good after all.
<div><br /></div><div><i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-v.html">To be continued.</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-63255125829385122182023-12-19T00:00:00.002-05:002023-12-21T12:34:23.820-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part III)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBVgVTfjdM5D_iEtKbzzDr7ibjwf1N1HMWH98q6cyuwcO5jVqcFsba3pzPfdUNat1BZfoDPabAcdpAk8rnrabZXObOrgMf_KyWShj05WZOpOtf3HZIIypD-0arbB39mhZlq9wSLwzgDfiPjp6jvbpmlZFy4x6IbBNUGzVvTyDyJkU6AwgAqBMkFMo2rTI/s1600/s-l1600.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1016" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBVgVTfjdM5D_iEtKbzzDr7ibjwf1N1HMWH98q6cyuwcO5jVqcFsba3pzPfdUNat1BZfoDPabAcdpAk8rnrabZXObOrgMf_KyWShj05WZOpOtf3HZIIypD-0arbB39mhZlq9wSLwzgDfiPjp6jvbpmlZFy4x6IbBNUGzVvTyDyJkU6AwgAqBMkFMo2rTI/w254-h400/s-l1600.jpg" width="254" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>I have this poster.</i></td></tr></tbody></table>December 1990, the school of theater had arranged a tour of London and Stratford. We got to see Royal Shakespeare performances of <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/04/play-day-king-lear-bonus.html">King Lear</a></i>, <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2016/04/loves-labours-lost-2016.html">Love’s Labour’s Lost</a></i>, <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2022/12/on-understudies-swings.html">Much Ado About Nothing</a></i>, and Chekhov’s <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-seagull-2001.html">The Seagull</a></i>.
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I was still pretty jet-lagged when we rolled into the Royal Shakespeare Theatre for <i>Lear</i>, and literally pinched myself through the show to stay awake. The most compelling reformer was He Who Played Edmund (that’s a hint, by the way). In the first scene, Edmund says little, but gracefully endures the verbal bullets cast his way by other for his “illegitimate” birth.
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When all have gone, this Edmund took his position, center stage, one foot forward, and delivered the most cutting and hilarious rendition of the “Bastard” speech I have ever heard, feet planted, hands at his sides, he just said it. His voice, his face, and the text doing all the work.
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This was Ralph Fiennes, twenty-eight years old, and three years from <i>Schindler’s List</i> and international acclaim.
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The next day he was Berowne in <i>Love’s Labour’s.</i> For the “Love’s Whip” speech he did the same thing as with Edmund's soliloquy, he just said it, standing there. And I thought, "Oh, this is his bit. He does this.” For some reason, that left the twenty-two year me unimpressed.
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Then came <i>Schindler’s List</i>, and <i>Quiz Show</i>, and then he performed <i>Hamlet </i>at the Belasco Theater on Broadway in 1995, where it was quite the palpable hit. And we went to see it!
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Once more, I was seated in the very back row of a theater to see a live production of <i>Hamlet</i>. After being subjected to his uncle’s condescension and his mother’s entreaties, the Prince is left alone on stage, and recites “O, that this too, too solid flesh would melt …”
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Fiennes stood, one foot forward, hands at his side, and just said it.
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I leaned over to my girlfriend and whispered knowingly, “He does this."<br /><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAy_sjx0EMTbm9C4NjKebPo9Hfv4Y4Z-xtDrM-Xn4LHZsed0czdSP6buPvZtho0tEPnuKs94IGIZk2Rf_veFa6yhv2QM0yn7td-oGy6__uT1X-2tT1Zy-WyZqH2qx92rWsie_Wj3cQN2uevN2xr0kmHWI65dMd83LYv8-II-wnAJ-2AvwaOcdCM2qmS98/s506/fa5a5cda9d1f80b6b5ba5eb6482d298f.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="506" data-original-width="488" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAy_sjx0EMTbm9C4NjKebPo9Hfv4Y4Z-xtDrM-Xn4LHZsed0czdSP6buPvZtho0tEPnuKs94IGIZk2Rf_veFa6yhv2QM0yn7td-oGy6__uT1X-2tT1Zy-WyZqH2qx92rWsie_Wj3cQN2uevN2xr0kmHWI65dMd83LYv8-II-wnAJ-2AvwaOcdCM2qmS98/w309-h320/fa5a5cda9d1f80b6b5ba5eb6482d298f.jpg" width="309" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ralph Fiennes as Hamlet<br />Belasco Theatre, 1995<br />Photo: Mark Thompson</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Of course, he did so much more, too. Hamlet has several soliloquies and monologues, each of which move the plot forward and track the progression of his psyche throughout the play. “<a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-i.html">Too, too solid flesh</a>” is the rock bottom; if he does have a suicide soliloquy it is this, and not “To be or not to be.” That first speech mentions “self-slaughter” as a viable (if damnable) option. If anything, “To be …” is an argument <i>against </i>entropy.
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Regardless, Fiennes stood, for that one moment, and was on the move for the rest of the show. I recall in particular his delivering Hamlet’s advice to the players as he worked with them to set up chairs for the performance. Kinetic, engaged – a participant.
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I stood, too, during the curtain call. I even hollered “Bravo!” which is slightly embarrassing to recall. Was it that good? I think he was, he was certainly the best Hamlet I had seen to that date, which included GLT’s <a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-ii.html">1989 production</a>, Zeffirelli's 1990 film, and another local production in 1991, the inaugural offering from the Cleveland Theater Company, an entirely unabridged production directed by Tom Fulton and featuring every Equity actor in town.
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Ralph Fiennes won a Tony Award for Best Actor for playing Hamlet in 1995. The next year would provide us a high-profile, star-studded film adaptation about which I have so many thoughts.
<br /><br /><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-iv.html">To be continued.</a></i>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-11897030104528375392023-12-18T00:00:00.007-05:002023-12-19T22:03:27.646-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part II)<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcGLrfVKgj243RyB3-F73PcrqrFxy-ZzZVBtpe7Mk9isUyXG3YB-zSEFM-B5uC7OB5MB7FZGwbiju-nKR-rIJ-18qeKTDQ4-lFKbzwXDW_9KQvEZ42hTT46_NBHl0KdGiA5GYF_bpSGr_NwppBf90z_qaf5BsvTCfqqbdnuSmUPUun8EXr_SKPi4Z7s3A/s2982/Image%20(11).jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2982" data-original-width="1971" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcGLrfVKgj243RyB3-F73PcrqrFxy-ZzZVBtpe7Mk9isUyXG3YB-zSEFM-B5uC7OB5MB7FZGwbiju-nKR-rIJ-18qeKTDQ4-lFKbzwXDW_9KQvEZ42hTT46_NBHl0KdGiA5GYF_bpSGr_NwppBf90z_qaf5BsvTCfqqbdnuSmUPUun8EXr_SKPi4Z7s3A/w265-h400/Image%20(11).jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Promotional Mailing<br />Great Lakes Theater Festival, 1989</i></td></tr></tbody></table>My third year at Ohio University was Our Shakespeare Year. We hadn’t touched the Bard my previous two years, at all. But the school was producing <i>Romeo & Juliet</i> that spring, so it was necessary to bring us all up to speed. We rehearsed soliloquies for performance, the school purchased a complete set of John Barton’s “Playing Shakespeare” series on VHS.
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Side note on the “Playing Shakespeare” tapes. They were expensive and school secretary, Mother Martha V., our beloved school secretary, kept a close eye on them. They were for classroom use only, they were not to be borrowed, but they could be stolen which we promptly did, dubbing them off and then returning them. Eventually one went missing (not our fault, I swear) and I have ever after lived in fear.
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Also that spring, a certain classical theater company* based in Cleveland was producing <i>Hamlet</i>. Directed by Gerald Freedman, the style was very modern, it was promoted as an “angry young man” version of Hamlet. A number of us drove up from Athens to catch a Saturday matinee, but a water main break in the Ohio Theatre meant the performance was canceled, so my friends and I went to see the just-opened-that-weekend <i>Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade</i> that afternoon.
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We did get seats for that evening’s performance, which were way up in the vert last row of the thousand seat house. This would be the very first time I would see a live performance of <i>Hamlet</i>. I hated it.
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No doubt I had a chip on my shoulder. I was twenty years old. I had spent an entire semester devoted to the works of Shakespeare. I had memorized an entire soliloquy (<a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-book-of-william-how-shakespeares.html">two, actually</a>) from the great Dane. I knew a thing or two about <i>Hamlet</i>, and about being an angry young man.
<br /><br />
Looking back, I am sure I would have enjoyed this production, if it hadn’t been my first. At the time, I found its touches of modernity far too clever. Claudius had a nasal twang meant to evoke that of sitting President George H.W. Bush (<a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2017/07/the-testament-of-mary-mamai-theatre.html">folks hate politics in their Shakespeare</a>), the mad Ophelia went topless, and then there was the man himself whose main objective was, as I recall, to be angry.
<br /><br />
One of my mentors gave me a very good piece of advice, to wit; Anger is boring. <a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-i.html">My own rendition</a> of “O, that this too solid flesh,” was peevish, this Hamlet was literally shaking with rage.
<br /><br />
At one point he walks on stage, fires up a spliff, takes a mean drag, and begins, “To be …” It brought the house down. I thought, at the time, that that was entirely inappropriate, turning the most famous speech in the English language into a pot-fueled rant.
<br /><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi29_yL8Efi4bR-4VkNRSFKhqP4s60lbKGL_cNd55a8AD8hJIMZwEucxpGxNewbxS8ksI_QTKeLOFhPcmJiJ13IlV_1_GiJ6d8bXaVmhjwh5miV4_u6btzgSs2yqqTn8E5lVvztL4f4If3GFCxWrMdT6PizUFf9KF9nSeosLH3jKLnVF4JcNxSvrbvlCgw/s364/genre-hamlet1968.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="364" data-original-width="364" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi29_yL8Efi4bR-4VkNRSFKhqP4s60lbKGL_cNd55a8AD8hJIMZwEucxpGxNewbxS8ksI_QTKeLOFhPcmJiJ13IlV_1_GiJ6d8bXaVmhjwh5miV4_u6btzgSs2yqqTn8E5lVvztL4f4If3GFCxWrMdT6PizUFf9KF9nSeosLH3jKLnVF4JcNxSvrbvlCgw/s320/genre-hamlet1968.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Hamlet and the Ghost<br />(Anthony Powell & Peter Aylward)<br />Great Lakes Theater Festival, 1989<br />Photo: Roger Mastroianni</i></td></tr></tbody></table>I have different opinions today, about cannabis and more importantly, about that speech, which I still haven’t figured out. Opinions differed among audiences, too. Letters to the company in response to the production ranged from the outraged to praise like the following:<br /><blockquote><i>“Your exciting, riveting production of Hamlet is just about the most creative and wonderful production I have seen in years. The attention and shock which you elicited from the audience was palpable. No one moved, no one coughed, no one spoke throughout the performance.
<br /><br />
No wonder. This modern interpretation of the classic was … so meaningful. Freedman did more than change the costumes and setting; he interpreted Hamlet in light of modern times for a contemporary audience.
<br /><br />
Yours is the kind of production that young people must see. Then they will understand that Shakespeare was meant to be seen and heard – not read”</i> - Norman W., Cleveland
</blockquote>I agree with all of that. They received some negative letters, too, though most I read were of the “why do you have to mess with Shakespeare?” variety, criticism lobbed at all modern adaptations of Shakespeare for more than a century, and a point of view I find tiresome. The director himself put it very well, in his Director's Note:<div><blockquote><i>"There is no perfect' Hamlet, or a Hamlet for all seasons and all people. One of the difficulties in producing the play is that each person sees Hamlet in himself or herself. Critics have for centuries encrusted the role with ideas and theories that have biased readers to various interpretations. The theater is the place to experience him." - </i>Gerald Freedman</blockquote>And at least I finally saw it. The entire play, beginning to end, performed by a professional company. Only ten years later I would attempt to direct it myself, and my intention would also be to create an exciting, riveting -- and modern -- production of <i>Hamlet</i>.
<br /><br /><i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-iii.html">To be continued.</a></i><br /><br /><i>
Source: GLTF Spotlight, August 1989, Vol. 4, No. 3</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>*Full disclosure, my employer is Great Lakes Theater.</i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-24481607419848572802023-12-17T10:00:00.010-05:002024-01-07T15:05:55.170-05:00Hamlet & Me (Part I)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgilckv3BfCBTMt-WpURfsQ3rkiFhHTDvJmS1EQNj_E5P3CJa-YSoht2ivtut_4EYpZmNFznldsT66xPHcVhoiAW9ItxhuSKairsVJhlzAg4G0mQbM9_JCLRlh5vusXQ7DsdMigO35034TOvUXMG5sHKvX_t14VgNVJy09_YEOP9nuFaiW1q9qpZZC3kjU/s861/Screen%20shot%202013-10-06%20at%209.08.15%20AM.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="645" data-original-width="861" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgilckv3BfCBTMt-WpURfsQ3rkiFhHTDvJmS1EQNj_E5P3CJa-YSoht2ivtut_4EYpZmNFznldsT66xPHcVhoiAW9ItxhuSKairsVJhlzAg4G0mQbM9_JCLRlh5vusXQ7DsdMigO35034TOvUXMG5sHKvX_t14VgNVJy09_YEOP9nuFaiW1q9qpZZC3kjU/s320/Screen%20shot%202013-10-06%20at%209.08.15%20AM.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Heaven and earth, must I remember?"<br />Spring 1989</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div>Junior year at Ohio University, I was preparing a soliloquy from <i>Hamlet</i>, the one that begins “O, that that this too, too solid flesh …” The day I presented it in workshop for our voice and movement teachers, I was asked why I had chosen this particular piece.</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgki5zSBrq8-GqeKZvY-R2Rjwd8Zw4WPhb9Q6BbNUlTA5CqUFoOS-gTeGEB2hoAuLwblNFLxaFj8BPNOKfwY7X2ZJMubyFl2d3fRGcr7h0LInAYlaYvMkXkVxA35db4V1dzzpG8z6-X31nBKxJF018pl5NpNDytT7wm7OO5NU8YQDOTNQ-uuCdNhWo0NVQ/s500/s-l500.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="495" data-original-width="500" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgki5zSBrq8-GqeKZvY-R2Rjwd8Zw4WPhb9Q6BbNUlTA5CqUFoOS-gTeGEB2hoAuLwblNFLxaFj8BPNOKfwY7X2ZJMubyFl2d3fRGcr7h0LInAYlaYvMkXkVxA35db4V1dzzpG8z6-X31nBKxJF018pl5NpNDytT7wm7OO5NU8YQDOTNQ-uuCdNhWo0NVQ/w200-h198/s-l500.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><div>I could have been honest and said, “I don’t know.” I could have said it was the first monologue in the first script I picked up yesterday. I can’t remember what I actually said, but I am sure I tried to bullshit my way through. I was worried I might be asked to choose a different piece, and I’d already worked on this one for over an hour and I did not want to start again.</div><br />
But they wanted to know, what interested me about the character? Why Hamlet? And the more they asked, the more embarrassed and defensive I became because the fact was, I knew nothing about <i>Hamlet</i>.
<br /><br />
I was fortunate enough, attending Bay High School in the early 1980s, that I could still benefit from the expansive liberal arts education that had been afforded to the teeming mass of my Baby Boomer antecedents. We weren’t merely offered the same English curriculum provided to every grade level (English I, English II, etc.) but quarter classes in a variety of genres and disciplines.
<br /><br />I took classes in Journalism, radio drama, <i>Death in Literature</i>, and courses in both Shakespeare Comedy and Shakespeare Tragedy. It was like a college curriculum. We even had a quarter course in Vonnegut, if you can even imagine that.
<br /><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHJRgR2-t4wTk48IsK064SqINRZbRTqXrGfHhGbzmgQJd1RXWlN09M3ZquWauvYDomGrTpdA2KvYvMgRU5g_kYLR2fVIgGFNTdVzxV6YplZKu48Apja9JYLSM-kqrbSVdIPXd7dmDgdAGIhMgj20AQnB0w_DY15P_-L3WwUhUYDY71o6cjMczEXZ8uCRI/s537/index.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="537" data-original-width="537" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHJRgR2-t4wTk48IsK064SqINRZbRTqXrGfHhGbzmgQJd1RXWlN09M3ZquWauvYDomGrTpdA2KvYvMgRU5g_kYLR2fVIgGFNTdVzxV6YplZKu48Apja9JYLSM-kqrbSVdIPXd7dmDgdAGIhMgj20AQnB0w_DY15P_-L3WwUhUYDY71o6cjMczEXZ8uCRI/w200-h200/index.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Richard Burton & Alfred Drake<br />Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, 1964</i></td></tr></tbody></table>For Shakespeare’s Tragedies we read <i>Hamlet</i>, <i>King Lear</i>, and <i>Romeo & Juliet</i> (we had all read <i>Macbeth </i>in eighth grade.) We watched the BBC adaptation of <i>King Lear </i>starring Laurence Olivier and John Hurt (1983) and Franco Zeffirelli’s <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> (1968). But we <i>listened to</i> the 1964 Broadway Cast Recording of <i>Hamlet</i>, starring Richard Burton and <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/02/letters-from-actor-book.html">directed by John Gielgud</a>.
<br /><br />
I cannot speak for my classmates, but I absolutely loved these studio recordings. What I remember most was how Burton brought out Hamlet’s great, cynical humor, which I had missed on the page. Wry, sarcastic, incisive, bitter. The guy was an asshole, and so was I.
<br /><br />
And so, several years later, it made sense to choose a piece from this play to rehearse for class, but as was normally the case during my undergrad years, I hadn’t bothered to return to the text. I knew nothing about <i>Hamlet</i>.<div><br /></div><div><i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/12/hamlet-me-part-ii.html">To be continued.</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-49220347529624238972023-12-16T00:00:00.006-05:002024-02-02T13:44:32.921-05:00Twenty Twenty-Four<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9vRG03WvYGDyqwuBzBJh0Qz2-Ff66B-u_KzpQWGiKfHkBd85ZYnLw4y4cea4-z5XfJktVrrYL1U7-fbiDwj1i7FyAAst2Nk5LIke5w1Ujka7IOfX360xdCA24jb1k1a16hhTWO-12C879PbiAHuYdKkvdVEfbXY-sTR3fZfGPkh4KZB5_Mpbc5dfbrUY/s1162/Tommy%20(repose).jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1162" data-original-width="1161" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9vRG03WvYGDyqwuBzBJh0Qz2-Ff66B-u_KzpQWGiKfHkBd85ZYnLw4y4cea4-z5XfJktVrrYL1U7-fbiDwj1i7FyAAst2Nk5LIke5w1Ujka7IOfX360xdCA24jb1k1a16hhTWO-12C879PbiAHuYdKkvdVEfbXY-sTR3fZfGPkh4KZB5_Mpbc5dfbrUY/w320-h320/Tommy%20(repose).jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Thomas Whitely Cullinan<br />Promotional Photo for "Hamlet"<br />Bad Epitaph Theater Company, 1999<br />Photo: Anthony Gray</i></td></tr></tbody></table>The next year will mark the twenty-five year anniversary of many important events. 1999 was (literally) another century ago, and at that time I was at once wrapped up in some of the most exciting adventures and also in therapy.
<br /><br />
Numbers are arbitrary. However, I was very unsettled at the time about the impending millennium, and hey, I guess my fears were entirely justified. But at the time I was engaged in creating a new artistic endeavor, <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2014/05/lysistrata-2000.html">Bad Epitaph Theater Company</a>, which debuted in April with a production I insisted on calling <i><a href="http://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/11/thespians-with-benefits.html">The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark</a></i>. With the recent passing of Tom Cullinan, I have been thinking more about that production than I have for a very long time.
<br /><br />
I was also engaged in another sense, engaged to be married! My wife and I celebrate out 25th wedding anniversary this summer, and unlike Bad Epitaph, which lasted five years in fits and starts (or my first marriage, which barely lasted two) our romantic partnership has survived, thrived, blossomed, borne fruit … what I’m saying is that we are very happy in our life together.
<br /><br />
A quarter century ago I had written one produced play, and I produced it. But since then have written fifteen more new works than have received a full production. It has been three years since my last, <i><a href="http://davidhansen.org/savory-tanha/">Savory Taṇhā</a></i> (yes, a live zoom production counts, thank you very much) and so I am very glad that in 2024, <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/03/the-tale-of-haina.html">Talespinner Children’s Theatre</a> will produce my new play script, <i><a href="https://talespinnercle.org/performances/">The Toothpaste Millionaire</a></i>.
<br /><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDg2sFRYlH9LNTdUqFVYOnDPXcuWzTPWkKScz9dd3CBxzqM_VhjY_whO00_-G6MuB58HGOUoKLyOyFaYBMthZLUXA2TR8LPHfo6daIDTtTLnxFV3VJqfObdYnBfPYyRDGAtYNX5cDAhOw2ghJ97McgcvpzFJgjkiEJdWYW2iVlTF56bZ0G6q-m1UYv4LM/s472/ABC%20still.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="472" data-original-width="472" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDg2sFRYlH9LNTdUqFVYOnDPXcuWzTPWkKScz9dd3CBxzqM_VhjY_whO00_-G6MuB58HGOUoKLyOyFaYBMthZLUXA2TR8LPHfo6daIDTtTLnxFV3VJqfObdYnBfPYyRDGAtYNX5cDAhOw2ghJ97McgcvpzFJgjkiEJdWYW2iVlTF56bZ0G6q-m1UYv4LM/s320/ABC%20still.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ralph Hoopes & Tierre Turner<br />"The Toothpaste Millionaire"<br />ABC Afterschool Special, 1974</i></td></tr></tbody></table>This will be an adaptation of the book by Jean Merrill (<i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pushcart_War">The Pushcart War</a></i>) about a twelve year-old entrepreneur from East Cleveland. This is my first authorized adaptation, my <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-mysterious-affair-at-styles.html">Agatha Christie</a> works were taken from her books in the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-secret-adversary-in-review.html">public domain</a>.
<br /><br />
Published in 1972, <i>Toothpaste Millionaire</i> was a book I loved as a kid, because it tells my favorite kind of story; one of creation, promotion, and success. These were the same feelings I had in 1999, as the director and also marketer for a new theater company, producing what was at that time heralded as the “greatest poem” of the second millennium.
<br /><br /><i>Millionaire</i> is aimed at the late elementary school audience, kids aspiring to adolescence, it’s also packed with practical applications of math, and it’s also a history play, subtly acknowledging the mood of the times, and the shifting demographics in one American community.
<br /><br />
We look forward, we look back. We always do.
<br /><br /><i><a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/magazine/millennium/m1/vendler.html">Source: “Hamlet Alone, A Celebration of Skepticism” by Helen Vendler, The New York Times, 4/18/1999</a></i><div><br /></div><div><i><a href="https://talespinnercle.org/performances/">Talespinner Children's Theatre presents the world premiere of "The Toothpaste Millionaire" in May, 2024</a></i></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-13250045704838677822023-12-10T00:00:00.002-05:002023-12-11T05:49:05.208-05:00Ten Amazing Productions in 2023<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRFV7LdcGFS80AhntR4S7a4bauGg617N1ldRT8oBqW-NqIeOIGjdA1hlsfZJy5kENEwfb0OfQuyWrL3yryk0hOvXYCiCEQxyAmNL9q26vikhgnVnaMm3MTPjzAi9xiTCA4sPrybv15VSA0n6eOcLpuKr5hoqFXo1mecM0dztcduKrkCnQcitMboEeQONw/s1440/330925711_498396219037396_6054208342147479218_n.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="1440" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRFV7LdcGFS80AhntR4S7a4bauGg617N1ldRT8oBqW-NqIeOIGjdA1hlsfZJy5kENEwfb0OfQuyWrL3yryk0hOvXYCiCEQxyAmNL9q26vikhgnVnaMm3MTPjzAi9xiTCA4sPrybv15VSA0n6eOcLpuKr5hoqFXo1mecM0dztcduKrkCnQcitMboEeQONw/s320/330925711_498396219037396_6054208342147479218_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jordon & Orson at "Hadestown"</i></td></tr></tbody></table>When did we start posting photos of our programs? I remember all those in early 2016 who went to see <i>Hamilton </i>with the original cast, showing off selfies in the Richard Rogers Theatre, feeling at once joy for whoever was there and also that inevitable pang of jealousy.
<br /><br />
Totes FOMO, yo.
<br /><br />
Of course, I have also posted a picture of my <i>Hamilton </i>program on Instagram, but also, when I remember to, pictures of the program from whatever show I am seeing, wherever I’m seeing it. It’s a promotion, not a flex (I promise) reminding anyone out there who cares to know that theater is happening, and to encourage others to choose it.
<br /><br />
This year I had the opportunity to see a lot of shows, and I want to make more of a habit of this. Since the kids have moved on to college I have taken more opportunities to just go see shows as a regular thing.
<br /><br />
Here are ten I caught this year which were amazing (presented in chronological order).
<br /><br /><b>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyMl3tBA3EFXMCPartwnJbil6h5K3NPvA-Zoe35eb00BiOSRvE82v-FKQECAZ7iJb4VQ31Knb-89fZZczEIq__ZUPDcnTk80P78tdZUkrqrlOTEizzmSjYoRup2is_MEQrcoNPfvK3ZT1oB-tXX680m5f_SFfdrkjjpxXIbWKgq0SaTZHnk9wazPir3Zg/s1239/331400681_1196973737600811_9172558532493337144_n%20(2).jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1239" data-original-width="1238" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyMl3tBA3EFXMCPartwnJbil6h5K3NPvA-Zoe35eb00BiOSRvE82v-FKQECAZ7iJb4VQ31Knb-89fZZczEIq__ZUPDcnTk80P78tdZUkrqrlOTEizzmSjYoRup2is_MEQrcoNPfvK3ZT1oB-tXX680m5f_SFfdrkjjpxXIbWKgq0SaTZHnk9wazPir3Zg/w200-h200/331400681_1196973737600811_9172558532493337144_n%20(2).jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Scenes From a Night's Dream"<br />Photo: Rob Wachala</i></td></tr></tbody></table><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/02/2023-neomfa-playwrights-festival-week_18.html">Scenes From a Night’s Dream</a></b> (convergence-continuum) Yes, I’ll start with one of mine. This was my Master's Thesis, an exploration of the darker corners of my own psyche and I couldn’t have been more pleased with the acting company who realized not only the loopiness of the dream but the dreadful tension of reality.
<br /><br /><b>
Hadestown </b>(Palace Theatre) The boy and I <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2021/10/hadestown-at-walter-kerr-theatre.html">saw this show on Broadway</a>, and we were both excited to get to share the touring production with our partners, here in Cleveland. I’m not really a huge musical fan, but I like what I like, and I really think this is the best original musical of the past ten years.
<br /><br /><b><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/08/how-i-spent-my-summer-2023.html">Fun Home</a></b> (Cain Park) This show is meant to be intimate, which is why it was weird to see the Broadway tour perform <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2021/01/gay-comics-19-bob-ross.html">Alison Bechdel</a>’s memoir play from the balcony in the Palace seven years ago. The Alma was not only a more suitable venue, but we were seated front row center on opening night. Joanna Cullinan directed this piece with all the sensitivity and humor it deserves.
<br /><br /><b>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOeUOvrkF7l8IwOpZ-jnGlgA9ECP82-MeGgpRl0xr3Ej806QkUJ1X2zemhO16P8nm33ynxqL1KYn7-VLz9t2Ejj_Hc-wK75PpTqDYt0q0-8ETcpylRZ9h-gujbGygFL4A7_wYlY3yxwgYy6HE7ALa9nAT8JMnB5pPlzRT5aHpD8BnCZEmj4m7j0XMfLpE/s991/6Z8A6231cr%20(1).jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="991" data-original-width="991" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOeUOvrkF7l8IwOpZ-jnGlgA9ECP82-MeGgpRl0xr3Ej806QkUJ1X2zemhO16P8nm33ynxqL1KYn7-VLz9t2Ejj_Hc-wK75PpTqDYt0q0-8ETcpylRZ9h-gujbGygFL4A7_wYlY3yxwgYy6HE7ALa9nAT8JMnB5pPlzRT5aHpD8BnCZEmj4m7j0XMfLpE/w200-h200/6Z8A6231cr%20(1).jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Step Nine"<br />Photo: Steve Wagner</i></td></tr></tbody></table><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/08/step-nine-at-borderlight-fringe.html">Step Nine</a></b> (give me your keys) This is another one of mine, a twenty-minute two-hander about toxic masculinity in the theater community. Presented for free in a small room at Parnell’s downtown as part of the BorderLight Fringe Festival, I have been led to understand that a few men about whom I know absolutely nothing were angered that I would write a play about intimate details from their personal lives.
<br /><br /><b>
The Last Five Years</b> (Near West Theatre) The main problem with any production of <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2016/09/the-last-five-years-musical.html">this two-person musical</a> by Jason Robert Brown is that anyone playing Jamie will try to make him sympathetic, but he’s not. Neither is JRB for having written a somewhat cringy roman à clef about his first marriage. The folks at Near West saved the play from itself by queer casting Sarah Blubaugh in the role, who was able to cut to the heart of the role in the way no man could, and by God, she even crafted a mythic spectacle from the much-derided “Schmuel Song.”
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDYGZzwg-dx3kyFI2DzoeOzeJ0IDvTEE4GnSK-CqQYUHNaMTyqTQJz8zglGfEB4m94ibTGMPt1a43TEmWbgPuVohh13HH9AhGUoKCCHecQfPN3JAfYlBNeda9i0QfAEPI3EL6PK6M1Baxvi5OkjH_n0thFSJvFgICmkIIrx34yTAbW_BgkUIKeA8bVHTg/s949/378114765_810711924393472_2996621041251066794_n.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="949" data-original-width="949" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDYGZzwg-dx3kyFI2DzoeOzeJ0IDvTEE4GnSK-CqQYUHNaMTyqTQJz8zglGfEB4m94ibTGMPt1a43TEmWbgPuVohh13HH9AhGUoKCCHecQfPN3JAfYlBNeda9i0QfAEPI3EL6PK6M1Baxvi5OkjH_n0thFSJvFgICmkIIrx34yTAbW_BgkUIKeA8bVHTg/w200-h200/378114765_810711924393472_2996621041251066794_n.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"The Last Five Years"<br />Photo: Amber Patrick</i></td></tr></tbody></table>Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812</b> (Great Lakes Theater) People who love this musical really love this musical, but that’s not a lot of people. I came to it entirely fresh and was entirely overwhelmed. This was the best show I have ever seen at Great Lakes Theater. Alex Syiek as Pierre brought me to tears, twice.
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Bulletproof Backpack</b> (Tri-C West) Eric Coble wrote a very good script about America’s gun pandemic, and director James Alexander Rankin staged a fast-paced production packed with urgency. And that’s the best kind of art they is.
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Merrily We Roll Along</b> (Hudson Theatre) Ever since I heard of this musical’s troubled history, I’ve been fascinated by it. I read the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2010/07/merrily-we-roll-along.html">Kaufman & Hart play</a> it is based on, I have been inspired by the backward chronology, I’ve seen the <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2017/10/best-worst-thing-that-ever-could-have.html">documentary</a>. Songs from this show are now classics. When I heard this production was headed to Broadway I told my wife, we’re going. And it's a hit! People are really starting to get into Stephen Sondheim.<div><b><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJeahQRoydgwab_yPwS6Lr8vLIL4dkc7fS3qjrAKO_hCLARx5SFzWv3XEPHGz18ITIqlaH52k_OXsYE5pb3E6jr1NjL2b8THpH0iRQfk-VTmYgz8TCkXLV96NTpLQMjiio5EnNyXkXZFlyFB2hDFt7C0C1aKrU24aBHSSmau2K8557I7Luvdt-9_ESaIM/s1162/407694507_10160989259963389_3892217694968096927_n.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1162" data-original-width="1162" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJeahQRoydgwab_yPwS6Lr8vLIL4dkc7fS3qjrAKO_hCLARx5SFzWv3XEPHGz18ITIqlaH52k_OXsYE5pb3E6jr1NjL2b8THpH0iRQfk-VTmYgz8TCkXLV96NTpLQMjiio5EnNyXkXZFlyFB2hDFt7C0C1aKrU24aBHSSmau2K8557I7Luvdt-9_ESaIM/w200-h200/407694507_10160989259963389_3892217694968096927_n.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"John Proctor is the Villain"<br />Photo: Daren Stahl</i></td></tr></tbody></table></b><b>Purlie Victorious </b>(Music Box Theatre) It is a beautiful thing to see a triple threat like Leslie Odom Jr. tackle a straight play where he still has the opportunity to bring the graceful might of his voice and agility to the work. It is a demoralizing thing that a play from sixty years ago that comments on the state of civil rights in America is just as relevant in the 21st century, but I guess that’s why we do theater, right?
<br /><br /><b><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2020/04/play-day-john-proctor-is-villain.html">John Proctor is the Villain</a></b> (Academy for the Performing Arts) Having first read this piece by Kimberly Belflower during the lockdown, I was really looking forward to eventually seeing a production. A high school drama about agency and abuse, I’m very glad I had the chance to see the work executed so expertly by actual teen performers.
</div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-46215651105263838082023-11-28T00:00:00.005-05:002023-12-26T09:53:02.319-05:00Shakespeare In Debt Benefit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitheZ-V49brhNkQxwoNKc8ja5SWUirpfNM44RgJvXeG_ft87AgxbrPbU3LAcMeeshyphenhyphenRj3_iEVPudjUQ-NwFOqFbU82MGF4eC6kLEBHz5Lej9skd0nDzTpDT_ix8SvbWZzmuK2zo4Pyhsc68paTn9r33sOUOxGyYH7i5KSuxnHegzWhDFbBiN1wImUtrJU/s1194/benefit(3).jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1194" data-original-width="1194" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitheZ-V49brhNkQxwoNKc8ja5SWUirpfNM44RgJvXeG_ft87AgxbrPbU3LAcMeeshyphenhyphenRj3_iEVPudjUQ-NwFOqFbU82MGF4eC6kLEBHz5Lej9skd0nDzTpDT_ix8SvbWZzmuK2zo4Pyhsc68paTn9r33sOUOxGyYH7i5KSuxnHegzWhDFbBiN1wImUtrJU/w320-h320/benefit(3).jpg" width="320" /></a></div>I hadn’t planned Bad Epitaph further than one show. I was 30, and I wanted to direct a production of <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2019/02/letters-from-actor-book.html">Hamlet</a> </i>with all my friends. That was it.<br /><br />
We held a fund raiser at the Brick Alley Theatre at 4051 St. Clair Avenue, where the show would be presented in April, 1999. The evening was called <i>Shakespeare In Debt</i>, a play on the title of a <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2017/10/shakespeare-on-stage.html">recent hit movie</a>. The generous goodwill offered by neighborhood restaurateurs as well as funds raised by an electric and interesting silent auction brought in about eight hundred dollars, which was close to our goal.<br /><br />
We also put on a few silly sketches and a live set by a singer-songwriter Rachel McCartney. The entire evening was a show of heartfelt support from the Cleveland theater community for what we were trying to do.<br /><br />
At the end of the evening we were cleaning up and tallying funds when I noticed a bankers box just sitting out on a table, in front of a large window, right next to the (unlocked) door to St. Clair Ave. “What’s this?” I asked.<br /><br />
It was the door, admission to the event, which had consisted largely of walk-ups, paid in cash. There was another five hundred dollars in there.pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-3531051591833049792023-11-27T00:00:00.001-05:002023-11-28T21:55:40.466-05:00Sin (1999)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3oR-gRNrskloiBlV0i-GBucoawyK8ODvQB0faOBs_tywwpAzXbLWFfLjsunDoNX7hWNu822jaxo16UZUmhm5ej6lQqorWK964sADpCfFkbqDeUVBlpTUi3IBzkdfWrN6uYC0iWeJUlDMa38-zOSJi4zcmuXlGwqCzXTpz-HGomiXx6qmcXdPD1sGsL0g/s923/Sin%20(1).jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="923" data-original-width="923" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3oR-gRNrskloiBlV0i-GBucoawyK8ODvQB0faOBs_tywwpAzXbLWFfLjsunDoNX7hWNu822jaxo16UZUmhm5ej6lQqorWK964sADpCfFkbqDeUVBlpTUi3IBzkdfWrN6uYC0iWeJUlDMa38-zOSJi4zcmuXlGwqCzXTpz-HGomiXx6qmcXdPD1sGsL0g/w200-h200/Sin%20(1).jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Before digital cameras, and later, phones, made it possible to see the picture you had taken right away (or to just take half a dozen images all at once to appraise later) we'd take one carefully posed photo and wait a few days, hoping it turned out all right.<br /><br />
So, here's an overexposed picture from when playwright Wendy MacLeod was Bad Epitaph Theater Company's guest of honor at a performance of her play <i>SIN </i>in late 1999. From left, director Roger Truesdell, MacLeod, myself and Sarah Morton, who played the central character, Avery Bly.<br /><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnp-Ai0y7RUXKWtZMABMPRSdaFXz9SVqpem4bnrujD1tdVb8j3-9-Bz4K3q-Dvmx6y6Rqqq8aOYehNtpIyiNlixXC9CK-sowETk2ec5R-RIt8RsA6KAy4hnyTCViYX8cAcTpIeKhkFUULjsqd-AndOR3g9pafPaW6hQEXlPC61PY1Do_8LCLhJiZggKhc/s999/Sin%20(2).jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="999" data-original-width="999" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnp-Ai0y7RUXKWtZMABMPRSdaFXz9SVqpem4bnrujD1tdVb8j3-9-Bz4K3q-Dvmx6y6Rqqq8aOYehNtpIyiNlixXC9CK-sowETk2ec5R-RIt8RsA6KAy4hnyTCViYX8cAcTpIeKhkFUULjsqd-AndOR3g9pafPaW6hQEXlPC61PY1Do_8LCLhJiZggKhc/w200-h200/Sin%20(2).jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Discovering long-hidden photographs can take you right back to a place you thought you remembered, but offer so many lost details. <br /><br />
For this production we partnered with INSIDE, a Tremont art gallery at <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-actors-gym.html">2393 Professor Street</a> (now the site of <a href="http://www.bourbonstreetbarrelroom.com/">Bourbon Street Barrell Room</a>) dividing the space in half with curtains so that half could maintain displays while a temporary performance space was knocked up with other half. <br /><br />
Forty seats. We sold the house every night!
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And that's how you do that.
<br /><br /><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="285" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/xLHnS-3X7iQ?si=FbSBlXlt1fmYaKyl" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-81043627944890229482023-11-26T00:00:00.004-05:002023-11-28T21:56:57.505-05:00The Santaland Diaries (Revisited)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpiJQrn5Euva9ks08dIBxZLCyL-ba6LV0-Fpwk7jdstLR2_13E16mcRKGNBGqJhErPvCDN6Pk5iLIb6c50xjVE7-F3YuYRI8YxZGGeJUGd7B1vMF5m_JLSHG5vIi4rlDnQA4-ufKP-kWR1Hh8PViAOlqP4Ekk9QLsW64H85kc4bzSwXuJ4RyDOYftZuno/s1036/brick%20alley.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1036" data-original-width="1036" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpiJQrn5Euva9ks08dIBxZLCyL-ba6LV0-Fpwk7jdstLR2_13E16mcRKGNBGqJhErPvCDN6Pk5iLIb6c50xjVE7-F3YuYRI8YxZGGeJUGd7B1vMF5m_JLSHG5vIi4rlDnQA4-ufKP-kWR1Hh8PViAOlqP4Ekk9QLsW64H85kc4bzSwXuJ4RyDOYftZuno/w200-h200/brick%20alley.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Recently I have been going through a lot of junk in my home, and came across photos from days long past that I must have taken and immediately stashed away. Among these were pre- and post-show photos for a few Bad Epitaph Theater Company productions.<br /><br />
This photo was taken from the booth at the (former) Brick Alley space at East 40th and St. Clair, opening night of <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2011/12/the-santaland-diaries-1999.html">The SantaLand Diaries</a></i> by David Sedaris, starring Curtis D. Proctor and directed by Thomas W. Cullinan.<br /><br />
That was twenty-four years ago this weekend, in late 1999. What an adorable cabaret space. So rough, so Cleveland! See the photo at right for the view from the house (and look carefully at this first photo and you might even see where I am seated.)<br /><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd0lsCFQkYvzJHBydMVY-oPqod0dndt-s1LRcwUiyLhfSBEXKf30tJdZ-NyUPUgm0KCcBGciJIycfZ5HKlplLs-6NFwl3_OgiNaCKbA1mu5wTz-Wy-fzglBtsHzvaxEcfgZ4EVT8qPP1jhYZoit_9DZxDlYlvhh2R2DoEdRydMLjKwa4taTQKICmCWDtU/s960/Screenshot%20(913).png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="960" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd0lsCFQkYvzJHBydMVY-oPqod0dndt-s1LRcwUiyLhfSBEXKf30tJdZ-NyUPUgm0KCcBGciJIycfZ5HKlplLs-6NFwl3_OgiNaCKbA1mu5wTz-Wy-fzglBtsHzvaxEcfgZ4EVT8qPP1jhYZoit_9DZxDlYlvhh2R2DoEdRydMLjKwa4taTQKICmCWDtU/w200-h200/Screenshot%20(913).png" width="200" /></a></div>Since we started having live children, the holidays have been the absolute last time I want to be involved in a production. I was needed at home nights, and that's just where I wanted to be.<div><br /></div><div>And yet, looking at that picture, I am reminded once again how enjoyable to be on the Great Holiday Show Calendar. To be out and among the people, and to be the one providing them their festive and much-desired entertainment. Best wishes and many grateful thanks to my friends and colleagues who are all opening shows tonight.<br /><br />
This production is <a href="https://youtu.be/pOiwUtvfz_E?si=mLo2TgnEtceaxWdT">still currently available</a> on YouTube. The video is a bit shaky, but the audio is surprisingly good.<br /></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-43018820643321456812023-09-24T00:00:00.002-04:002023-09-25T21:42:12.449-04:00The Marriage of Bette and Boo (1988)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi38Q8EirYMgp2Zj9UKOO7jUhSUC8onkpobVdLM1aLmwrzu_2AR99GVoeQjoL0NlQHmj8v9_yCgYHy30LwuZ9l8ygJT38gCssvF1Me_e1Fg4fsCBO_Fe2zthf8VW7g7pCGJo99BtSuWZBtK_rmy6LDMIO9HxRcb1C7uxhaTICGnbWHu9EeES8CNKAbELTs/s2028/THE.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2028" data-original-width="1349" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi38Q8EirYMgp2Zj9UKOO7jUhSUC8onkpobVdLM1aLmwrzu_2AR99GVoeQjoL0NlQHmj8v9_yCgYHy30LwuZ9l8ygJT38gCssvF1Me_e1Fg4fsCBO_Fe2zthf8VW7g7pCGJo99BtSuWZBtK_rmy6LDMIO9HxRcb1C7uxhaTICGnbWHu9EeES8CNKAbELTs/w266-h400/THE.jpg" width="266" /></a></div>Folks need to stop auditioning with the tuna fish monologue from Christopher Durang’s <i>Laughing Wild</i> (1987). It’s a go-to comedic monologue for people who need a funny and check a list of “ten best comedic monologues for women” or something, I don’t know where they get it. People born in 2001 can’t possibly have ever seen this show. Anyway, the "Child of Prague" monologue is right there and I’ve never seen anyone try that.
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When I was a sophomore at the Ohio University’s School of Theater, I played the role of Father Donnally in an undergraduate production of Durang's <i>The Marriage of Bette and Boo</i>. I recently came across my script, upon which I had drawn a faithful self-portrait (see right) as the character Father Donnally.<br /><br />
For the run at the Public Theatre in 1985, the role of Father Donnally was originated by Richard B. Shull who is best-remembered by my generation for performing as the judge in Billy Joel's "Keeping the Faith" music video. The role of Paul was performed by another Ohio University School of Theater grad, J. Bill McCutcheon who played Uncle Wally on <i>Sesame Street</i> fame and also Dropo in <i>Santa Claus Conquers the Martians</i>.<div><br />
There was much about this play that I did not understand as a nineteen year-old undergrad. Alcoholism for one, child loss for another. A thinly veiled roman a clef about his own family (the playwright played the protagonist in the original production) Bette is a woman who desperately wants lots of children, but only her first survives. Bette and her husband “Boo” have the Rh factor, which was why my own grandparents’ children all died, in utero or shortly after birth.
<br /><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8zDuumPMBgVck1xPrei3wSCyHDDIuk9yvgIn0Z75vOQI29hiTyrHgSEMPsJnOtkI-gWejpu4L5gk-YFGWhYmnn2NWydIYlBzSy-ypss_FjoGolZyJhX8VIBHEgqUnNsPVyfchQZ33cu4opfCZ9zk2bIjexu16Z2wA5LLs8odwvhOPZryT4SoxhoU6c3w/s511/10391746_180385752959_573884_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="511" data-original-width="511" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8zDuumPMBgVck1xPrei3wSCyHDDIuk9yvgIn0Z75vOQI29hiTyrHgSEMPsJnOtkI-gWejpu4L5gk-YFGWhYmnn2NWydIYlBzSy-ypss_FjoGolZyJhX8VIBHEgqUnNsPVyfchQZ33cu4opfCZ9zk2bIjexu16Z2wA5LLs8odwvhOPZryT4SoxhoU6c3w/s320/10391746_180385752959_573884_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Self (Father Donnally) with Katurah Nelson (Bette)<br />"The Marriage of Bette & Boo"<br />Ohio University School of Theatre (1988)</i></td></tr></tbody></table>We say quite simply that a couple “can’t have children” but what we’re really saying is that they tried, probably several times, with heartbreaking results. After two miscarriages and a stillbirth, my grandparents adopted my father.
<br /><br />Father Donnally is a figure of patriarchal uselessness. He and a doctor are supposed to be played by the same actor, the only character who is not a member of Bette and Boo's family. A different actor played the doctor in this production. </div><div><br /></div><div>In the play <i>Bette and Boo</i>, every time another child is expected the doctor arrives with a swaddled bundle, drops it on the floor and announces dispassionately, “It’s dead, the baby’s dead.” In the Forum Theatre at O.U., the doctor dropped the baby from the lighting grid over the stage. On opening night, each announcement got bigger and bigger laughs from the packed house of supportive theater students.
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The second weekend of performances was Parents’ Weekend, and that Saturday night there was absolute silence or uncomfortable moans whenever we made a dead baby joke. I asked our director, Dr. Condee, why all our parents didn’t laugh. <div><br /></div><div>He said quite simply, “Maybe they don’t think stillbirth is funny.”
</div></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-89972087504385557902023-09-16T00:00:00.004-04:002023-09-17T11:48:42.335-04:00Acapulco Gold (book)<b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcBW3YdcNZF4VYolEkWSpOD1WS32eLeuLY_48ok3DGzUN2Lwzak_42OzwVNeCee4GEWaOgUTl4-F0R9LHCWPKTI1CCnYg7ifomK8m751QxxfADQCAYk3kf3IB3ZvZPVaHbrv40XybDrHfwdO6rw9IzzlQaK_MOfw7oGaAO_nRY7mhC22ueDDBqrz5T71k/s600/54063035.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="372" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcBW3YdcNZF4VYolEkWSpOD1WS32eLeuLY_48ok3DGzUN2Lwzak_42OzwVNeCee4GEWaOgUTl4-F0R9LHCWPKTI1CCnYg7ifomK8m751QxxfADQCAYk3kf3IB3ZvZPVaHbrv40XybDrHfwdO6rw9IzzlQaK_MOfw7oGaAO_nRY7mhC22ueDDBqrz5T71k/w198-h320/54063035.jpg" width="198" /></a>Pengo's 2023 Summer Book Club
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I have always been in love with marketing. As a kid, I wanted to sell things. I don’t mean I wanted to make money (I’m still no good at that) I wanted to create product for others to acquire from me.
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An artist does, too, but an artist is very particular about what they create. I wanted to make and to find an audience for things people wanted. I would design cereal boxes and candy wrappers. I made greeting cards. I wanted to be a graphic designer, I guess. <div><br /></div><div>I did try taking courses in design, at Ohio University, and at Kent. But I was never very successful. Mom said I should have gotten a job at American Greetings, and she was right.
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I embraced my role making posters and other promotional materials for Guerrilla and <a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2020/11/adventures-in-marketing.html">Dobama</a>. I was happier designing the posters for Bad Epitaph than I was directing the plays.
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Long before becoming engrossed in the TV program <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2013/11/mad-men-tv-show.html">Mad Men</a></i>, which is ostensibly about the business of advertising, I had read a book in high school called <i>Acapulco Gold</i> by Edwin Corley. Written in 1972, it’s an in-depth description of one Madison Avenue advertising executive, told with the same kind of hard-drinking, hard-playing bravado of that aforementioned 21st century TV program, though this story focuses on the account of one firm working secretly to get the jump on federal approval for the recreational use of cannabis.
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCGQU8B-7Ok_TT3W1l1cxA0EKEcq71SqAlDf-Unxbkc9enXhWc-n0f57CFXUvw8h2cwHI3WiBRW-TycLRp8PFU0156ALYOx9umY8cZeJS7I7Y9ViVgP6c464pr3ALTrBarFDsq-xzsOhZngPG4wTX39d2w_JN9MFc4eFFViWfqfG8tGe0DihaKLbi-tNo/s1097/21246166_10154900211937960_3871864854570926710_o.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1097" data-original-width="848" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCGQU8B-7Ok_TT3W1l1cxA0EKEcq71SqAlDf-Unxbkc9enXhWc-n0f57CFXUvw8h2cwHI3WiBRW-TycLRp8PFU0156ALYOx9umY8cZeJS7I7Y9ViVgP6c464pr3ALTrBarFDsq-xzsOhZngPG4wTX39d2w_JN9MFc4eFFViWfqfG8tGe0DihaKLbi-tNo/w247-h320/21246166_10154900211937960_3871864854570926710_o.jpg" width="247" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Mind Your Own Business" poster<br />Guerrilla Theater Company (1994)<br />I drew this!</i></td></tr></tbody></table>How would a commercial advertising firm promote weed?
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The more amusing aspects of this fable set aside (are they amusing? I cannot tell if the casual racism, sexism and homophobia exhibited by the main protagonist is meant to comment on the mores of the time, or the author’s actual sensibilities and does it make any difference) as a teenager I was largely compelled by the occupation itself – how to create a campaign for the product.
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Currently, I am writing the adaptation of a book, a different book, a book for children, and it also tells the story of a product (to be sure, an entirely different product) from first idea to development to marketing and national exposure. </div><div><br /></div><div>This children's book is tightly focused on the mission to succeed and how, as is often the case, the effect these decisions have on the lives of those around the actors involved can get lost. Capitalism creates many orphans.
</div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-422433941454188290.post-26334055974376544302023-09-10T00:00:00.011-04:002023-09-13T14:30:07.703-04:00Pandemonium 23<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfx3HFC59IBrGMiJXCjoC87VagXqMRySIeJwLTwMEOBPko3bZ80ZNB8MYuG85CUxle_OYY5ymg1gSu9wkP65ar8ohQ6a54RmOL_5fg3KyITO6LEI5a7TKRPJILBq1IM1Z_LxgsCpzs_PY7JGqMtoo593MU9KDbF3SkCfKkXL2SSnUhqdaA7penBa5Jtqw/s3024/376371258_329753146085849_2766903545250789216_n.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfx3HFC59IBrGMiJXCjoC87VagXqMRySIeJwLTwMEOBPko3bZ80ZNB8MYuG85CUxle_OYY5ymg1gSu9wkP65ar8ohQ6a54RmOL_5fg3KyITO6LEI5a7TKRPJILBq1IM1Z_LxgsCpzs_PY7JGqMtoo593MU9KDbF3SkCfKkXL2SSnUhqdaA7penBa5Jtqw/s320/376371258_329753146085849_2766903545250789216_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div>Saturday night was my tenth experience at CPT’s Pandemonium. This does not even include the time I sent the actor-teachers to conduct the <i>Where the Wild Things Are</i> residency with a throng of partying adults.</div><div><br /></div><div>
I have written short plays, I have performed in plays written by others. Last year’s experience was good, and I was very happy with not only how James and Sarah performed <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2022/09/pandemonium-22.html">Here’s To You, Mrs. Robinson</a></i> but also how well it was received. The next day, however, I developed Covid symptoms and though it didn't time out that I contracted the illness there, it was very likely I shared it, which was upsetting to me. I decided to sit it out this year.
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But then Melissa Crum contacted me about participating in a piece she was directing and I said, well, why not? And I am very glad I did.
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The Heart in the Wind </i>was conceived by Raymond Bobgan, and while I will refrain from breaking down exactly how it worked (not my tale to tell, and besides, as they say, you had to be there) a team of mechanicals focus on a single party goer, in a private space, and invent a poem specifically for them which is then shared with a larger audience.
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmejlRJ02KZS26msOKf3DdXQYLOl3kIPL5Xn9SoHk5P_PEmxBz7Ac23OeWQFghlQZlFroqJgC6mhBGUorWX8litepvjjCK2RIv24HBD5HeLog6awdrAOQCFYCea_daaP-36sfInCKGa3-C7g91lWiA4amZfhfQwxD_nw7vpwqv7RqktV7KUULw0hEiUp0/s3574/375193288_807374757757805_1748873198667572072_n.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3574" data-original-width="2400" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmejlRJ02KZS26msOKf3DdXQYLOl3kIPL5Xn9SoHk5P_PEmxBz7Ac23OeWQFghlQZlFroqJgC6mhBGUorWX8litepvjjCK2RIv24HBD5HeLog6awdrAOQCFYCea_daaP-36sfInCKGa3-C7g91lWiA4amZfhfQwxD_nw7vpwqv7RqktV7KUULw0hEiUp0/w269-h400/375193288_807374757757805_1748873198667572072_n.jpg" width="269" /></a></div>Missy asked me to be the person who invited people into the tent, and it was I who interviewed these subjects. I understood why she asked me to play this part, because this is what I do. My experience as an actor-teacher, and in coaching actor-teachers means I have a skill at asking total strangers meaningful questions about themselves.
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It was a warm, powerful, and immersive experience. One of our subjects was a self-described mother and caregiver, who was surrounded by her husband and three big, adult sons and the experience brought joyful tears and embraces.
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I had my own personal, immersive experience during dress rehearsal (on the night we were too engaged in our own work to engage any other of the offerings) when I read a children’s story to a mermaid. The experience brought me to tears. I haven’t been so moved since the witches’ house at <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2013/08/sleep-no-more-play.html">Sleep No More</a></i>.
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My own work has been largely cerebral, and it has been challenging for me to think outside of crafting scripts for actors to learn and speak – though there is power in that, as evidenced by <i><a href="https://clevelandcentennial.blogspot.com/2023/08/step-nine-at-borderlight-fringe.html">Step Nine</a></i> at BorderLight last month. But these opportunities, for audiences of one, they can resonate, they last, like a fondly remembered dream, and I wish I could tap into that power. For that I may need to right collaborator, and I think I know who they might be.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='500' height='250' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dz7xk3AIjR34jW0HvbSS-yjsh4HBMIw4Ylyo8K32mLFepwlxzmnj1KKWrJ73f4zL7uMeyUJZxWbUx_7AmrQhg' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>pengohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06159516848217178336noreply@blogger.com0