First Annual Eggs Mayonnaise Honorary Theater Thread

[Donovan]

Because he woulda started it but he was busy looking for his remote, and then the tea was ready, and then the Oscars came on, and then he just didn't feel like it.


First up, not really my favorite or best choice and not even technically theater, but you can't go wrong with a clip that has Dr Who AND Jean Luc Picard AND Shakespeare all in one clip. Now can you? And it was filmed theater-style with minimal set dressing, so there's that.

Hamlet: climactic scene.
[YOUTUBE]W9VZp7IFfXQ[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Donovan]

Mel Gibson's version, for comparison.

[YOUTUBE]3irLWeS5G3Q[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Donovan]

And Branagh's film version, sorry couldn't find a better version than this.

[YOUTUBE]jpNFvkizozI[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Donovan]

Here's a fun one: 1899, Sarah Bernhardt as Hamlet. Funny considering traditional theater including Shakespeare had all roles played by men. [YOUTUBE]Mp_v_dP8s-8[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

Bernhardt was the Glenn Close of her day.

Although Meryl has done the drag king thing too, with the film version of the Broadway epic Angels in America (my favorite). She/he even quotes King Lear -- everything comes back to Shakespeare!

[YOUTUBE]rDWWRxLLcOo[/YOUTUBE]

 

[curiousa2z]

^WOW

 

[Donovan]

I've always kind of been on the fence about Streep as an actress, that might have tipped me back the other way. That was pretty phenomenal.

re: Hamlet (as you probably can tell, one of my favorites), I love to compare differing visions of Shakespeare because the original plays left no stage direction so there's a lot of room for interpretation. The climax scene I find as important as the more famous soliloquy because it's where everything comes together, all plots resolved, all actors get a moment to shine, and it can make or break the play depending on the performances. For example, Gibson plays his Hamlet more manic and mad like a howler monkey, but the final scene focuses much more on the queen Glenn Close as she dies. They even rearrange the order of events a little to establish that dramatic turn. The duel is a street fight of sorts, second to the poisoning. Branagh's version is much more formal, Branagh plays every bit the wronged Prince who is struggling with his destiny, and the duel itself is the key part of the scene, not the players. I like this version a lot, but the scenery does occasionally steal the scene. Too glittery.
As for Tennant's version, while one would think the Brits do Shakespeare best, there's one tiny part of that scene that spoiled it all for me: when Hamlet forces the king to drink poison or face the blade, Patrick Stewart does this little...shrug and smirk thing then chugs it down. I see what he was trying to do, but it comes off as a person weighing a choice whether to have one more beer on a work night, not a man contemplating his own imminent death. Wrecked the scene entirely.

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

The Willy S play I'm more drawn to for its elasticity is The Tempest. I saw a stiff, traditional Elizabethan performance of it in college (my school had a WS festival every spring and performed the annual WS play on a recreation of the original Globe stage). The head of the Drama Dept. gave himself the role of Propero rather than casting a student, so it was kind of a tainted experience. But the story and themes (the end of the Rennaissance, Shakespeare preparing to put down the pen, how the world was turning away form magic and mysticism and toward the Modern Age) have always intrigued me.

When my family first got cable, one of the first movies I saw on HBO was a modern, very loose retelling featuring John Cassavettes and Gena Rowlands -- but it was actually written/directed by Paul Mazursky. It's quirky and has rough edges, but I could watch it a hundred times.

[YOUTUBE]DDvoBtHIWTU[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE]PyPDg8R03_o[/YOUTUBE]

Great performances by Susan Sarandon, Raul Julia as Caliban, and Molly Ringwald's screen debut as Miranda.

The latest version with Helen Mirren as a gender-bent Prospera was flawed but ultimately satisfying. One of those movies that earns 3 stars but you're kinda pissed that it doesn't deserve 4. For all of Julie Taymor's wildly creative ideas, she's a rather fussy director. For all its serious moments and poignant scenes, people can forget that The Tempest is ultimately a comedy. I think I'll have to watch this version again to see if I'm being too harsh on it.

[YOUTUBE]GKG4nRtOwrA[/YOUTUBE]

I went to Ireland for the Millennium, and while sightseeing in Dublin I happened upon the Abbey Theater, and guess which play was currently running! I bought a ticket and saw that night's performance. Amazingly, I remember next to nothing about it, other than the theater seemed kind of shabby and had a ton of dust in the air from the dirt stage. I was disappointed that this once in a lifetime opportunity ended up being a ho-hum night at the theater.

 

[curiousa2z]

holy shit! that Helen Mirren Tempest has an amazing cast!!! I MUST SEE IT.

 

[Donovan]

I love Shakespeare, and every time you see his plays you realize just how much his works have become the basis for so many other things. I enjoy the Tempest as one of his comedies, although to be fair he was very good at mixing both drama and comedy and even Hamlet has a couple of nice little fun bits. But my favorite of the comedies is probably Twelfth Night, especially the scene known simply as "Yellow stockings." For those unfamiliar, the character Malvolio is a steward who is basically the victim of trolls that take advantage of his humorless disposition, literalmindedness and repressed nature. In short, very fitting for this place.

In the scene Malvolio has been convinced that all the things the Lady Olivia hates (smiling, yellow, and cross-garters) are things she loves and that she loves him too. Hijinx ensue.
First a stage version. Funny note: pay attention to his speech, about halfway through he utters a line that has been stolen by a great many politicians who either don't know or have forgotten that it was originally a joke at a self-important pompous idiot's expense. I smile whenever I hear someone just like that say it with a straight face. Gotta love irony. You'll know it when you hear it.
[YOUTUBE]JzG3JhilSPo[/YOUTUBE]

Here's a fun one: 1998 version with Helen Hunt, Paul Rudd, and Kyra Sedgwick. Couldn't find the yellow stocking scene here but it's fun anyway, so I'll post a couple scenes.
Olivia (Sedgwick) meets Viola (Hunt) who is posing as a man. She falls in love with, uh...her.
[YOUTUBE]CpwaTBtlhA0[/YOUTUBE]

Paul Rudd as Duke Orsino. Still posing as a man, Viola falls in love with him.

[YOUTUBE]bf0NKwBthEU[/YOUTUBE]

The guy from The Crow and The Warriors, David Patrick Kelley, plays the fool Feste.
[YOUTUBE]OLf_Gb0SdgU[/YOUTUBE]

And finally, the film version trailer from 2008, Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia with Ben Kingsley. Nice pedigree in that one.

[YOUTUBE]F8DGoF0CQlU[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Donovan]

OOP found one more, which I will include because it is none other than Obi Wan Kenobi being PWNT as Malvolio. His trolling is right at the beginning as he reads the letter supposedly from Olivia...his response is around the 8 minute mark.
[YOUTUBE]SHJnqTSstyE[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

Funny, when I was still doing theater in the early 90s, some friends of mine put on Twelfth Night, and the production looked much like the first clip -- done in the round, with the period moved up to the turn-of-the-(20th) century.

I've seen several of Joe Papp's productions in Central Park: OMG including the one I forgot to mention in my Tempest post, because I couldn't find a clip and it was 6 in the morning: Patrick Stewart as Prospero in 1995! But I'll have to write about that later because I'm at work and I just goofed off long enough watching clips and Googling for info, LOL.

 

[Donovan]

Here's something that has occurred to me before, and getting lost in these great youtube clips really reminded me. My local theater league has been working with NYC to bring broadway hits and productions to town, an idea which excited me but lately has fallen well short of expectations.
Here's the thing, and I'll try not to sound like a theater snob: if his day, the guy whose work we worship and steal from and quote endlessly and remake and re-envision and plagiarize etc, was considered commoner theater, the 16th century version of an Adam Sandler movie.
But when I look at the string of hit productions headed our way today, I see: Shrek. Spiderman. Jersey Boys. American Idiot. Wicked. Children's books and Rock and Roll. Commoner theater.

Now I understand the nature of the business, and that they have to produce the shows that fill seats, but my question is this: if Hamlet's soliloquy WAS commoner theater, and Doc Ock IS commoner theater, has theater gotten dumber or have we?

 

['Gear]

Theater snob. We of course.

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

Short answer: Theater has gotten dumber, because it's now a tourist attraction rather than mainstream entertainment.

Long answer: Before television and the rock music era, theater and movies were on equal footing as the main sources of American entertainment. At one point, theater tickets in New York actually cost LESS than movie tickets. TV and rock music both dealt a 1-2 punch to Broadway music, kicking it off the cliff as a relevant source of pop music. The more theater became a niche art in the US, the more Broadway became an "event" rather than a routine and the higher prices rose (well the unions has something to do with it too but we won't go there).

Incredible documentary from 2004, Broadway: The Golden Age, has interviews with just about every Broadway name who was still alive at the time, and the way all their stories blend together is amazing. We find out how much of a community it was, and how the greatest stage actress of the 20th century is someone completely unknown to people today. It's also amazing how many people in the documentary have died since.

[YOUTUBE]P5TeoXpLJvo[/YOUTUBE]

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000649YA2/ref=oh_o06_s00_i06_details

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

Oh, and orchestra/lower mezz tickets are now about $130-140.

Prices for fucking WILLIAM SHATNER'S TWO-HOUR ONE-MAN SHOW range from $95-$135. I'm not going to see it.

 

[curiousa2z]

^Gods, times (and amounts have changed).

can you still show up in the morning of a show and get cheap[er]tickets? Or are those days over?

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

No, some shows still do same-day standing room and cheap seats. And there are tons of places online that offer the same kinds of discounts that you used to have to stand on line at TKTS to get. I subscribed to TheaterMania.com, and it really helps out when I have to buy large quantities of show tix around Christmastime.

 

[Eggs Mayonnaise]

Stuff to Netflix (streaming):

Theater of War – Go behind the scenes of the Public Theater's 2006 production of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children, starring the legendary Meryl Streep and translated by Pulitzer Prize winner Tony Kushner. In addition to offering a rare window into Streep's process, the documentary also examines how Brecht's own tumultuous life experiences informed his remarkable play. Other interviewees include Streep's co-star Kevin Kline.

[YOUTUBE]BbZXJTjSBvA[/YOUTUBE]

The Life of Reilly – The late actor, comedian and talk-show quipster Charles Nelson Reilly recounts tales from his amazing life in this filmed staging of his one-man play in North Hollywood, Calif. The Tony winner regales the crowd with reminiscences of his lobotomized aunt, his racist mother, his acting classmates Jason Robards and Hal Holbrook, his Hollywood Squares stints and more -- all with his trademark wit and good humor.

[YOUTUBE]04cxv_1hCTc[/YOUTUBE]

 

[curiousa2z]

he more I learn of Meryl Streep, the more in awe I am. And Kevin Kline is no slouch either. I think I've loved everything I've ever seen him do.