The Mighty, Mighty Bard

I went with friends to Staunton, VA this past weekend to see three performances by the American Shakespeare Center, which performs in the Blackfriar Theatre, an exact replica of the one Shakespeare wrote for. They were phenomenal! I cannot say enough good things about the touring company we saw to do them justice. Therefore, I will just leave it at phenomenal. In light of my lovely trip, I've decided to comment on the three plays. I know this is a bit off my usual pop culture beaten path, but, as I remind my students, Shakespeare was the pop culture of his day.

Taming of the Shrew
Taming has long been one of my favorite plays, despite the extreme anti-powerful woman statement. If you need a plot summary, just watch Ten Things I Hate About You, which is based on the play. The woman who played Katherina, Ginna Hoben, was tremendous. Kate is a tough character to embrace, especially since she spends much of her time complaining and torturing her sister, Bianca. Yet Hoben played her with pizazz. Josh Carpenter, who played Petruchio, was also excellent. He was a good match for Hoben and even had a little Heath Ledger swager to him. These two had really good chemistry, which made for an excellent play. That said, it is difficult to watch this play in the postfeminism era. Essentially, Petruchio starves and browbeats Kate into complete and utter submission. Still, I like this play and its humor.

The Merchant of Venice
Before the show began, Wendi asked me why I liked this play so much. I couldn't really tell her at the time; I just remember really enjoying it after reading it in college. The story follows Antonio, a merchant, who allows his very good friend Bassanio to borrow money on his credit so that Bassanio can woo his love, Portia. Bassanio goes to Shylock, a Jewish money lender, who demands a pound of flesh from Antonio's heart if he cannot pay. Antonio loses his ships and cargo and cannot pay; Shylock demands his pound of flesh, which would kill Antonio. Portia masquerades as a judge and tells Shylock he can have his flesh but he cannot take any blood. In the end, Antonio gets half of Shylock's wealth and Shylock is forced to convert to Christianity. This play was my favorite of the three. I like the play because Shakespeare recognizes that Jews are not necessarily bad people but put into a bad situation by Christians. Yet, Shakespeare doesn't do anything more than this. He still brings about ruin to Shylock, who has every right to be angry with the Christian population and who deserves his pound of flesh. In addition, Shylock's daughter, Jessica, has run away and eloped with Lorenzo, but she is not happy despite her conversion to Christianity. The only happy people are the Christians who have tricked Shylock out of his money and revenge. Merchant is a complex comment on anti-Semitism. What really wowed me about this performance was its ending. Jessica is so distraught that she topples over the money tables being used as the set. The entire place was silent and all you heard was the table thrown over and the change on it spilling over the stage. Although Shakespeare gives no indication that Jessica is so upset at the end of the play, it was an excellent interpretation by the director. I was moved to tears at the end because of Alisa Ledyard's performance as Jessica.

Henry V
This was my first time with Henry V. I don't remember doing the Henry cycle in Shakespeare class in college (but Jennica may want to correct me on this). If I had read this play in the past, I did not remember it. Henry V invades France and succeeds. He marries Katherine, Princess of France, and unites the country for a brief time. This play is about the invasion and a little about his brief courtship of Katherine. I liked this play the least, but that was simply because I didn't know it at all and so it was harder for me to follow; it was still brilliant. A crash-course in Brit history during intermission brought me up to speed and I was able to better grasp the end. Evan Hoffman, who played Henry, was fantastic. His Saint Crispin Day Speech was profoundly moving. He moved around and in the audience to give it and I even wanted to fight for him. I look forward to seeing Henry V again as I'm sure I'll get much more out of it next time. What really impressed me about this play was that 10 people played 46 roles. The point of the American Shakespeare Center is to recreate as much of the original performance's feel as possible. One way they do this is to have a small company, just 12 people in the touring group. To watch the same actors portray multiple roles was excellent in all three plays, but especially in this one as it had significantly more roles to it.