11 December: Plays and things

[starlady]

Favorite plays, what you like about theater, etc. for via_ostiense 

I kind of have a type when it comes to plays--you might be able to figure it out when I say that my favorite playwrights are Tony Kushner, Tom Stoppard, and Mary Zimmerman. Honorable mentions to Brian Friel and Michael Frayn, too. And Shakespeare of course but that's practically a given. I really like plays that go after big ideas, that unite ideas and people, that think and dream big. I also really like wordplay.

Favorite individual plays? Stoppard's Arcadia, Frayn's Copenhagen, Kushner's Angels in America (I make no claims that my tastes are unconventional), Zimmerman's The White Snake (note to self, her Wikipedia page is badly out of date). I also really enjoyed the Beardo musical, and I've liked everything I've seen of Stephen Sondheim's so far--really, my theater education is pretty woeful, particularly for someone who once had her own one act plays performed in her high school.

I think what theater excels at is the fact that it's in the moment--which is obvious, but because it's a time-bound thing (even more than all art) it can bridge the gap between times and places with very little effort. The cricket scene in The Invention of Love is one such example--the finale of Mary Zimmerman's Arabian Nights, in which medieval and contemporary Baghdad are briefly one, is another. I don't actually know a lot about theater, so I can't speak from a place of any especial knowledge, but that's always the magic for me--how we can go anywhere without leaving the same room, transported by some people in costumes. It's a definite kind of magic.

Now I really miss Shotgun Players and Berkeley Rep. I never wrote up the last shows I saw there--Tom Stoppard's Salvage and Dear Elizabeth, respectively, both of which were really good. Salvage in particular was excellent, but then, I do love Stoppard. (P.S. Shotgun is doing an all-female playwrights season in 2015!)

Comments

[snickfic]

Aw man, Arcadia. I've liked other work of Stoppard's, too, but that one just mesmerized me. MATH. And structural trickery! I eat that stuff up with a spoon. (Also I came out of it shipping Thomasina/Septimus, which probably makes me a terrible person.) And did you see the on-campus production of it? I don't know how much of their production choices were specified in the script, but I really, really liked what they did with it.

[kinetikatrue]

But shipping Thomasina/Septimus is the totally correct response to Arcadia! I mean, that dance! And how he spent the rest of his life trying to solve her proof! Basically, you're not a terrible person, IMO. And Arcadia's my favorite Stoppard, as well - and the one I've read a million times. Which is also to say that I'm curious what production choices you particularly liked about that production, 'cos I could probably tell you whether they were Stoppard-handed-down or invented by the group doing the show.

[snickfic]

See, now it's been long enough since I saw it that I will probably not recall correctly, but at one point towards the end you have the modern day group at one end of a long table and the romantic-era group at the other end, and there's a servant in each era that's been played by the same person throughout the play - signaled by taking off or putting on a jacket - and at that point he starts interacting with the two groups by just walking back and forth, without even taking the jacket off. It was great. (He might actually have been a friend of the modern group, rather than a servant.)

EDIT: Also, lol, thank you for affirming me in my shippy ways! :D

[kinetikatrue]

Ah, no, not a servant, but the brother character - Valentine and Chloe's younger brother who doesn't talk (Gus) gets to switch back and forth between groups at the end without changing costume because in the modern era group they're all in costume for the party their mother is throwing. And the costume he's in is the one Thomasina's brother (Augustus) has worn for the rest of the play. So, yeah, that bit's pretty standard, but it's lovely to see done, all the same. Also, the bit where he's dancing with Hannah while Septimus dances with Thomasina.

And supporting you in your shipping ways is not hard at all, given that a) good ship and b) pretty much canon.

[snickfic]

Oh, yep, that sounds very familiar! I LOVE when stories do that: convince you of their own arbitrary boundaries, and then break them.

[kinetikatrue]

And Arcadia does it all throughout the play, what with the portfolios that pass back and forth through time, getting things added to them and set back down on the long table.

[starlady]

I did see the on-campus production, and thought it was quite good. I first saw it in high school, when my friends did it in a tiny black box in Old City and not all the actors understood what they were saying. I think I may have seen it a third time, actually, but I'm not sure…

And yes, Septimius/Thomasina all the way!

[swan_tower]

Is it possible to see Arcadia and NOT walk away shipping Thomasina/Septimus?

I suppose if the production were really terrible, maybe.

[via_ostiense]

The Invention of Love is my favorite Stoppard, although I liked The Real Thing when I saw it this fall.