The Final Four of a Half Year of Theatregoing

Lincoln Center, Friday night June 20, 2017.  Photo Credit Me.

June ended for me with Oslo by J.T. Rogers at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center.  The play was briskly intellectual, cleverly interesting, occasionally quite funny (people are), its characters were passionate in different ways — and yet the play was not.  Oslo was about the unlikely yet true secret meetings leading up to the Oslo Accords and the Arab-Israeli Peace Process back in the 1990s.  The production, directed by Bartlett Sher, was excellent, with great performances by all, particularly those who played more than one role.  But something seemed to be missing for me, perhaps because I know that all this passion, manipulation, energy and sincere effort led merely, after all that, to a temporary success.

Not to mention I’d been overwhelmed by Indecent less than a week before….

  

Jennifer Ehle and Jefferson Mays in OSLO

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On the day before Independence Day I saw 1984 at the Hudson Theatre.  Alas it was all for show.  Lots of shock value, with lighting effects that may be detrimental to people subject to migraines or epilepsy.  Reed Birney was excellent.  The play may be of possible interest to anyone who did not read the book in school — now that’s a dreadful thought leading to feelings of hopelessness. Simply put, the play was not good. 

Read the book.

Then after Independence Day, more Shakespeare with Hamlet at the Anspacher Theater at the Public Theater in its downtown headquarters.  Director Sam Gold’s production was innovative and exhilarating, playing in four hours that felt like two.  Oscar Isaac is a splendid Hamlet, clever and soft, the boy next door with a secret.  He is an actor with a technical mastery of the language that makes it all sound utterly spontaneous.  The very small cast wove in and out of multiple characters.  Standouts were Gayle Rankin as a quirky, golden-voiced Ophelia, Ritchie Coster as Claudius, Anatol Yusef as Laertes, and Peter Friedman as Polonius.  Unfortunately, this limited run closes Sunday.  (Yes, that’s this Sunday, 3 September.)

Isaac as Hamlet with Rankin as Ophelia.  Photo by Sara Krulwich

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A couple weeks after loving Sam Gold’s production of Hamlet, I saw his production of A Doll’s House Part 2 at the John Golden Theatre.  At best, it was annoying. The play runs a four-act structure in 90 minutes, with mostly two-person scenes beyond which playwright Lucas Hnath must grow.  For no good reason at all, Jayne Houdyshell’s character suddenly started swearing right and left.  I felt it was probably so that Chris Cooper, the sole male in the cast, wouldn’t be the only character using foul language.  And much as I typically like Laurie Metcalf, her Nora made me think of Roseanne, which is not pleasant for me.  Condola Rashad was oddly intriguing as Nora and Torvald’s grown daughter. Director Sam Gold may have received accolades for this one, but I cannot agree this time. 

Jayne Houdyshell and Laurie Metcalf. (Photo by Brigitte Lacombe)

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In closing, it was a lively half year of theatre for me.  When I look over my notes scribbled after these performances, one theme repeated.  “Smartphones.”  This bane of civilized discourse creates annoying addicts too self-centered to turn off their "phones" when requested, too insecure to get through intermission without them.  It should be noted that this rude behavior is not limited to one generation.  What a world.  But that’s for another musing.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to enjoy Labor Day Weekend with friends and family.  Be safe and have fun.

A Wee Hamlet

Last week, the compact traveling production of Hamlet from Shakespeare’s Globe was quite entertaining and unlike any Hamlet I’ve ever seen.  That said, was it Hamlet?  It didn’t feel like Hamlet, although it was certainly Shakespeare.  The language, rapid-fire and musical, was intellectually challenging, and, by virtue of the words themselves and the rhythm of the lines, emotionally fraught.  But were the characters? 

The play opens with song, Laura Forrest-Hay’s music performed by the eight actors who portray all the characters in the script.  Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole co-directed the play with Bill Buckhurst on a tight, clever set by Jonathan Fensom, who also designed the versatile costumes.

Scenic Design Jonathan Fensom, Lighting by Paul Russell.  Photo credit (c) 2012 F. Stop Fitzgerald

The spitfire Hamlet of this production was Michael Benz, a very young man in whom we could see all those things the play says Hamlet was wont to embody — courtier, scholar, etc.  Mr. Benz articulated the brilliance of Hamlet, rather like a teenager whose genius was appreciated before but no longer, not under the reign of the usurper.  This boy is hurt, rather frightened, and still responds with immaturity to much that occurs around him.  Which comes off quite funny.  The lines of the play have always shown us that, but Mr. Benz gave us more of the young man’s brash uncertainty than the older actors to whom we are accustomed.  This Hamlet was a stranger in a familiar land.

Tom Lawrence played the grounded best friend, Horatio, with warmth and humor, and lent life and reality to his other charges, Reynaldo and the Norwegian Captain.

Peter Bray gave equal weight to his portrayals of Rosencrantz, Osric (witty and swell), and Marcellus, although his Fortinbras was not as well defined. 

Matthew Romain plays a fine fiddle, a sensitive and loving Laertes, and a Guildenstern with some depth.

Benz, Bray, and Romain, Miranda Foster in the background.  (c) 2012 Fiona Moorehead.

Christopher Saul was grave as both Polonius, who didn’t talk nearly as much as usual, and the Gravedigger in a greatly shortened scene.

Dickon Tyrrell did good work as the Ghost of Hamlet’s father and the usurping Uncle Claudius, his characters clearly differentiated.  While his lively First Player and Player King were quite delightful, playing all those roles did require some suspension of disbelief from the audience, particularly during the cleverly curtained scene changes surrounding the play within the play.

Miranda Foster played Gertrude rather as a fishwife, braying her tears and fears.  Mind you, in this shortened version of the play (I wish I could see the actual script), Gertrude did seem to have been given short shrift.

Carlyss Peer played Ophelia as a country girl, strong, not too bright, which was fine in the first half, but not so much in the second.  Her mad scenes did not come off as a girl deranged by loss but rather as acting exercises.

Hamlet and Ophelia.  (c) 2012 Fiona Moorehead.

Sometimes, despite the skill of these players, it almost seemed like a production of youngsters, perhaps because most of the players seemed to be physically slight in comparison to the blatant adult males — Saul’s Polonius/Gravedigger and Tyrrell’s Claudius/Ghost, both men much taller than the other players.  Must give us pause.

While the set was fabulous and imaginative, the upper portion was barely used — primarily when Hamlet “hid” Polonius’ corpse and when he returned from his sojourn with the pirates and tells Horatio the tale.  Unfortunately at the time they were upstage of the people clearing the stage (rhythmically, artistically) of the graveyard scene, so it was easy to miss what Hamlet had to say about Rosencrantz and Guildenstern et.al.

Polonius, Claudius, Hamlet, and Gertrude.  (c) 2012 Fiona Moorehead.

The humor in the play was at the forefront here — perhaps that has to do with speed — and the musical opening, interludes, and closing were jolly.  And, of course, there was time for them since you cannot tell me that the text workers (they’re not called dramaturgs in the program) didn’t cut quite large swathes out of the script.  The play wasn’t a mere 2 hours 40 minutes just because Hamlet spoke so fast.  It’s been cut and cut and cut, and while the result was not precisely a new play, it’s a different version.

Back to my earlier question:  Was it Hamlet?  It was not a tragedy, nor was it emotionally engaging.  Well, it was a “Wee Hamlet.” All in all, a flawed but enjoyable afternoon at the theatre.  While the New York run has ended, the production also plays Boston and the West Coast. See it if you have the opportunity.

~ Molly Matera, signing off to re-read the play.  The long version.

Hamlet and the Met

My friend Marcia was in town from Minnesota, so we used my corporate ID and visited the Met gratis. On the advice of a museum-savvy friend, we were determined to see the Vermeer exhibit. Unfortunately, a great many other people were also seeing the Vermeer exhibit, making it almost impossible to get a clear view of the paintings. What we could see was thrilling. I’m not a big fan of static exhibits – that is, the still visual arts as opposed to performing arts – but seeing original Vermeers up close was a startling pleasure. No reproduction in any medium can do justice to the colors, to the lure of the light source in each painting. And looking at the similar paintings grouped in the exhibit, Vermeer still stands alone.

However, those glorious colors were obfuscated by too many people. Marcia and I were happier with the marvelous Egyptian wing. It’s immense, it’s always there, and in one afternoon’s visit you cannot make a dent.

The Egyptian wing is quietly accessible, simple and remarkable. I wondered as I wandered if any of the ‘art’ of the 20th - 21st centuries could weather over 3000 years as these pieces of history have. Imagine the extraordinary few of those days with the good and frightening fortune to create masterworks of painting, sculpture, architecture, and engineering while the majority were relegated to picking, pushing, pulling, dragging and hauling. The work has survived, colors fresh and vibrant, details amazing. For those of modern times not among the fortunate few who work for their art and not at any subsistence jobs, remember this: After you design, execute, and decorate a temple, you will not be buried underneath it!

Wonders:

• The golden sandals that would be a bitch to wear in the summer’s heat -- yes, I can be that dense. It took me several minutes to realize the gold sandals were reserved for the dead. Never mind.
• The ‘dollhouses’, the toys, the entire villages and ships created in miniature to populate the tombs. Those have lasted all these years so we can marvel at them. The living in Egypt did not have that opportunity after all, since these survived because they were sealed in airless sepulchers.
• The colors, preserved, on the transported walls, the statues, the metalwork. To hell with paint chips, I must go back for postcards to save for the next paint job at home.
• Around each corner we marvelled at the precision, the delicacy, and extraordinary imagination required to create beauties & horrors, dreams & nightmares.
  

Mind you, I can always do without mummies and statues. I dislike life-size and slightly larger than life statuary. Creepifying. Put me in mind of the stadtmuzeum across the strasse from the laundromat in Göttingen, Germany. There my minimal German was insufficient to read the legends on the exhibits in a room of mostly photos, black-and-white WW2 era, that appeared to be concentration camp survivors. Nonetheless, I could figure it out. They were photos of survivors of camps, but they were German survivors of Soviet camps. Nowhere in that museum of this university town were the German concentration camps mentioned.

Escaping from that appalling room, I stumbled into a long gallery of statues mounted on pedestals. Not Aryan, more like Norse god figures. Larger than life, but human. Creepifying.

Statues. Bah.

Note: yes of course my laundry was still where I left it, safe, no watchers needed there. It was Germany.

Back to NYC October 2009. We took the 79 crosstown bus to the B’way IRT, then had a pleasant dinner at “Room Service,” a Thai restaurant on 8th Avenue. It may not have been better than the many others along 8th Avenue in the 40s, but it was much prettier. From there we moved on to Hamlet at the Broadhurst. My second time, Marcia’s first.

I had looked forward to seeing the play a second time, assuming I’d see changes, the cast moving into a comfort zone, building upon the solid story-telling it had already accomplished. Alas, the performance felt as if it hadn’t progressed in the three and a half weeks since I saw the play in previews. Geraldine James had found her footing (OK, her lines, all of them), but she still hadn’t created a memorable, distinct Gertrude. Claudius was not any better than he had been -- I still want to see Richard Johnson again. Nor had Laertes gained any depth, although his final scene with Hamlet does work. Horatio seemed to have stepped back into the shadows, when I wanted more of him. And Ophelia was just as bad as she had been, and the underscoring of her song in the ‘mad scene’ was just as infuriating.

Second time around, the still excellent Jude Law stood out in a way he oughtn’t. Yes, he’s Hamlet in Hamlet. That doesn’t mean the rest of the characters who people the story should be drawn in duller colors. So what’s that about? Direction. The same man who underscored Ophelia’s mad song must have directed the actors to give Law stage, when Law is perfectly capable of taking it if he wants it and seems rather to wish to share it. Calling Michael Grandage: Empower the rest of your cast to challenge Mr. Law. They’ll have more fun, and so will the audience.

~ Molly Matera, signing off. Thanks for stopping by.