Mad Hungry Mind

Approaches to Playgoing

Lately I've been struck by different approaches to playgoing:

• Entertainment: Some people go to plays the way they go to movies--to view a spectacle, have a few laughs, or shed a few tears. This is an easygoing, recreational approach to attending the theater.
• Performance: Others are drawn to the theater as a showcase for actors. The play is secondary, although without it there would be no opportunity for an actor to display his ability.
• Textual: Still others are interested in the play as a text--the words are important here, and their vocalization onstage is one of many permutations in the experience of the playwright's intention.
• Scholarship: This is related to the Textual approach, but doesn't suffer from all the postmodernist baggage. I think of the Scholarship approach as encompassing an interest not only in the play, but its theatrical history and literary/historical context.

My approach is primarily Scholastic. When I make plans to attend a play, I usually prepare by doing the following:

1. Read the play. Sometimes I skip this step, especially for contemporary works. I spoiled my experience of Edward Albee's Three Tall Women by reading the play in advance, so the moment of transformation in that play was not the surprise it could have been. However, I always read Shakespeare in advance; the complexities of his language demand preparation.
2. Watch previous productions on DVD. Again, this usually applies to Shakespeare rather than contemporary plays, which might not even have been produced for film or TV. These media are not the same as a theatrical production, obviously, but often make reference to theatrical staging. I think watching DVDs is most helpful at helping me understand character development within the play. For example, I watched two video productions of Macbeth before seeing the play in New York, which informed my understanding of Lady Macbeth's character immensely.
3. Read supporting material. I read theater reviews and playwright profiles wherever they are available. I try not to let reviews inform my own opinion of the play when I see it, although I'm not going to try to deny that they make an impact. I am very interested in a playwright's creative process, so profiles in American Theater are always of interest to me. Finally, if a play references a specific era in history, I try to read up on it; this was especially important when I was getting ready for the Royal Shakespeare Company's Histories Cycle ; I read several books about the Wars of the Roses and Shakespeare's historical sources for the plays.

I certainly don't think my way of approaching theater-going is the right way, but it works for me. Maybe this is because I'm interested in thought processes and creative discovery more than I am interested in entertainment and performance alone.

Anyone else out there have a different approach to the theater?

Macbeth: Patrick Stewart at the Lyceum, NYC

My thought, whose murther yet is but fantastical,

Shakes so my single state of man that function

Is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is

But what is not.

One of the downsides of being a rural theater buff is the distances I have to travel to see a good performance. Driving to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival is a minor matter, but flying to Stratford-Upon-Avon to see the Royal Shakespeare Company's History Cycle was a major commitment in time and money. What was my first act upon returning stateside? Making arrangements to see Patrick Stewart as Macbeth at the Lyceum Theater, NYC.

Madness? Maybe, but the deeper I delve into the theater, the more I see the stylistic distinctions between generations of actors. Both young and old can deliver a wonderful performance, but there is a conversational, intimate element to an older actor's delivery that I fear will be lost when these men and women are no longer appearing on stage. I suppose theater buffs of every era have mourned the passing of the old guard, but the truth is that theater traditions are largely preserved in the moment of performance, in the memories of playgoers. Patrick Stewart is an old-school actor, and I have a great memory, so it seemed only right that, fresh from the OSF and RSC, I should book myself on a flight to New York to see him in person.

Mr. Stewart appears in Rupert Goold's production of the Scottish play, which has traveled from the Chichester Festival Theater to the Brooklyn Academy of Music to arrive at the Lyceum. Mr. Goold has set Macbeth in an unspecified authoritarian state; the Scottish lords wear dress military uniforms reminiscent of Stalinist Russia. The staging is not a pure historical piece, however; contemporary allusions abound, such as the mortuary-like pallor of the three witches' makeup and the targeted use of videomontage over the stage to signal Macbeth's psychological shifts as he succumbs to the power of the otherworld.

In the opening act, I found Mr. Stewart's performance curiously self-effacing and passive. Macbeth returns in honor from a war against the Norwegians, and although he muses over the predictions of the witches, he is soon overpowered by his ambitious lady (played with convincing shrewishness by Kate Fleetwood). However, after the murder of Duncan, Stewart's Macbeth assumes a steely determination. His moments of doubt are expressed with wry resignation but no real fear. This resoluteness makes Lady Macbeth's distintegration all the more believable.

Mr. Stewart is admirably supported by Michael Feast as Macduff, who delivers the most convincing emotional collapse at the disclosure of his family's murder. This scene (Act Four, Scene Three) is a key moment in the play; it exposes the desolation of Macbeth's destructive rampage, and elevates Macduff as a man of true human sentiment: "But I must also feel it like a man" he asserts to Malcolm, in an expression of true rage and true grief.

In the end, Macbeth's fate unravels inexorably, but with an unexpected twist of self-insight. His death struck me not as the execution of a tyrant but the surrender of a flawed man to his own nihilistic impulse. The theatrical effect is staggering, in no small part thanks to Patrick Stewart, truly an actor of the old school.

Resources:

NYT Review

NYT Patrick Stewart article

London TV video interview with Patrick Stewart and Kate Fleetwood

NYT video slideshow, narrated by Patrick Stewart

Theater Go-Bag

I'm quite a bag-obsessed person. Deep down, I think I believe that the key to life is the right bag and what to put in it. I have bags for almost every situation, which I admit has created more chaos than order.

However, one unqualified success is my theater go-bag:

I use an Eagle Creek Sidekick, a convertible waist pack/purse, which I wear around my waist during a performance. This gives me a place to rest my hands and forearms during the play (important when my neighbors try to poach the armrests). In the bag, I have

• A small notebook
• A copy of the play
• A program
• A good pen
• Gum, much preferable to throat lozenges for preventing that irritating tickle in the throat during the last act of Othello
• Cell phone (turned off during performance)
• Lip balm
• Tickets, of course (not shown)

What else would I add? Perhaps a mini-flask for water. I can't fit a 12-oz bottle into this bag comfortably, and this is too much water for a single play anyway, so perhaps a small whisky flask. The only thing preventing me from doing this is the fear of being accused of Oscar Wildean pretensions.

Any other bag fanatics out there?

Bags

Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2008: Updated

I chose to celebrate my 40th birthday by seeing A Midsummer Night's Dream at the OSF. Whether this play, which reveals the absurdity of human love through a series of delightful accidents, is an appropriate subject for one's 40th birthday could be debated, but I won't indulge in such digressions here. Instead I'll relive the romp, the spectacle, the party that the OSF production hosted--so I am pleased to believe--in my honor. Check out the page.

Xtreme Playgoing

I'm not much of an athlete. When people ask me if I run, I'll say "Only if something's chasing me." However, I've discovered a sport made just for me:

X-TREME PLAYGOING might be defined by the following exertions:

1. Traveling long distances in order to attend interesting productions.

2. Willingness to attend 2-3 plays on a single day.

3. Ability to stay awake during the 2-3 plays mentioned in #2.

So far, I've traveled over 15,000 Mileage Plus miles this year to arrive at theatrical destinations. I've also logged 400 miles of driving. As for attending multiple plays in one day and remaining awake, I'm your girl. I saw all three parts of Henry VI at Stratford on the same day--ten hours of performances! Priceless.

Are YOU an X-treme playgoer?

Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2008: Updated

A report of the OSF's production of Coriolanus is now available to read. Cheers!

Off to the Theater Again: Macbeth

I'm off to New York tomorrow to see Patrick Stewart in Macbeth at the Lyceum Theater.

Here's a video interview with Stewart and Kate Fleetwood, who plays Lady Macbeth:

Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2008: Updated

A new report on The Clay Cart is now online. Enjoy!

Oregon Shakespeare Festival: Updated

A review for Welcome Home, Jenny Sutter, by Julie Marie Myatt, is now online here.

More Shakespeare? You Betcha!

I know some of you were wiping your brows with relief at the conclusion of my posts on the Royal Shakespeare Company's Histories Cycle--but don't pack your bandanas away yet. I just got back from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, where I saw six of the eleven plays being performed this season. I plan to write about each play over the next few weeks, and will update this page as I do so. A report on the first play I saw is already up--enjoy!