Let's Go on with the Show!

Is it possible to overdose on the theatre? In the last two weeks I have seen Oliver!, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Dinner at Eight, Dead by Nine. However, these have been the only three plays I've seen this year so I don't think it is so bad. In fact, I think it is great! I am quite fond of the theatre.

Oliver! was a middle school production. My ticket was $5 and I could have walked to the performance if I'd felt like it so I thought "Why not?" and went. Before seeing the play my knowledge of the story was limited to the movie and a comic book adaption that I read years ago.

What is it with school buildings and their horrible sound systems? Goodness! This was the worst of all the systems I've been subjected to. Whole scenes went by without the audience catching more than a vague idea of what was going on. I don't know if I would've liked it anywhere near as well as I did if I hadn't known the plot.

Yes, it's true. I did like the performance! I don't know how I couldn't like it. I mean, some of the acting was sub-par and there was some flat singers and I couldn't always hear what was going on but it was still enjoyable.

I had no idea that Mr. Bumble had a relationship with the orphanage's headmistress person, that was an interesting discovery. The one scene, after their marriage, when she is all upset because he didn't like her any more was quite funny. All of their scenes were amusing. My favorite bit though was when she dropped down onto her knees and started bawling. It was so overdone, it was hysterical. :D

I think my favorite songs to see in the play were my favorite songs to see in the movie. Songs like Oom-Pa-Pa, It's a Fine Life, Be Back Soon, Who Will Buy? Reviewing the Situation, etc. were great. Who Will Buy? didn't have the whimsical quality that it had in the movie but I think that it sounded the best of all the songs. They hit the "Who will buy? (Who will buy? (Who will buy? (Who will buy?)))" perfectly. I was really impressed.

I think the best scene was the scene was right after Nancy's corpse was found, when Bill Sykes was shot. That scene was acted very well in my opinion. The gunshot was extremely realistic, too, or else my over imaginative imagination kicked in during all the drama. In my imagination a bullet came out of the gun and collided with Bill Sykes breast and somebody screamed.

Hang on a second? Did I just scream? Oops. I guess I got into the moment a little too much.

Last Friday I saw a highschool production of A Midsummer Night's Dream that one of my friends was in. She played Helena. I don't normally like Shakespeare much because I haven't got the intelligence for it but she got me interested with her enthusiasm so I went.

At first I was a little lost because I couldn't wrap my frail little brain around the Shakespearean language but I got the hang of it surprisingly quickly. I wonder if one of the actors' pre-stage fears was that they wouldn't be able to translate the words for their audience? Obviously the acting was very helpful in the deciphering process, without their help I probably would have remained lost in the obsolete language.

This production of the play was sort of fantastical. Or, they meant it to be fantastical. In the program it said that, when the lovers left the authoritarian rule of the duke and went to the forest, they were transported to a world like our own where teenagers are trying to find a place in the world outside of the rules of parents and guardians. Or something like that. That is what it said in the program but you couldn't really see anything of that in the play except for in the fairies' lair.

The scenery that made up the fairies' lair was a wooden scaffolding drapped in chain and four brick walls covered in graffiti. (The graffiti said things like, "To sleep perchance to dream," "Et tu Brute?" "All that glitter$," "Megan," etc.) A good lair for rebellious (and mischievous!) teenagers but I thought it made a great fairy lair, too! This was my favorite set and I thought it was great before I read the little blurb in the program about the futuristic nonsense they'd attempted. I thought it made the perfect place of residence for a Susanna Clarke-like fairies.

My family and I had the greatest seats ever. It was fantastic. Front row! And not just any old front row but when the actors came and sat on the edge of the edge of the stage their feet would be dangling in our laps. It was great! I am an up close and personal viewer, thank you very much. I like to be able to clearly see facial expressions and such like.

My favorite character was Bottom without a doubt! He was great! He was hysterical. He was a fantastic actor. I didn't like him quite as well when he was a donkey because I wasn't able to see the expression on his face. His facial expressions were what sold him, what made him so great. My other favorite character was one of the acting troupe, I don't remember his name. I think he was a tinker? He was a fantastic actor. He went around with a stupid expression on his face and he had developed a whole way of walking and posture for his character. He really impressed me.

My favorite scene was definitely the play put on by the acting troupe at the end. Oh, me! It was so funny! The guy playing the girl, talking so shrill-ly and periodically adjusting his bust. Bottom being his funny self. The "kiss" was really great.

Of course, I had some things about the play that I did not like. For one, the fairies were very slutty. That wasn't the pleasantest thing to watch. Also, what is it with schools and their sound systems? This one would make loud shrieking sounds every once in a while. Everytime it made this sound I'd expect the sound to be out and gone for good but it seemed to be fine. Also, near the middle of the performance one of the fairies grabbed a nearby microphone and song a solo. I wasn't a fan of this at all, my reasons being that it was boring and pointless, the girl wasn't that great of a singer, the song also seemed like nothing more than a random collection of words. I didn't get the point of it. I wouldn't say, "it could've been left out," I say, "it should've been left out."

On Sunday I saw a comic whodunit at a dinner theatre. Actually, it was in the basement of a church and put on by a church. The dinner was catered by a local restaurant. The food was pretty good, I mean, nothing really fancy. It was no gourmet dinner but it wasn't...hot dogs and twinkies? The salad was good, the spaghetti was okay, and the garlic bread wasn't too fantastic. But, whatever. It was fine.

The play was pretty good. I mean, it was okay. It was one of those plays were the action happens all around you. There isn't really any stage. The play started with the players introducing themselves to the audience in the way that people in stories and plays do and then the guest of honor walked in. She got to the front of the stage eventually, sat down, and the lights went on. When the lights came back on she was dead! She had face-planted in her spaghetti, quite lifeless! There was a comical interchange where one of the man held her head and made her nod and shake to answer questions because he didn't want the dead woman's niece to know that her darling aunty had been--gasp!--poisoned.

At the intermission some yummy brownies were served and everyone was asked to fill out a sheet of paper with their guest as to whodunit. All the right answers would be put in a hat and the name drawn out would get a prize. We all guessed correctly, I thought it was pretty obvious who did it! We were at the table right in the very front so it was pretty easy to see and notice the guest of honor poison her own glass. A line about the fact that the will could only be amended if she killed herself also convinced me that the slight moment I had seen really was what I thought it was.

So, that was fun! It was over way too quickly. There really wasn't a lot to it. My favorite characters had to be the chief--she did a brilliant French accent--and the nephew's wife--who was a great actor and the pastor of the church. (Digression: female pastors are very odd.)

Yeah, I really don't have a lot to say about this last one because their really wasn't much to it. I liked it all right but I wouldn't see it again or anything.

So now, Mame is playing at the end of the month, I would like to see it. I don't know much about it but I would like to see it and know more. It's a musical--who doesn't like seeing musicals. I would also like to see Snow White on the fifteenth of April.

But you know, I shouldn't see either of those. I must penny pinch during the next sixty days until Les Miserables because sometime between now and then I'm going to have to buy an outfit and I'll need money with which to pay for the foodstuff.