OK, Shakespeare fans in or near St. Louis--get excited! Richard III is coming!

[Michelle in MO]

We just finished reading this play and thoroughly enjoyed it! (Now, if I can ever figure out the Wars of the Roses and the Houses of Lancaster and York, I'll really be on top of things!

 

Anyway, the Shakespeare Festival in St. Louis is hosting several plays, but Richard III is coming! This is your big chance to see the twisted character of Richard III on stage. I've never yet been to this particular venue for Shakespeare, but I've heard it's really good.

 

Here's the info:

 

http://www.sfstl.com/os.03.html

 

Plan your trip to St. Louis now, if you can! And, no, I'm not part of the St. Louis Tourism Bureau! ;)

[Jane in NC]

 

Plan your trip to St. Louis now, if you can! And, no, I'm not part of the St. Louis Tourism Bureau! ;)

 

Sure, Michelle. ;)

 

We recently saw Henry V at the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, VA, which features a reconstructed Black Friars Theater. They will be doing Richard II in the autumn. Hmmm...I may need another road trip.

 

Jane

[Michelle in MO]

Now I do remember you posting about that. Did you enjoy it?

 

I think they do the production in St. Louis in Forest Park, which is the huge park in St. Louis which was built for the 1904 World's Fair. I also believe the productions begin shortly after dusk, and the lawns are lit up with lights.

 

I can't believe I've never been to this one. Now I have ample reasons to go!

[Jane in NC]

Now I do remember you posting about that. Did you enjoy it?

 

 

 

Great fun. The theater's motto is "We do it with the lights on" which they explain was how Shakespeare performed at Black Friars: with overhead lighting and wall sconces. The small company of eleven did all 40+ parts, incorporating the audience into the show. This worked since the lights were on!)

 

The theater is just gorgeous and the cast was entertaining not only during the production but beforehand when they sang. One interesting aspect of the production was that all of the characters except Hal began the play in modern street clothes, changing into their various characters' costumes throughout the play. Yet, at the end, they were all back in street clothes (all except Hal), an interesting comment, it seemed to me, on the artifice of theater and on this production in particular which requires imagined fields of battle.

 

While I enjoy filmed productions and reading Shakespeare, nothing beats seeing Shakespeare.

 

Lots of communities have summer Shakespearean festivals. We should all take advantage.

 

Jane

[SwimmerMom]

Y'all are SO lucky!!

[Michelle in MO]

you could attend? You know, both Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller were crazy about Shakespeare. You might do a Google search to see if there's a Shakespeare festival around there somewhere. I don't know your location in Germany (and you don't need to reveal that), but there might be something.

 

It would be interesting to see Shakespeare in German! Or, they might do it in English.

 

Of course, you could see some great German opera! Try this:

 

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,3305582,00.html

 

in Berlin. I think that's the "Queen of the Night," but hairless---she looks really strange!

 

You might also see some Bertolt Brecht or perhaps Faust being performed somewhere.

 

Here's some info. about Shakespeare in German:

 

http://german.about.com/od/literature/a/Shakespeare.htm

 

Also:

 

http://cco.cambridge.org/extract?id=ccol0521267013_CCOL0521267013A015

 

Also this one:

 

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C03E2DA1239F933A05751C1A963958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

 

I couldn't (yet) find any Shakespeare productions in Germany, but I would imagine there probably would be. Shakespeare was very popular in Germany!

 

Good luck! I hope you find one close by!

[SwimmerMom]

Wow! Thanks, Michelle. I had no idea he was so big here. We actually live in the "backwoods" of Germany, so there's not a lot of "culture" here outside of what you normally think of as German culture. I was trying to buy a kind of tea that is manufactured in Germany. I told them where I live and they told me I "must go to a more cosmopolitan part of Germany" to buy their products!! :lol:

 

Bean and I have been to London and toured the Globe (totally worth it!) and visited Stratford-upon-Avon (SO not worth it!). This is our last summer here and we'd love to get to the Globe for a performance, but I hesitate to expose my 12-yo dd to a modern production of Midsummer Night's Dream, kwim? And, while she loves the Bard, I'm not sure King Lear would do anything to further that affection. Oh well, we should be back in the states next year.

[Michelle in MO]

Btw, if you ever want help with the getting a handle on the Wars of the Roses, let me know... it was one of my favorite periods of British history when I was in middle school and I still feel as if the vast multitude of characters are familiar ... not friends exactly, but folks with whom I used to spend a lot of time. [i must confess upfront to my bias, though: I was a passionate Lancastrian and Margaret of Anjou was one of my childhood heroines. (yes, I know that's weird! :) )]

 

since we read the play! It seems like a very difficult period of history to "get right," and I've been wondering if there was a great book (I'm sure there is, somewhere) that would explain that period of history very carefully and thoroughly. I also thought about reading both sets of Shakespeare's tetrologies from the beginning, to get the "full picture" (although I realize Shakespeare took some "artistic liberties" with that time period in order to please Queen Elizabeth). In other words, I would like to read Richard II; Henry IV, Part I; Henry IV, Part II; Henry V (I've already read that one a number of times); then read Henry VI, Parts I-III and then, finally, Richard III. I'm also interested in finding out more about the "Richard III Society" which believes that Richard, albeit ambitious and grasping for the throne, was not the completely evil tyrant which Shakespeare portrayed. My oldest daughter told me that Richard III is a favorite character for Shakespearean actors to portray. She's pretty observant---she also said that the way Macbeth is portrayed, there's some sympathy for his character---he's evil, but still has a conscience which he keeps suppressing, whereas Richard III appears to have no conscience whatsoever.

 

At any rate, this is a fascinating period of history and one that I'd like to read about and research further. (I should have been a medievalist---I sometimes feel completely anachronistic with this time in history!)

 

Thanks for sharing, Eliana!

[Jane in NC]

The American Branch of the Richard III Society ("Dedicated to the study of the life and a reassessment of the reputation of Richard III and the study of fifteenth-century English history and culture") may be a good starting point for your research.

 

Josephine Tey's book, The Daughter of Time, will be a fun read after you see the play (if you have not read it already).

 

I am not an apologist for Richard III but find the modern emotionalism for this historic figure to be interesting.

 

Jane

[TRILLIUM]

Michelle we've taken the kids to most of the Shakespeare Festival shows and have always enjoyed them. They are in Forest Park near the Art Museum.

 

We'll going this year.

[Anne in S'pore]

It seems like a very difficult period of history to "get right," and I've been wondering if there was a great book (I'm sure there is, somewhere) that would explain that period of history very carefully and thoroughly. I also thought about reading both sets of Shakespeare's tetrologies from the beginning, to get the "full picture" (although I realize Shakespeare took some "artistic liberties" with that time period in order to please Queen Elizabeth). In other words, I would like to read Richard II; Henry IV, Part I; Henry IV, Part II; Henry V (I've already read that one a number of times); then read Henry VI, Parts I-III and then, finally, Richard III.

 

How exciting -- this is exactly what I'm planning to do for my own self-education! In fact I have Richard II and 1 Henry IV on order.

 

On books that explain this period of history, I'm currently reading Peter Saccio's Shakespeare's English Kings (OUP, 2nd edition 2000) which is a great resource. It explains what really happened in history during the periods covered by each of the history plays, and then points out what Shakespeare changed, whether for dramatic purposes or because his sources were flawed.

 

Anne

[GailV]

Michelle we've taken the kids to most of the Shakespeare Festival shows and have always enjoyed them. They are in Forest Park near the Art Museum.

 

We'll going this year.

 

You know, we've been here 2 years and haven't tried going yet. Dd seems interested in Richard III -- she's the one who told me that it was playing! Maybe we'll try this year. I need lots of tips for how to do this -- how early do you get there? Is it better to go in the earlier days? How late does it last? What's the parking like?

[Michelle in MO]

I've heard that it does last late---I think the shows start at 8:00 p.m. in Forest Park and probably end around 10:30 p.m. or so. There is a "pre show" that starts at 6:30 p.m., which sometimes has a shortened version of the play for kids and other information.