pumpkinstrokemarrow

For some reason I had remembered the theatre as being rather longer than it was. Perhaps on the last occasion we had been sitting at the very back, perhaps behind one of the pillars, which would have made the auditorium seem longer than it did from where we were sitting yesterday, in the middle of row S. I had had also forgotten that the new owners had messed around with the proscenium arch, building out in front of it, obliterating the first line of boxes and with a large gantry with lights hanging above. Rather spoilt the appearance of things as one gazed forward, waiting for the action. But, to be fair, one forget about it once the action had started. But see comments from the time when we were last there which was on or around March 29, 2009.

Given the size of the cast and the complex goings on, the producer had had the helpful idea of projecting the name of the lead in each scene onto the back of the stage. So 'Margaret' or 'Anne' or whatever. But I could have done with it being done slightly less noisily. I suspect that some helpful explanation had also been inserted into the text.

And then, despite the fact that my copy of the text is clearly described as a tragedy, the thing was played largely for laughs. A sin compounded by the tendency, observed before in the Globe, of modern audiences to laugh in all the wrong places, renaissance sensibilities and preoccupations simply appearing silly rather than tragic. Again, as observed before in the Globe, the men, with the honourable exception of Spacey who was strong, failed to convince as men of war who had just come through 20 years of havoc and mutual slaughter. Far too urbane. And the important point that Richard might have been bad, but was just more successfully bad than all the rest of them, was rather muted. Also that, that after fifty years of Henrican incompetence, another minority was not really such a good idea. Also that Margaret had got fairly dirty hands too; a regular lioness in winter.

All in all, the production was very Spacey centric, with the honourable exception of the ladies who made a valiant effort to provide some sober and sensible balance. Buckingham was a presence, but a comic rather than a sober one.

Quite long at 3 hours, but it rattled along OK for the 2 hours before the interval, which seemed to chop Act IV, Scene 2 in half, although the programme was agnostic on this point. Last third, after the interval, seemed a bit slower. Perhaps, Richard having finally made it to the throne, it was all down hill.

Towards the end I was pleased to see that Margaret was carrying what appeared to be a middle sized & middle aged Globetrotter case for her travels. That is to say a grey fibre glass affair from what used to be a fine brand, much patronised by regular travellers, such as people who worked for airlines and tour companies. I own several of them, all bar one from car booters. Sadly, the first one that I owned was damaged by a parking meter and when I came to replace it, Globetrotter had gone far downhill from their glory days and amongst other crimes were using a light grey fibre glass to which they applied a dark grey paint, paint which gradually flaked off with use. Most unsightly. I doubt whether you can buy them at all now.

On the way home, following up the agnostic point, I searched the programme for any mention of work on the text, which had presumably been fiddled with for the occasion. But I found no mention of anything of the sort; the only writer getting a credit was the bard himself and no-one living was credited with preparing the text for the production despite the fact that we had been invited to shell out £9 or something for a copy. We were not even told what text had been used as a foundation. Perhaps one had to shell out the £9 for information of that sort. The £4 programme was there to tell us about parallels with Gadhafi and stuff of that sort.

Having been warmed up in this way, and ready to pay attention to the words as well as to the action, it would now be good to see a more traditional production. Probably not worth trotting up to Hampstead to see the one there put on by Hall junior; from the write up it looks far too much like this one. A sort of cut price, bloodied up version.