When I picked up the DVD for the RSC's 2009 production of Hamlet, my first thought was: "David Tennant as Hamlet and Patrick Stewart as Claudius? This should rock!"
Sometime later I thought: "Wait a minute, one of those two has already done this..."
It turns out I was right - Patrick Steward played Claudius opposite Derek Jacobi's Hamlet in the BBC film version back in 1980. I had largely blocked that from my memory, due to the fact that it was extremely boring.
Maybe it was the video quality of the tape I watched in high school, but it seemed too dark and muted to be able to really understand what was happening on screen half the time, and the actors were all so... "actorly" that it was hard to actually engage with the drive of the story. Plus, as a teenager, I couldn't quite forgive or accept the fact that Jacobi was clearly around the same age (maybe older) than the actors playing his "parents".
I get that Hamlet is the ultimate "actor's role", and everyone who has every played him wants to be imortalised as one of the definitive Hamlets. I realise that's why it is so tempting for an actor who played Hamlet on stage in his 30s to have a crack at the role on screen twenty years later... but it's just not good. Hamlet is a young man's role, and needs youthful engergy rather than mature gravitas.
This can be a bit odd, in the grand scheme of things, because I felt Branagh was too old for the role when he filmed it at the age of 36, but Tennant seemed to carry off the youthfulness much better, even though he was 38. Olivier was 37, and seemed more "wet" than "youthful", and Gibson was 34 but looked like he was trying to hard to act young and reckless. Branagh didn't really try to act youthful, which is guess is better than trying and failing.
Jacobi, though, was just too old. He should have let someone else play the role on screen. Same with Ethan Hawke. Not because he was too old for the role (at 29 he was the perfect age), but because he was terrible.
I thought the Hawke film would have been worth watching just to see Julia Styles in the role of Ophelia. She wasn't half bad, but the rest of the film was rubbish. It was really only interesting for the fencing scene on the rooftop. Apart from that, it just gave you the opportunity to note that Ethan Hawke belongs with Keanu Reeves in the catagory of "actors who should never be allowed to perform Shakespeare again".
There were, oddly, a few similarities between the Hawke version, which I didn't like at all, and the Tennant version, which I quite enjoyed. Both shifted the play out of it's original historical setting to something more "nowish" - which allowed Hamlet to dress like a modern slob at points. The way both Hamlets used hand-held cameras was also a similarity. Another was the way some scenes just didn't fit at all in this new setting.
The fencing scenes were strangely disjointed in both films because of the modernisation. In a historical context it makes perfect sense for the young men to all be involved in sword sports. It would have been a fairly common thing for men of their station to do. But when everything has been moved up to the 21st Century, fencing becomes more of a specialty activity and it's oddly surprising to have them suddenly put on white jackets and start waving swords around.
I felt as if it was a bit of a deus ex machina moment in both films. "Oh, we need to stab people with poison things now so... tada! They fence! Isn't that neat?"
I don't know why, but I would have preferred to see the fencing gear earlier in the piece. Someone should have been playing with a sword, or practising some moves, or polishing their fencing trophies... anything. It just needed some forshadowing in the modernised version to make it seem less contrived.
Mind you, it's been so long since I saw the Hawke version that I can't say for certain they didn't do this. I just remember feeling the scene was so out of place in a modernisation that it should have been replaced with some other activity - a game of pool or something.
I did enjoy Tennant's portrayal of Hamlet, - he was the first actor I've seen who made me understand that Hamlet was actually sad (grieving the loss of someone he loved very much) and not just depressed - but I also felt the film was lacking something. I can't put my finger on it.
Maybe I've just seen too many version of Hamlet. They all have different strengths and weaknesses and you will never find one that hits every mark for every viewer.
Wonder who'll be in the next one?
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
He said: "She has a lovely face..."
Tennyson rocks my world a little bit. He's a great poet, and he likes writing about the same things I like reading about, so it all works out quite well, really. The fact that I haven't read more of his poems than I have always befuddles me - I know I will enjoy them, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I must fix that one of these days.
I have always loved his version of the Lady of Shalott. Mallory's version is just depressing (and part of the reason behind my undying hatred for Launcelot), but Tennyson's is incredibly beautiful... and depressing.
Well, they both end with the main character both a) dying and b) experiencing unrequited love that directly lead to the dying, so you can't really get away from the depressing aspect of it. But where Mallory's version of the tale is all about Launcelot being a jerk, Tennyson's is this sweet, lyrical character study in which Launcelot is an innocent bystander - the tale is more tragic and less obnoxious the way he tells it.
And then Loreena McKennitt put it to music.
By all that's bright and colourful, McKennitt's setting of the poem is one of the most gloriously beautiful pieces of music I have ever heard. It doesn't matter how often I've heard it, I still get shivers down my spine when she sings the lyric:
It's just the perfect complement - a brilliant match between an excellent poet and a fine musician. Maybe you won't quite find it as inspiring as I do, but I feel I should share it anyway:
God, in his mercy, lend her grace...
I have always loved his version of the Lady of Shalott. Mallory's version is just depressing (and part of the reason behind my undying hatred for Launcelot), but Tennyson's is incredibly beautiful... and depressing.
Well, they both end with the main character both a) dying and b) experiencing unrequited love that directly lead to the dying, so you can't really get away from the depressing aspect of it. But where Mallory's version of the tale is all about Launcelot being a jerk, Tennyson's is this sweet, lyrical character study in which Launcelot is an innocent bystander - the tale is more tragic and less obnoxious the way he tells it.
And then Loreena McKennitt put it to music.
By all that's bright and colourful, McKennitt's setting of the poem is one of the most gloriously beautiful pieces of music I have ever heard. It doesn't matter how often I've heard it, I still get shivers down my spine when she sings the lyric:
She left the web, she left the loomIt's hard to explain if you've never read the poem (or heard the song), but that's the moment where a young girl's yearning to see something real for the first time in her life seals her doom. McKennitt's vocals ever so subtly draw attention to that - three paces were all that had separated the girl from her window. Three paces that she had never walked before for fear of some nebulous curse (that turned out to be true).
She made three paces through the room
It's just the perfect complement - a brilliant match between an excellent poet and a fine musician. Maybe you won't quite find it as inspiring as I do, but I feel I should share it anyway:
God, in his mercy, lend her grace...
Monday, November 7, 2011
My Fair Freddy
"She married Freddy, of course."
For some reason I've always remembered this line as being something George Bernard Shaw (GBS) wrote in his "sequel" to Pygmalion (the play better known in its musical incarnation as My Fair Lady). On rereading that story recently, I discovered it wasn't there. Not only wasn't it the first line, which is where I thought I remembered it being, but it wasn't in the text at all.
In the copy of Pygmalion I own (a second hand copy bought for a dollar back when I was a teenager), GBS has provided both a prologue and an epilogue for the play. In the prologue he tells of one of the professors of phonetics he knew back in the 1870s who formed a large part of the inspiration for Henry Higgins. In the epilogue he provides the "sequel" - telling us what happened to Eliza (and some of the other characters) after the events in the play had finished.
When I first read this story, as a teenager, I found it vaguely depressing. Like many people who loved the tension between Liza and Higgins, I wanted the play to be a love story. At the time, I thought the only fit sequel to the play would involve Liza eventually taming and marrying Higgins. The idea that she would settle for Freddy, of all people, just seemed like a let-down.
I think I've been at a disadvantage because I've only ever seen Freddy performed as something of a non-entity. Whenever I've watched the movie or stage production of My Fair Lady, Freddy comes across as being a bit of a sap, really. But, reading over the play again recently, I've noticed this isn't in the play at all.
Freddy can be played as a sap, or he can be played as the Prince Charming of this particular Cinderella story. The script supports either interpretation.
And there's something else the script supports: Freddy knows.
At the very beginning of the play, Freddy gets a very good look at Liza's face when they bump into each other. They look eyes with each other just as a lightening strike illuminates the scene with a clap of thunder.
Then he comes back and talks to her again before that scene is over - no doubt paying attention to this strange woman who somehow knew his name (just as his mother had before him).
When he meets her later, in Mrs Higgins' parlour, his first words to her are "I've certainly had the pleasure". Granted, he could just be a bit of a vague fool, like his mother and sister appear to be... Or he could be a henpecked man who has met someone beautiful and fascinating and has decided to play along with this interesting game she seems to be playing.
Freddy has had it rough. He was born into the upper echelons of society, but his family is broke. He was raised to be the kind of person who doesn't need to work, but he can't afford to maintain that position. His mother and sister treat him like an idiot, and he's constantly trying to follow behind them and keep up appearances as they go from one social engagement to another (well, insofar as they can afford it). He's probably expected to marry someone just like them - but even if he wanted to, would he be able to afford it? And then, suddenly, this gorgeous young woman is dragged into his world, and it's the most interesting thing he's ever encountered in his boring, henpecked existence. Is it any wonder he's happiest when he's hanging around outside her house?
At the end of the play Eliza makes it clear that Freddy isn't stupid, they've been in contact quite steadily during the past few months, and she knows he loves her. She never says anything to indicate Freddy is someone she is "putting up with", or that she doesn't and could never return his affection. In fact, depending on how you played her, it could be quite obvious that she loves him too, but is still trying to figure out what she wants from Higgins.
It turns out Pygmalion is a love story after all, but we're so distracted by the relationship between Cinderella and her Fairy Godfather that it's easy for us to miss the real love story between our courageous heroine and her slightly goofy Prince Charming.
Reading the "sequel" again in this light, it's so obviously right. That's exactly what should happen. Eliza should marry Freddy, and they should start a flower shop. They both happen to be fish-out-of-water in this bold new middle class world (as she came from the lower classes and he from the upper); they they should struggle together to make a go of it. Higgins is someone who should always be an important part of her life, but like a godfather, not like a lover.
As GBS himself points out - Galatea could never really love Pygmalion, he's too godlike.
And Freddy? Well Freddy deserves more attention. He's so subtly drawn in the play that he can be easily over looked, and given short shrift in performance, but I think it throws the play into a whole new light if you work on the assumption that he isn't an idiot, and he knows exactly who she is - and doesn't care.
You know, I think Freddy just became my favourite character.
For some reason I've always remembered this line as being something George Bernard Shaw (GBS) wrote in his "sequel" to Pygmalion (the play better known in its musical incarnation as My Fair Lady). On rereading that story recently, I discovered it wasn't there. Not only wasn't it the first line, which is where I thought I remembered it being, but it wasn't in the text at all.
In the copy of Pygmalion I own (a second hand copy bought for a dollar back when I was a teenager), GBS has provided both a prologue and an epilogue for the play. In the prologue he tells of one of the professors of phonetics he knew back in the 1870s who formed a large part of the inspiration for Henry Higgins. In the epilogue he provides the "sequel" - telling us what happened to Eliza (and some of the other characters) after the events in the play had finished.
When I first read this story, as a teenager, I found it vaguely depressing. Like many people who loved the tension between Liza and Higgins, I wanted the play to be a love story. At the time, I thought the only fit sequel to the play would involve Liza eventually taming and marrying Higgins. The idea that she would settle for Freddy, of all people, just seemed like a let-down.
I think I've been at a disadvantage because I've only ever seen Freddy performed as something of a non-entity. Whenever I've watched the movie or stage production of My Fair Lady, Freddy comes across as being a bit of a sap, really. But, reading over the play again recently, I've noticed this isn't in the play at all.
Freddy can be played as a sap, or he can be played as the Prince Charming of this particular Cinderella story. The script supports either interpretation.
And there's something else the script supports: Freddy knows.
At the very beginning of the play, Freddy gets a very good look at Liza's face when they bump into each other. They look eyes with each other just as a lightening strike illuminates the scene with a clap of thunder.
Then he comes back and talks to her again before that scene is over - no doubt paying attention to this strange woman who somehow knew his name (just as his mother had before him).
When he meets her later, in Mrs Higgins' parlour, his first words to her are "I've certainly had the pleasure". Granted, he could just be a bit of a vague fool, like his mother and sister appear to be... Or he could be a henpecked man who has met someone beautiful and fascinating and has decided to play along with this interesting game she seems to be playing.
Freddy has had it rough. He was born into the upper echelons of society, but his family is broke. He was raised to be the kind of person who doesn't need to work, but he can't afford to maintain that position. His mother and sister treat him like an idiot, and he's constantly trying to follow behind them and keep up appearances as they go from one social engagement to another (well, insofar as they can afford it). He's probably expected to marry someone just like them - but even if he wanted to, would he be able to afford it? And then, suddenly, this gorgeous young woman is dragged into his world, and it's the most interesting thing he's ever encountered in his boring, henpecked existence. Is it any wonder he's happiest when he's hanging around outside her house?
At the end of the play Eliza makes it clear that Freddy isn't stupid, they've been in contact quite steadily during the past few months, and she knows he loves her. She never says anything to indicate Freddy is someone she is "putting up with", or that she doesn't and could never return his affection. In fact, depending on how you played her, it could be quite obvious that she loves him too, but is still trying to figure out what she wants from Higgins.
It turns out Pygmalion is a love story after all, but we're so distracted by the relationship between Cinderella and her Fairy Godfather that it's easy for us to miss the real love story between our courageous heroine and her slightly goofy Prince Charming.
Reading the "sequel" again in this light, it's so obviously right. That's exactly what should happen. Eliza should marry Freddy, and they should start a flower shop. They both happen to be fish-out-of-water in this bold new middle class world (as she came from the lower classes and he from the upper); they they should struggle together to make a go of it. Higgins is someone who should always be an important part of her life, but like a godfather, not like a lover.
As GBS himself points out - Galatea could never really love Pygmalion, he's too godlike.
And Freddy? Well Freddy deserves more attention. He's so subtly drawn in the play that he can be easily over looked, and given short shrift in performance, but I think it throws the play into a whole new light if you work on the assumption that he isn't an idiot, and he knows exactly who she is - and doesn't care.
You know, I think Freddy just became my favourite character.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Under Construction
Every now and then, I just want the drilling to stop.
That's all - not world peace, not health and riches, just a good solid hour without drilling.
I expect the students studying for their exams might agree with me.
That's all - not world peace, not health and riches, just a good solid hour without drilling.
I expect the students studying for their exams might agree with me.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Where to put a spoof?
I was in the public library the other day when I noticed this:
Now, at the risk of sounding like a character from Sesame Street: "one of these things is not like the other..."
For those of you who might not know, Molvania is not a real country, and the guide book is not a real guide book. It's a spoof of travel books - a joke aimed squarely at the Lonely Planet type books with which it is currently sharing shelf-space.
I wondered, for a moment, if I should say something to the librarians, and then realised they probably know - there just wasn't a better place to put it.
After all, where else would you put a spoof of a particular genre? 827.994 might work for Australian "humor and satire", but is that really a better place to put it than with the genre it is satirising? Perhaps having it interfiled with the books it is mocking is more appropriate.
But, still, the library geek in me thinks they should have put the 827 in the call number somewhere. It's been too long since I've taken a good look at the DDC, so this is probably a little bit off, but perhaps this would have been a more honest classification: 914.700827994.
Maybe I'm just putting too much thought into this for a Sunday morning...
Now, at the risk of sounding like a character from Sesame Street: "one of these things is not like the other..."
For those of you who might not know, Molvania is not a real country, and the guide book is not a real guide book. It's a spoof of travel books - a joke aimed squarely at the Lonely Planet type books with which it is currently sharing shelf-space.
I wondered, for a moment, if I should say something to the librarians, and then realised they probably know - there just wasn't a better place to put it.
After all, where else would you put a spoof of a particular genre? 827.994 might work for Australian "humor and satire", but is that really a better place to put it than with the genre it is satirising? Perhaps having it interfiled with the books it is mocking is more appropriate.
But, still, the library geek in me thinks they should have put the 827 in the call number somewhere. It's been too long since I've taken a good look at the DDC, so this is probably a little bit off, but perhaps this would have been a more honest classification: 914.700827994.
Maybe I'm just putting too much thought into this for a Sunday morning...
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Three books, Part Two
In one of my last posts, when I introduced the idea of the game "what three books would you choose for locking with a kidnap victim in a tower" (which makes much more sense if you think of the fact that the last two retellings of Rapunzel point out that she had exactly three books with her), I referenced a much more normal game (one with less kidnapping):
"If, by some miracle, you were able to plan ahead and keep three books with you on the off chance that you were shipwrecked on a deserted island, what three books would you take?"
These are my books:
1. The Complete Illustrated Works of Lewis Carroll.
Lewis Carroll's poems, in particular, are something near and dear to me. I could probably spend the next few years learning them by heart and reciting them to the trees quite happily. Besides, I might finally get around to reading Sylvie and Bruno. You never know.
2. Suur illustreeritud sõnaraamat, by Jean-Claude Corbeil and Ariane Archambault.
This is an illustrated dictionary that consists of exploded diagrams with every part labelled in English, Estonian, Russian, German and French. It kind of rocks. I have to hide it in another room so I don't stay up to midnight finding out what the French word for "casement window" is. Alone on a deserted island, I can waste as much time as I like on looking up random things.
3. The Bible, by various.
The Bible is the perfect book to have with you in such a situation. On the one hand, it's the anthology to end all anthologies. It has legends, history, poetry and philosophy. There are stories about battles, romances, politics, tales of daring-do and naval gazing. I maintain there's even a play in there (hello? The Song of Solomon has a Greek chorus, for crying out loud!). Some books are miserable, some books are joyful, some are perplexing and others are a wee bit sexy. And if you are willing to argue with the thing rather than blindly accept it word-for-word, there are puzzles that will have you changing your mind over and over again.
On the other hand, it's great for existential stuff. If you want to yell at God for abandoning you on an island, the Bible can help you with that. If you want to ask Him to rescue you, the Bible can help you with that. If you want to ask Him to change the way you see the world so that being lost on a deserted island doesn't seem so bad, the Bible can help you with that. And, woven throughout the entire thing, turning up in different places and in different ways, is the overarching message: "you are not alone".
Like I said, the perfect book for such a situation.
So, those are my three books. What are yours?
"If, by some miracle, you were able to plan ahead and keep three books with you on the off chance that you were shipwrecked on a deserted island, what three books would you take?"
These are my books:
1. The Complete Illustrated Works of Lewis Carroll.
Lewis Carroll's poems, in particular, are something near and dear to me. I could probably spend the next few years learning them by heart and reciting them to the trees quite happily. Besides, I might finally get around to reading Sylvie and Bruno. You never know.
2. Suur illustreeritud sõnaraamat, by Jean-Claude Corbeil and Ariane Archambault.
This is an illustrated dictionary that consists of exploded diagrams with every part labelled in English, Estonian, Russian, German and French. It kind of rocks. I have to hide it in another room so I don't stay up to midnight finding out what the French word for "casement window" is. Alone on a deserted island, I can waste as much time as I like on looking up random things.
3. The Bible, by various.
The Bible is the perfect book to have with you in such a situation. On the one hand, it's the anthology to end all anthologies. It has legends, history, poetry and philosophy. There are stories about battles, romances, politics, tales of daring-do and naval gazing. I maintain there's even a play in there (hello? The Song of Solomon has a Greek chorus, for crying out loud!). Some books are miserable, some books are joyful, some are perplexing and others are a wee bit sexy. And if you are willing to argue with the thing rather than blindly accept it word-for-word, there are puzzles that will have you changing your mind over and over again.
On the other hand, it's great for existential stuff. If you want to yell at God for abandoning you on an island, the Bible can help you with that. If you want to ask Him to rescue you, the Bible can help you with that. If you want to ask Him to change the way you see the world so that being lost on a deserted island doesn't seem so bad, the Bible can help you with that. And, woven throughout the entire thing, turning up in different places and in different ways, is the overarching message: "you are not alone".
Like I said, the perfect book for such a situation.
So, those are my three books. What are yours?
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Three Books, Part 1, update
On second thought, The Complete Encyclopedia of Stitchery is not a good choice for locking with someone in a tower.
On the one hand, it could keep them occupied for hours on end, but on the other hand, it requires resources. You would have to keep supplying your victim with a steady stream of cloth and thread.
No, a much better book would be Mel Bay's Ukulele Chords, by Mel Bay. All you need to provide then is the ukulele and some spare strings in case one snaps.
Then you can happily leave your victim to be locked in the magic tower (which grows it's own fruit and vegetables) and only come to see them once a year.
I'm gravitating a bit towards the Rapunzel's Revenge scenario at this point.
On the one hand, it could keep them occupied for hours on end, but on the other hand, it requires resources. You would have to keep supplying your victim with a steady stream of cloth and thread.
No, a much better book would be Mel Bay's Ukulele Chords, by Mel Bay. All you need to provide then is the ukulele and some spare strings in case one snaps.
Then you can happily leave your victim to be locked in the magic tower (which grows it's own fruit and vegetables) and only come to see them once a year.
I'm gravitating a bit towards the Rapunzel's Revenge scenario at this point.
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