View Full Version : What was the last play you attended?
tcmahoney
16 Oct 2005, 02:54 PM
Like the title says, what did you go see? What theatre? Who's the playwright? Any actors or actresses you want to say "Hey, watch for this one!"
I went to see Becky Mode's "Fully Committed" yesterday at Longview Stageworks (http://www.lvsw.org/) here in town. It's a funny one-man play about a harried actor-turned-reservations taker at New York's hottest restaurant. The actor gets to play egotistical socialites, an even more egotistical chef and a wide variety of characters in between. Good stuff.
Since today's performance is a benefit for Hurrican Katrina victims, and I'll still be able to make it to work on time, I think I might just go for a repeat this afternoon.
Freestyle2000
16 Oct 2005, 03:13 PM
Last play was "Power in the Blood" at the Alliance Repertory in Burbank, but I was an understudy. Before that, "Killers" at the Evidence Room.
RS
ManiacalClown
16 Oct 2005, 03:25 PM
Much Ado About Nothing in Little Rock, AR
Captain Splarg
16 Oct 2005, 05:22 PM
Wow, it's been a few months. I think the last one was going to see The Producers for the 3rd time in London.
Great show, i look forward to seeing it a fourth time. Hopefully when I'm in the states this winter, i'll go and see Spam-a-lot in New York.
Coach_McGuirk
16 Oct 2005, 07:02 PM
"God's Favorite" by Neil Simon.
Of course, I was in it, so that may not count.
SoccerFan8270
16 Oct 2005, 07:18 PM
"The Nerd" by Larry Shue at the Delaware Theater Company. Very funny...
bojendyk
17 Oct 2005, 08:31 AM
Saw the terrible "update" of A Doll's House (called Dollhouse and set in Lincoln Park) at the Goodman a couple of months ago.
Before that, Cherry Orchard at Steppenwolf.
minorthreat
17 Oct 2005, 10:28 AM
I can't remember the last play I saw.
But I'm an amateur actor, so I've been in several recently. Actually, I'm in one now.
Iceblink
17 Oct 2005, 10:54 AM
I saw Merchant of Venice at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater yesterday.
Good production... very controversial... loads of anti-semitism... which really seemed to have been played up to make it hard to root for the "good guys" or, rather, the beneficiaries of the label, "comedy."
Motterman
17 Oct 2005, 11:19 AM
Saw Mamma Mia! in Las Vegas... heh...
bojendyk
17 Oct 2005, 11:47 AM
I saw Merchant of Venice at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater yesterday.
Good production... very controversial... loads of anti-semitism... which really seemed to have been played up to make it hard to root for the "good guys" or, rather, the beneficiaries of the label, "comedy."
I was curious about that production, as it's one of my favorite Shakespeare comedies, in spite of the anti-Semitism.
DoctorJones24
17 Oct 2005, 12:01 PM
I saw Merchant of Venice (#) at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater yesterday.
Good production... very controversial... loads of anti-semitism... which really seemed to have been played up to make it hard to root for the "good guys" or, rather, the beneficiaries of the label, "comedy."
Interesting. I saw an RSC production a few years back that pretty effectively muted the anti-semitism by isolating Shylock from other Jews, who treated him with contempt.
Last play we saw? Jeez, must have been a university production of Fiddler last year. Before that it was the RSC's Midnight's Children probably, or the Folger Library's Othello, both a couple years ago.
Achtung
17 Oct 2005, 12:32 PM
A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Hamptons Shakespeare Festival on Long Island. Good show, just wish I'd brought a jacket...
bojendyk
17 Oct 2005, 12:37 PM
Interesting. I saw an RSC production a few years back that pretty effectively muted the anti-semitism by isolating Shylock from other Jews, who treated him with contempt.
To be honest, productions like that annoy me. The play is anti-Semitic, even though it's brilliant. I don't understand why it's so difficult to inform the audience about this and trust them to judge it on its dramatic merits, rather than to try to present it as something that it's not.
Fanaddict
17 Oct 2005, 01:33 PM
Wicked. No great songs like the wizard of oz but a cute story showing the wicked witch of the west wasn't so wicked.
minorthreat
17 Oct 2005, 01:36 PM
To be honest, productions like that annoy me. The play is anti-Semitic, even though it's brilliant. I don't understand why it's so difficult to inform the audience about this and trust them to judge it on its dramatic merits, rather than to try to present it as something that it's not.Because anti-Semitism is such a touchy subject that has way too many associations.
Consider the fact that Taming of the Shrew is similar thematically to the Merchant of Venice in that it deals with issues of prejudice; yet, for some reason, it's much easier for audiences to stomach misogyny than anti-Semitism.
tcmahoney
17 Dec 2005, 07:36 PM
Bump. Just got back from Longview Stageworks' matinee of Tom Mula's Jacob Marley's Christmas Carol, which, of course, is Dickens' tale told from the POV of Scrooge's dead partner. It takes a liberty or two and is hit or miss, but it's still interesting stuff.
Last year, they did (takes deep breath) The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Dramatic Society Production of a Christmas Carol, which was Dickens' story told very intentionally badly. One or two jokes you could see coming from miles away, but it was still funny stuff.
VOwithwater
18 Dec 2005, 10:37 AM
Dirty RottenScindrals.
In Jan got tickets for Spamalot and feburary "Jersy Boy"
VOwithwater
18 Dec 2005, 10:39 AM
Wow, it's been a few months. I think the last one was going to see The Producers for the 3rd time in London.
Great show, i look forward to seeing it a fourth time. Hopefully when I'm in the states this winter, i'll go and see Spam-a-lot in New York.
Saw it on Broadway "springtime for Hitler" :-)
riverplate
20 Feb 2008, 03:20 PM
Boy, did I have a hard time tracking this thread down for a bump. Perhaps because I thought it was in the Books forum -- which turns out to contain practically zero about drama. Anyway...
The New York Times had an article this week concerning the uses of language in the plays of Tom Stoppard and Edward Albee.
Language, the Muse That Provokes Stoppard and Albee (http://theater2.nytimes.com/2008/02/18/theater/reviews/18bran.html?scp=2&sq=tom+stoppard&st=nyt) - Ben Brantley
Do you know what it’s like to be deeply, unbearably in love, all the while aware that you can never completely trust the object of your affection? I would wager that Edward Albee and Tom Stoppard do, almost to the point of delirium.
Don’t misunderstand me. I have no intimate acquaintance with the personal lives of these dramatists. It’s just that their ruling passion, jubilant and exasperated, proclaims itself publicly in pretty much everything they write, including their new plays of this season (Rock ’n’ Roll from Mr. Stoppard, and Homelife and Me, Myself & I from Mr. Albee).
How could it be otherwise, when it’s the most basic tools of their trade that they so adore? The faithless lovers of Tom Stoppard and Edward Albee are, in a word, words.