House of Joy

Posted on August 22, 2019 by djnpub

CSF, House of JoyTonight, I trekked up to Orinda to the the third of this year’s CalShakes plays, House of Joy. This was a modern play by Indian American playwright Madhuri Shekar, and is part of CalShakes “new classics initiative.” I’m not sure what the supposed connection to Shakespeare or the classics was supposed to be, but it was an interesting tale of palace intrigue under a despotic emperor that takes place mainly within the royal harem walls, where the wives and guards are all women. This is a relatively new play, and had some ups and downs, but it was generally entertaining. I didn’t think that it helped to try to connect the medieval setting to the modern day by using swear words and f-bombs. The costumes, particularly on the princess and the queen were quite stunning which sparkled brightly under the lights clear across the theater. It ended very abruptly in a dramatic way as the guards and the new empress are about repel invaders from the competing prince.

It was a very nice warm night, and I ended up sitting the row with a couple that had driven up from southern California to see the actor who played the doctor, who they knew well.

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King John OP

Posted on August 4, 2019 by djnpub

King John, CoSFI began this afternoon with a trip down to Lois and Les’ house where Lois had arranged a lunch with some of the family. In addition to Lois and Les, her kids Karen and Bob were there as were my cousins Nick and Dave. It was nice to see them all as it’s been 20 years since I’ve seen some of them. I guess we’re all getting a little older. Les is now 97 and he’s still looking great, and in a few weeks Lois and Les will have been married 71 years. Wow!

After lunch and some nice conversation, I headed back up to see the last play in my Colorado Shakespeare Festival season. It was an original practices production of King John. This is only the second time I’ve seen King John, a history play that deals with who is the legitimate heir to the throne. The OP productions are generally pretty exciting, and they did a great job. The cast is always very energized, and this year it came off very well. I highly enjoyed it. I stayed for the talk-back as did a lot of people. This has been a great five days of theater, and I’m very sorry to see it end.
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As You Like It, Again

Posted on August 3, 2019 by djnpub

As You Like It, CoSFTonight I saw the fourth play in as many days from the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s season, As You Like It. I’ve already seen it once this summer, and I’m scheduled to see it one more time. Interestingly, like the first one, this production featured a strong musical element. The music, a kind-of bluesy folky music, was arguably better in a stand-alone sense, but I still think the SF Shakespeare version was a little stronger. Nonetheless, this was still a funny and enjoyable play, particularly towards the end. One of the characters, who played the guitar, and did some of the singing, was very impressive. The key character of Rosalind wasn’t quite as forceful as in the first version, but it worked overall.

Part of my lack of enthusiasm may have had to do with the fact that this was a very warm day, and I somewhat cooked in my room all afternoon. So come play time, I wasn’t feeling great. Nonetheless, this was an enjoyable play, and and interesting contract to the prior production.
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A Wonderful Romeo and Juliet

Posted on August 2, 2019 by djnpub

Romeo and Juliet, CoSFTonight I saw the third play in three days from the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s season, Romeo and Juliet. This is one of my favorite plays, and as such I have high expectations which sometimes aren’t met. That wasn’t the case tonight. It was a wonderful production full of energy, emotion, and pathos. The acting was stellar and the characterizations were spot-on. They were very faithful to the original text, so I got to hear my favorite speeches including the opening prologue and the prince’s epilogue. It was done in a traditional staging. At this point it always gets me in the end, and this one particularly so. A standing ovation! It annoys me somewhat how emotional I get at the end even though I know what’s coming.

This was a very warm day, and earlier I was really feeling the effects of the heat, the altitude, and my lack of sleep. I was really dragging. However, I had a rest in the afternoon, and it cooled off a bit in the evening so I was awake and energized for the play. I even wore just shorts to the evening performance, which I almost never do. So far the festival has been great with the three plays I’ve seen.
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A Future History

Posted on August 1, 2019 by djnpub

King Charles III, CoSFTonight I saw the next play in the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s season, a Shakespeare-like play called King Charles III, which the author refers to as a future history play. It was written by Mike Bartlett in 2014. It imagines the premise that the current Queen of England, Elizabeth II, has died and her son the current Prince Charles has become king. On principle he tries to take a slightly more activist role as monarch and not just be a rubber stamp for the government.

It was interesting staging with a fairly fixed ornate set, but with graphic images on the back wall that periodically switched between royal portraits and newspaper images showing the building controversies. The acting was excellent, and the appearance of the cast, particularly of Prince William, appeared to closely match the real royal family.

This dealt with some interesting clashes between politics British-style and the monarchy, and between the generations of the royal family who each had their own agenda. It ended sad in my view as the initially principled Charles (who becomes a bit over tyrannical) is coerced into abdicating in favor of his son William who is more adept at playing the PR game, but who ultimately will just be a plastic image of a monarch.
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Twelfth Night

Posted on July 31, 2019 by djnpub

Twelfth NightTonight I saw the first play in the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s season, a wonderful production of Twelfth Night. It was a very warm night, and the play had a Caribbean tropical theme. They had a lot of action before the play actually started, pulling people up onto the stage for little bits, and I even got pulled up to “help them get their boat off the reef.” This was a really well done play, from the acted out dramatized wreck of the ship, to the broad comedy of the various scenes. The acting was very good, featuring some actors I’ve seen before.

Twelfth NightThe night before coming out I only got 3 hours of sleep, getting up early to come to the airport. On top of many short nights previously, and the high altitude and warm weather, I had to fight sleep during the first half of the play (no fault of the play). Fortunately with a cool night I could start to catch up on some much needed sleep. This play was a great way to start my week of Shakespeare, and I’m looking forward to the rest.
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Complete Works

Posted on July 25, 2019 by djnpub

Complete WorksTonight I saw the second play of the Livermore Shakespeare Festival’s season, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged) [revised]. I again joined Bob and Blanca. This is a fast moving comedy featuring only three actors, that tries (sort-of) to spin through snippets of all of Shakespeare’s 37 plays in a little over an hour and a half. It has apparently been around for around 20 years. It was pretty much silly comedy. Some parts were funny, some parts were too silly (stupid) for me. One successful segment was when they brought two people up onto the stage (one of which was a little girl), then engaged the audience in three groups to call out lines ending with the little girl screaming. (It was all supposed to represent the mental turmoil that Ophelia was going through with Hamlet.) It was a fun, warm, evening, and I’m glad I went even if it wasn’t the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.

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One Giant Leap for Mankind

Posted on July 20, 2019 by djnpub

First stepsIt’s hard to believe it was 50 years ago, July 20, 1969, when man first landed on the moon. It’s one of the few vivid memories of my childhood. Just an adolescent, I had been an avid follower of the space program, and this was the culmination of that effort. It marked the greatest adventure that has occurred in my lifetime. It also makes me feel a little old.

USA flag on the moonI can’t seem to get enough of watching the coverage these days. The photographs and films are beautiful and in color, and I have to remember back when I was watching it all we had was black and white. The landing happened at 2:17 pm in the afternoon where I was with the famous line “Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has landed.” The first step onto the moon occurred at 8:56 pm, and the EVA lasted around 2 hours. I remember it well, as my family had gone over to my cousins’ house where we were helping them lay a tile floor in their unfinished basement. I distinctly remember working on that floor and watching the moon walk on a small B&W TV. As we drove home well after midnight, we could look up in the sky and see the moon, and were all amazed at what had just happened.

Apollo 11 crew

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To The Moon

Posted on July 16, 2019 by djnpub

Apollo 11 launch50 years ago today began the culmination of the greatest adventure that has occurred in my lifetime. Apollo 11 launched from Kennedy Space Center on the first ever attempt to land men on the moon.

I still get emotional thinking about this and about the landing 4 days later. With my early years of growing up in the 1960s, the space program was a huge part of my young life. It flowed out into popular culture in TV shows and movies, and was part of our science education. While we have subsequently been so saturated with movies of space travel it seems fairly mundane, but then it was the stuff of fantasy and imagination. I remember as a kid, you could write to NASA and get free posters and pictures, and each step towards the attempt was extremely exciting. The entire atmosphere around the space program, and science and technology in general, played no small part in my eventually going into science and engineering, although by the time I finally got out of school the space program had settled into a much lower profile activity. I was recently talking to a younger friend of mine who was born much after the moon landing, and they can’t relate to what it was like.

I think there is no more beautiful rocket launching than the Saturn V. I don’t know if that’s just because of what it represented, but I think there is a beautiful aesthetic to the design and paint job, and the way it took off slowly was just amazing. As a kid I built and flew Estes rockets, and I still have my model Saturn V sitting on my dresser. A couple of years ago during a trip to Florida, I was able to visit Kennedy Space Center, and I when I got to the complex built around the Saturn V and the Apollo program, I found it very emotional to see, and I stayed there a long time.

The anniversary of the moon landing is just a few days off. It would be nice if something like that could capture the national psyche again.

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Civil War Othello

Posted on July 13, 2019 by djnpub

LSF Othello 2019Tonight I saw the first play in Livermore Shakespeare Festival’s season, Othello. I joined Bob and Blanca on a relatively warm evening. While I always am frustrated by the theme of this play, it is very powerful. This production was very good. Interestingly it set the story at the later part of the Civil War, which kind of nicely fits in idea of the outsider black general. All the acting was good, though Iago wasn’t quite as viscerally evil as he did his dirty deeds. The scene were Desdemona was murdered was extremely long driving home the brutality of the act.
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