Once upon a time I went to a show, and it was called The Mikado. All the actors were dressed in circus clothes, and the set also looked like a circus and smelled like a circus, and it was a circus. Literally, it was as fun as a circus. And there was literally a balloon pit. I am not lying. The same people that did Pirates of Penzance, Gilbert & Sullivan, wrote The Mikado. Sean Graney and Kevin O'Donnell made it much shorter and they also made the songs more funny. It was funny to begin with, but they made it even more funny, which is the best of all things you can do with a play.
The show was about a young man named Nanki-Poo (Shawn Pfautsch)and he was in love with a maiden named Yum-Yum (Emily Casey). But Yum-Yum is engaged to a man named Ko-Ko(Robert McLean) who is the Lord High Executioner, which is an executioner that is lord high--that means he's very powerful. So Nanki-Poo is trying to hang himself because he was in love with Yum-Yum and she was the only girl he ever loved. But then the Lord High Executioner, who will have his place taken away if he doesn't execute someone, he finds him trying to hang himself and says "Why don't you come and have me execute you because if you don't then you'll miss all this fun stuff like fireworks--oh no you'll miss that because you'll be dead--but crying and Yum-Yum's attention will totally be taken away." And Nanki-Poo says, "Her attention will totally be taken away?" like it is the best thing ever. Nanki-Poo is a "second mandolinist" which is "too low" for a maiden. But he is actually The Mikado's son and that is the perfect thing for a maiden. He will agree to be executed only if he can marry Yum-Yum for the time that he is alive. But the problem is if women's husbands are executed then they'll have to be buried alive. At the end they do get married, but I don't want to spoil too much.
One of my favorite parts was when Ko-ko kept saying "Let's go over where the Chancellor can't hear us" and "Let's go here where the chief justice can't hear us." It's funny because he's saying all of these different kinds of people but the funny thing is is that the Pooh-Bah (Matt Kahler) is actually all those different positions and Ko-ko is talking to the Pooh-Bah. And the Pooh-Bah doesn't even seem to notice that Ko-ko is saying "Let's go over where you can't hear us. Let's go over where you can't hear us." But the Pooh-Bah keeps saying "good idea" because he doesn't want to lose his positions. It was hilarious because of how it was said and how the actors acted, and the lines are also funny.
I thought it was interesting that Shawn Pfautsch played both Nanki-Poo and Katisha because Katisha is a girl who wants to marry Nanki-Poo. They can not get married if the same person is playing the person that the person is getting married to. I thought, "Oh, good" when Katisha got married to Ko-ko because then Nanki-Poo was not dead and Shawn didn't have to do a quick change back and forth every two seconds to marry himself. I wanted Katisha to find love, but I didn't want her to marry the main character who was in love with someone else. I don't think they would have been happy together. They had very different interests. She came in playing a weird saxophone song. He played very nice and soft music, but she played weird nightclub music.
There was this song called "Three Little Maids from School" which was about Yum-Yum and her two sisters Pitti-Sing (Christine Stulik) and Peep-Bo (Dana Omar). Pitti-Sing had a really funny voice--it was very high. I thought it was the best hysterical voice ever. One of my favorite moments was when Peep-Bo showed off how smart she was when Nanki-Poo said to Yum Yum, "We'll make minutes hours, hours days, and days years and then we will have been together for 25 years." And then Peep-Bo (Hey! Bo Peep! But Peep-Bo!) says, "Then this conversation has lasted 4 hours and 18 minutes." That shows that she is very smart. The three little maids, none of them are exactly smart, but she just showed that that day she was the smartest of the little maids.
One of my favorite parts was when they used this little song that sounded like a vocal warmup. The Pooh-Bah, Ko-ko and Pish-Tush (Ryan Bourque) performed it like it actually was a vocal warm up. It went like this: "To sit in solemn silence on a dull dark dock, in a presidential prison with a lifelong lock, awaiting the sensation of a short sharp shock by a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block." I think I have actually heard that before, and it was nice to have a part of the play that I knew because I have never actually seen this operetta until now. I liked the tongue-twister element of it. The performers seemed like they were having fun but also doing a difficult task because it is actually a difficult element to a play to add a tongue twister in. People could laugh kindly at you--like it is a funny thing--or they could laugh mockingly at you if you mess up or they could laugh funnily at you. But it didn't seem like they messed up at all which I thought was amazing.
I thought it was funny in the scene where Nanki-Poo was singing with Yum-Yum about how they would never kiss again. But instead of saying "kiss' they would pucker up their lips and make a smooching noise. It told me that they really wanted to be together but they thought they could never do it. It was more funny than tragic. There is like a tiny sliver of tragic in there. And when they are singing "We'll never do this again," they almost kiss but it is illegal to flirt. Speaking of flirt--every time that somebody said "flirting" the rest of the cast would say "flirting" in a whisper as if it were a horrible thing to even say the word flirting. Actually it is not such a horrible thing to say the word flirting, but they make it sound like it is, which I think is fuhlarious.
People that would like this show are people that like balloons, comedy, and Pooh-Bahs that have many jobs. This show is perfect for kids because it is very humorous. Kids would not have very much trouble following the story because it has a very easy plot. Don't think if you are going to an opera house that the show there will be the same. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see a balloon pit in a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta! If people don't want to see a balloon pit or people riding tiny tricycles, they should not see this play. But what I really want them to do is take a chance. If they do, I think they will completely change their minds.
Photos: Matthew Gregory Hollis
Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called 44 Plays for 44 Presidents. It was about presidents and what happened during their existence in being president in different funny ways and in different scary ways. I think the writers (Andy Bayiates, Sean Benjamin, Genevra Gallo-Bayiates, Chloe Johnston, and Karen Weinberg) wanted to write it because they must really like history. It was history that went all the way back to 1789. It was not like reading a history book; it was much better because it was more fun and what I mean by fun is that you weren't just looking at a page that told you when he was born, when he got elected, when he got married and a picture of his wife. You are looking at people, actual people, that you are actually present with and you can actually interact with. People should see this show because it is educational but also the funnest play ever.
There was this really cool sketch about Barack Obama (played by Rani Waterman) where he came on stage and he came over to two boys and started jump-roping crazily with a long one and a shorter one. And then she got two jump ropes and jumped them. It seemed hard to do it and at the end she says "Can't you guys help me?" because Barack Obama is doing a lot of hard work but not enough people are helping him.
And if the president got elected twice a little bit apart from each other, like Grover Cleveland (Joe Dempsey), the actors would do kind of the same piece again only they would leave some of the parts out of it so they wouldn't waste your time. The first Grover Cleveland piece was all of the guests, which was everybody in the play, clinking their glasses together and dancing. But the next time they clinked their glasses together and started dancing and then were like, "Oh, come on!" and then they leave. Grover Cleveland and Grover Cleveland's wife (Rani Waterman) were the same both times.
In the Chester Arthur sketch I played Chester Arthur. I am not always going to play Chester Arthur. A different person will get to play him each time. You have to recite the oath of office and after you recite to oath of office then they put the coat on you and you have to try to get on to the desk. I could not, because I am too short, so they had to lift me up. And after that, they asked me a quiz. I think they wanted to say that Chester Arthur was made president very very quickly because the president before him was assassinated. He used to just be vice-president but then he was president. I felt like I was just an audience member at first, and then suddenly I was president! Do you know that I was actually elected president when I was 4 years old in 2008. Look it up in a history book. I will be there. No, I actually won't. The 2008 president was actually Barack Obama.
My favorite scene was about Millard Fillmore who was played by a loaf of bread. (This is also in your quiz at the beginning of the review.) And when Dina Marie Walters was eating bread when she started speaking her mouth was still full and so it sounded like this:"ummmmmmmmmummmmmummmm."See nobody could understand you if you were talking like that. It was hilarious because she was saying something historical but at the same time you could not understand what she was saying. Everybody else also had their mouths full when they were speaking, so they were also sounding like "mmmummmummmu," but I mentioned Dina first because I laughed the most at her because she had her mouth very very full so she sounded the most ridiculous. I thought it was fuh-larious.
One of my favorite scenes was the scene when Joe Dempsey as Tilden was reaching for the coat and Ryan Walters as Rutherford B. Hayes stepped in and it was a tug-of-war and then it turned into a wrestling match. They were trying to show us that they both really wanted the coat but they couldn't get the coat. They really wanted to be president and the coat meant you were president. And the coat would poke out from the door, and then a happy face with the coat would poke out. I liked it because I thought it was funny because I like slapstick comedy sometimes--but just some slapstick comedy; some slapstick comedy can be too violent.
One of the creepiest scenes was about William McKinley (Dina Marie Walters). He was shaking hands and they were getting pictures taken. Then this assassin (Bilal Dardai) shoots at him. McKinley held out his hand after he'd been shot once by the assassin, but he held out his hand and kept smiling in this creepy way. It made me think about Coraline, because Coraline has these creepy parents who are always smiling even though they are being hurt or something because they are made out of clay.
There was this scene where William Howard Taft (Rawson Vint) was a baby because he was such a baby when he was president. He didn't know if he wanted to be president or he didn't want to be president. He is dressed in this big fat costume. It was basically a beanbag with armholes and a place to put your legs. And it had a way to see where you were going. And when he was in the fat suit there was a woman (Dina Marie Walters) and Teddy Roosevelt (Ryan Walters) and they were trying to feed him applesauce but he wouldn't eat. They both say "Be my president, Billy" and try to put the coat on him, but he won't put it on, so then they have to force it on him. And then Roosevelt says if you don't want it, give it back, and Taft says, "now I want it." And they have a fight. It indicated that Teddy Roosevelt would not be a very good father.
People that would like this show are people who like Presidents, history, and bread. I think this is a good show to take kids to because it is about presidents. There were also some sad scenes and there are also mentions of children dying, but other than that it is fine for kids. Grownups will also enjoy watching it. I really liked this play because it had a lot of substance to the story, meaning that it had something going on and it wasn't just a bunch of hoo-ha that wasted your time. It taught me about the 44 presidents because I haven't learned about every single president yet. I liked that everybody was having a good time doing the show and that they knew what they were doing in how they could express the different presidents even if they hadn't been alive during their time.
Answers: 1.) No. Grover Cleveland did not actually discover Cleveland. They are spelled the same way though. 2.) Yes. John Wilkes Booth did actually say "Sic simper tyrannis" when he shot Abraham Lincoln. It means "Thus always to tyrants." A tyrant is somebody who wants to control the world but he actually can't. Abraham Lincoln was also not a tyrant. If it was anybody who was a tyrant it was Mr. Booth. 3.) No white breads have been elected for presidents. Not one. Ok. There was one: Bill Clinton. Wait. Let me look that up. Yep.
Photos: Maggie Fullilove Nugent
The Egyptian Doctor (Mark Plonsky) was a really funny character because he was serious--but also funny at the same time. He was like, "Oh. Nothing wrong with you! Good morning!" I thought it was funny because the millionairess, Epifania Ognisanti di Parerga, was like, "Look! I really have something wrong with me!" but he didn't trust her because she was just trying to be interesting. In the program, it just says Egyptian Doctor. It says Egyptian Doctor, because you don't find out what his name is. Because she says when she asks him to marry her, "ascertain his name and make the arrangements." It is funny because she doesn't even know his name as she's marrying him.
The lawyer (Joseph Bowen) you wouldn't suspect would actually be funny, but he was actually one of the funniest characters in the play. I liked that when Epifania said "I'm going to commit suicide, and I'd like to leave all my money to my husband,"he was like, "Oh you want to commit suicide? Here's some medicine that will kill you lickety split." And then she was like, "Don't you have any sympathy for me at all?" And he says, "I do have sympathy for you. You just said you wanted to commit suicide, and I am trying to help." And then she calls him a rhinoceros. I don't know why she calls him a rhinoceros; I think it is about the meanness, because rhinoceroses can be pretty mean. But I think it would be a better thing to say if he smelled bad, because rhinoceroses smell disgusting.
Epifania has a very strange relationship with her husband Alastair (Gary Alexander). It is weird because she is leaving all the money to her husband and she hates him because she thought he was going to be very romantic but he wasn't at all. I think he wasn't the best type for her because she only cared about money and he only cared about boxing and sports. Alastair had a girlfriend which was called a Sunday wife. The girlfriend's name was Patricia Smith (Jhenai Mootz). And he like ran off to her to become husband and wife but Epifania was kind of a Sunday wife to another man Adrian Blenderbland (Jonathan Nichols). I thought Patricia was funny, like when she said "And I ran to his arms and we embraced, but not like the way that you think of embracing." Blenderbland is always talking about how money isn't important at all, but it is when you need it. Like you need to get new food all the time and you need to get new clothes that fit you. I think that if anyone was actually doing anything wrong it was Alastair because he was actually dating someone and Epifania was only going to Blenderbland for help.
There was a part that was touching, and funny and weird all at the same time. The scene starts with Patricia and Alastair sitting in a hotel somewhere, maybe a hot tub, I'm not sure. And the part that was really touching, funny, and weird was when the Egyptian doctor goes up to Epifania and she says, "Check my pulse!" And then he checks her pulse and says, "That's the most beautiful pulse I've ever heard." And then they get married. It was touching because they got married and it was funny because they got married so suddenly. And it was weird because he married her for a pulse.
People that would like this show are people that like staged readings, trying to get new boyfriends, and really really long names. One thing that was interesting about it is that Shaw makes his characters talk in a different way than we actually do in real life--in a very opera like way. I mean that they talk exaggeratedly. And that is really fun to see in a play. I liked how they could make a staged reading into more of a play because they made costumes that looked like that time period and their performances I thought were great. People should see this show because it is fun and it gets you really interested in the plot of the story.
It is pretty difficult to do an adaptation of Harold and the Purple Crayon because of all the crazy things that happen, like quick scene changes where he is on land and is scared away from a terrible monster and two seconds later he has to be in the sea. Don Darryl Rivera was the writer and he did something that I have seen lots before in kids' shows: turning a book with almost no words into a play with lots of singing. (Auston James did the music and Rob Burgess did the lyrics.) I think they do that because younger kids like to sing along to lots of songs. Like when I was like 1, 2, and 3 I sang songs that my dad liked. Songs make a show longer and they can make you move on from what you were doing faster or slower. So this is an example in which they did not move along very fast: "I'm flying so high. There's a dragon in the sky." They were just saying two things over and over again that had to do with one thing: that there's a dragon in the sky. He was just scared and running in place. There was another song that was kind of repetitive, but it actually made the play go on faster because these aliens were trying to snatch the crayon and trying to eat it, but they all did it in different ways, which I thought made it more exciting. The song just went "Jump it! Jump it!" but the director Sean Graney and the choreographer Tommy Rapley told the actors to make up different tactics to try to get the crayon.
It could have been better if it had less singing; if it had had less singing it would have been more true to the book because there is nothing that says in the book that Harold could be singing at that moment--he is drawing and he is running and almost never has his mouth open in the whole thing. Dancing would be fine; you can do choreography with only three songs--three songs would have been perfect for this, but there were like around ten.
My favorite costume (by Alison Siple) was the porcupine because it kind of looked like armor and had spikes coming out of it. I liked how they used everyday objects. They used a bike helmet and put quills on that and I thought that was really cute and creative. I thought Harold's costume was very true to the book. I also loved the Alien costumes which I thought were really cute, and I loved their little tongues that poked out and kind of looked like socks trying to eat the purple crayon. That costume was also a puppet. I also liked the crab puppet/costume because of the little snappers that people would put their hands in and make them snap, and it made them look like they didn't have any hands, just snappers. It looked hard to move in, but Bethany Thomas made it look easy. Joanna Iwanicka did the puppets and props. One of my favorite puppets was kind of a puppet and also kind of an umbrella. It was a puffer fish that was an umbrella that when you pushed it up and made it pop out it was blown up. I thought the caterpillar eating the apple was really adorable because it had an enormous lump, which was the apple inside it, which I thought was really hilarious.
I thought the choreography was really awesome because it was good for the story to have that choreography because if it didn't have it, the songs wouldn't have as much impact on the viewer. If there was a bad song the choreography would make it seem more interesting. I liked the alien dance because they were all jumping and they were kind of hypnotizing Harold so he would do the dance and then they could eat his crayon. The moose and the porcupine I thought had a really cool dance when they were singing about the pie and how they were in love with the pie. I think that when the porcupine and the moose came on stage, I wanted to get to know those characters even more because the actors were good at playing their parts. Their dance was a lot of twirling around with the pie and basically not even noticing Harold was there. I thought the dance was funny.
People that would like this show are people that like crayons, using your imagination, and aliens. I think this show should be for ages 1 to 5 because there is nothing that would creep out younger children. I thought the script needed more work, but I thought all the designing was great. Kids younger than me might think more about the designs than the script, so the script problems might not be as much a problem for the younger kids because they are paying more attention to the puppets and the dancing.
Photos: Michael Brosilow
Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called Males Order Brides. It's called Males Order Brides because it is about men ordering brides so they can get married. They are doing it because they have certain dreams about what their brides should be like. They want them to be pretty in a certain kind of way, and good kind of conversationalists, and very proper, and lounge dancers. They learn that those kind of dreams are right under their noses. They have this lady named Star Billings (Kieran Welsh-Phillips) that is helping Big Harry Deal (Jason Bowen) to blow all the men and the heroine Calico Shurtz (Jacqueline Salamack) into little pieces. This show is a melodrama; that means that the villain tells you everything and they have like beautiful heroines and men that work in a gold mine. And they come right out and say what they want. This means you just have to sit back and relax and enjoy the show, and you don't have to figure anything out at all. I like figuring things out more than just seeing things happen and having the characters tell you everything that is happening. Some people don't like processing things as much as other people and some people just like a break from processing things and processing things and processing things. This play is good for a break if you like processing things but you really want a two-hour break.
I thought the can-can dancer costumes (by Jana Anderson) were pretty cool because they looked like they were from cowboy times. And the one of the brides that was very proper with the hat and the spectacles (which was actually Star Billings) had a silk-looking dress that looked like somebody that was coming from Britain. The bride with the blonde curly hair I thought looked like one of the girls from Little House on the Prairie and I also thought that the scientist/lounge singer costume looked very sparkly and looked liked a famous singer from New York--because that's what that bride was.
I think it was kind of a bad message to send to say that you should change yourself to make somebody like you like Calico Shurtz does. She goes with her friends and puts on a dress and a fancy hat because she has been a tomboy for the whole play. A better message would have been to say, "Just make him like you as a person as who you are." She does the exact opposite of that which is making him like her a different way than she was before.
The actors wanted to make the audience laugh, but sometimes they kind of didn't know how to, but at most points they made the audience laugh. When they don't get as many people laughing, they would make up a joke that wasn't in the script. Sometimes they were the funniest parts: like when Big Harry Deal said, "I'll go and check on her in the girls' bathroom" and when he leaves C.D. Nichols (Bruce Phillips) said "Don't go into the girls' bathroom!" He said it in a voice kind of like "I am kind of scared that he is going to go into the girls' bathroom" and I thought that that was one of the funniest parts in this scene.
When the audience would throw popcorn at the villains, sometimes it got stuck in their hats, sometimes it got stuck in their dresses, and sometimes it got stuck in their shoes. Sometimes it also got stuck in my hair. I did not like it very much to have popcorn stuck in my hair, but it was an experience--the first time I ever got pelted with popcorn. One of the jokes that I really liked was when Big Harry Deal was talking with Star Billings while she was being pelted with popcorn and she was eating it. And then Big Harry Deal said, "Don't eat so much. You'll fill up and you won't be hungry for your dinner." And I thought it was funny because you cannot possibly be filled up on three pieces of popcorn. And then another time when he was was serving them the dinner and he dropped one of the plates, and then he picked it up, and nothing had fallen off. So he shook it up and down, but nothing came off because it was a prop. And he just served it to them like, "Ohhh-kay. I'm giving them fake foo-ood I guess. Ohhh-kay.
People who would like this show are people who like melodramas, the old wild west, and people getting pelted with popcorn. Some kids I think will like this show because it is easy to understand what is going on and there is lots of popcorn throwing and they can throw popcorn--which is something they have always wanted to do and this will be like the only chance in their life they will get to do it. The grown-ups in the audience were acting kind of like kids because they were having so much fun watching the show, and the oldest people there even threw popcorn. And some of the oldest people maybe came to see it because it was like a child memory of going to see melodramas.
Photos: Braxton Black
The set (by Joey Wade) makes me think about what Usher's house looks like; it is so dirty, and the lamps have fallen down, and there is a drip. There were all these bookstacks with fallen books all over. It makes you feel kind of unsafe and there are some books pinned to the wall which shows you that after his sister dies he doesn't like reading books maybe because he liked reading them to his sister. There is a staircase indicating that it is a very big house, but it doesn't feel big when you are in there, so that was a good idea. It sets you into a scary mood that makes you feel like you are not completely safe. It is a scary way to feel when you are at a play, but it is still fun because sometimes you feel like you need to be scared, like on a roller coaster you go there to be scared but not to actually be in real danger.
My favorite scene was the drip scene. The drip scene was all about this drip. The scene starts with the maid coming in a going, "drip, drip, drip, drip, drip." And she's put down a bucket which gets some dripping into the bucket. And then Usher and the friend come in and he has this speech about how the rain is so unearthly. And then he pushes the friend to the window and says, "Look at this unearthly rain!" and then she says, "Excuse me but I'm getting dripped on." The drip, I think, is one of the cool gadgets they have in the show. It is like a tap that is hanging from the ceiling and is like a drip in a wall. It was super funny because of the maid coming in and saying in a Scottish accent, "drip, drip, drip."
In the book Usher is really grubby and disgusting, but in the play he is not very grubby and disgusting, he just has a beard, which I think was a good choice because you only want one of the characters to be grubby and disgusting and then it would be kind of hard because all of the actors are playing the character and it would be hard to make someone disgusting before the show if they are not playing Usher first. I think how they played Usher kind of made you see the different ways Usher changed back and forth. Halena's Usher seemed older than the other Ushers. Tien's Usher seemed more threatening, and Christine's Usher seemed more interested in marrying his friend.
The maid is like your comedy character in this because she is really funny and she likes getting everything for her master and the friend, like she likes getting the gin and lemon and knives so that the friend can cut the lemon herself and eat it and also put in into the gin and sometimes she has to grab two lemons because sometimes the friend gets a little too drunk. Halena's way of doing the maid was more Scottish and emphasized that she was a maid and that she wanted to make people laugh. Tien's maid was more talkative and imitated the friend more: like when the friend said the word Danger, and the maid went "Danger!" too. Christine's maid seemed like she was most loyal to her master because she was the one that mostly said "Yes, Master!"
The friend is not usually a girl; she is usually a boy in the book and in other plays of this. I think it was a good decision that Sean Graney made to make her a girl because it changed the relationship with Usher. It changed it because there was a romantic tension in it. There is tension in the book too; it is between Usher and the sister, but it is kind of not the best idea to do that because you cannot marry your sister. In the play, Usher likes both of them. I know that because he kisses them both on the lips. Christine was the fanciest of the friends. Halena's version of the friend was more concerned for her friend Usher. And Tien's was more British and more worried about messing up her clothing.
The sisters were all basically the same because they all were kind of a creepy sister. And one of them, Christine's, only had to fall through a door on her face. It was creepier to see it in real life because you thought, "This house is going to fall on top of me!" Tien's was the one that sang the most and did creepy songs. Christine's did the most falling on her face. I think Halena didn't play this part, but I might be wrong. I might have just lost track.
They used other Edgar Allan Poe stories three times that I recognized. 1.) There was a song called "Annabel Lee." "Annabel Lee" is about a kingdom by the sea with a beautiful girl called Annabel Lee and she dies because of these stupid angels, and she has a boyfriend that is sad that she died, and he keeps thinking he sees her everyday. 2.) Usher says he hears a rapping at his chamber door, which is from "The Raven" which is the most famousest poem that Edgar Allan Poe ever did. 3.) "The Cask of Amontillado" is the story the friend reads. They just talk about a wall being boarded up over a friend, but they don't say "For the love of god, Montresor!" which is my favorite line because I think it is funny because it is under-dramatic. He should be saying, "Get me out of here or I'll kill you!"
People that would like this show are people that like Edgar Allan Poe, funny drips in walls, and having gins with lemons. People should see this twice so then you can see it from both angles. There are some things that you can't see from each angle, like some people turn other ways so you can't see their faces. I think they did that so it can be more of a mystery, but then the audience can come back again and solve the mystery when they see it again. This might be scary for some kids. They should read the book first, so they can see if they can handle it on the stage.
Quoth the Raven, "Review some more!"
Photos: Matthew Gregory Hollis
I thought Hamlet was perfectly sad but also had little chunks of funniness to it. So when something was really sad and you thought you were going to cry, then something funny would happen, but sometimes they didn't have a funny part, just a sad part, and then you just had to cry. Like at the very end when everybody has died except for like 4 people.
In the first scene there were two policemen (Noah Simon & Josh Zagoren) and Horatio (Dennis William Grimes) and they were out on a balcony I think and they saw the Ghost of King Hamlet (Matt Kahler) going through the sky. But they can't actually point at the king up in the sky because they don't have a flying machine in the woods. I thought it was like people could see it for a brief time but then it would turn invisible because ghosts can turn invisible. I was very much convinced because it is convincing if people are like, "Wow! look at that!" and people look really scared. The dead king's name is Hamlet and his son is named Hamlet. If they had a girl her name would be Gertrude.
In Hamlet there were girls playing boys' parts. So in the original version, Laertes is a boy, but Elizabeth Laidlaw was not playing a boy; she was playing a girl, so they just changed it. I thought that was a cool choice because it made it seem more like it was their own version. Ophelia (Brittany Burch) and Laertes wouldn't have the same relationship with each other if one of them was a boy and one of them was a girl because if there is a girl and girl they both think about the same things because they are both girls. Polonia (Lily Mojekwu) is usually not named Polonia. It is usually Polonius, so it sounds like a boy's name, but in this version it was a girl. Polonia is supposed to be annoying but hilarious and I think Lily Mojekwu did a great job in expressing that. I felt bad for Polonia because she got stabbed because Hamlet thought that she was the king, but she double wasn't. She kept interrupting Ophelia and Laertes while they were walking away. She would say things like "Don't express your passion too much," then they would have to keep stopping and turn and listen and while they were walking away she would keep cutting them off. I thought that was really funny. Rosencrantz (Jillian Rafa) and Guildenstern (Sara Gorsky) were beheaded. After you see this play, you don't think Hamlet is a very nice person because he kills his friends--not directly, but he has them killed. They are working for the King (Jeff Christian) but they don't know he is evil. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern think that Hamlet is going insane and they are trying to help him so he can just get all this insaneness over with.
In Hamlet there are these players (Josh Zagoren, Danny Taylor, Noah Simon, Matt Kahler, and Nadia Daniels Moehle) who are going to put on a play for Hamlet. But the players are not dressed in nice tights. They are dressed in shirts with peace signs and tie-dyed with bandanas around their heads. And then they were singing a song that went, "Stop, look, what's that sound, everybody just turn around." Or something along the lines of that. I thought it was really funny to think of the players as hippies with sunglasses and all. And then they put on a play about Hamlet's father's death which didn't give a very soothing effect to his stepfather.
When they were performing the play, the players didn't talk in pretty voices; they still sounded like hippies like they did before. Except for the Queen (Danny Taylor), because he was the best actor. I don't know how Queen Gertrude (Christy Arrington) felt about a guy playing her that didn't look at all like her. Queen Gertrude loves her husband who was also her other husband's brother but actually killed his brother so he could marry the queen, have a lot of money, and be the king. She loves her son Hamlet, but I don't know if he loves her because of their hasty marriage.
Hamlet (Shane Kenyon) is the biggest role in Hamlet because his name is in the title; it is the whole entire title. When you go, you are expecting it to be sad and Hamlet is supposed to be really serious, but then he is also very funny, like when the players come in, then Hamlet is tapping his foot because they are playing some catchy music. In the the graveyard scene, The gravedigger (Noah Simon) was saying insulting things about Hamlet because he didn't know that the person he was talking to was Hamlet. He said "oh he is crazy and gone off to England," something like that. I thought the graveyard scene was really funny because of how Hamlet reacted to the gravedigger when he said "He's so crazy, and I'm glad he's never coming back." He was like, "I'm glad too that he's never coming back, but I'm actually right here." He doesn't say that out loud, it is just how he looks. He's just a regular guy coming in to look at graves in a castle. Who does that? The prince! Not somebody outside of the Denmark castle! I don't know why the alas poor Yorrick speech didn't give the gravedigger a clue that he was the prince.
When Ophelia went mad, she sang this creepy song, which I don't dare repeat. It is so scary. She seemed like the craziest person in the world. I don't mean she is actually a crazy person; she is a very nice girl. I mean she did a good job acting like a crazy person.
The last scene has Laertes and Hamlet fighting. They are fighting because Hamlet killed her mother by accident and that made Ophelia go crazy and fall off the tree which made her drown. If Ophelia wasn't crazy she might have had the sense to try to swim out. I thought the last fight was very realistic because everybody did actual fighting moves and didn't just do made-up fighting moves. It made you feel scared for Hamlet and Laertes. All the people that you like die, except for three people: the two policemen and Horatio. And that's why it is called a tragedy.
I almost didn't get to see Much Ado about Nothing because it rained. All day! And the actors who wanted to give the audience a performance that night had to bail out all the water. The whole entire woods was a swimming pool. Then they put on some mulch so we could sit on it. The play is about a girl named Beatrice (Elizabeth Laidlaw) and her cousin named Hero (Jillian Rafa) and a boy named Benedick (Scott Cummins) and another boy named Claudio (Dennis William Grimes). Each boy has a girl; Claudio's girlfriend is Hero and Beatrice's enemy is Benedick, but they actually turn out liking each other.
The first scene didn't include everybody bathing in a weird funny way, which happens in the movie. Everybody lined up in their best clothes. I thought this was a better way to express that they were excited than taking a big bath. It also started with the song "Hey, Nonny Nonny." I think it is a very pretty song, but you can make it a jazz song like they did in this play. I thought it was more fun because the play is pretty but also very dramatic and also a comedy.
In this show, they used a lot of audience participation. One: all the kids got masks at the beginning and went up and danced for the masquerade scene. I got to do that, and I thought it was really fun to get to go up on stage and dance. Two: Leonato (Jeff Christian) and the Prince (Matt Kahler) and Claudio were all walking through the aisle and Claudio got a chair stuck on him and the Prince stole people's beer, and Leonato came over and kissed my baby doll, and then the Prince said, "he's running for President, you better wash that baby." And I did wash that baby. I thought that was really awesomely funny to think that this guy was running for president because there were no presidents in that time. Number three: When Benedick was spying on the Prince and Claudio and they said, "Did you hear that Beatrice is madly in love with Benedick?" And then they said something about Beatrice pounding her heart and saying she'll die if Benedick doesn't love her and she'll die if he does. And then the audience participation comes in. Then Benedick picks up a beer and hides behind that, and then he picks up a chair and hides behind that. Claudio and the Prince and Leonato looked when he was carrying the chair like "Why is that chair floating?" and then he picked up a girl that was about 5 or 6 and he hid behind her and was carrying her! It was hilarious. Everybody was like, "Why is that little girl floating?" Four: and then a while later, Borachio (Shane Kenyon) kept saying "Conrad? Where are you?" And Conrad (Brittany Burch) was in a lawn chair having a beer. And then she said, "Nothing much. I'm just enjoying the show," which I thought was really funny because it is not supposed to be a show, it is supposed to be real life.
In Beatrice's scene that was like Benedick's scene where he hides behind things in the audience, she didn't hide in the audience. She hid in the background and on stage. So the first thing that she did was hear them say, "Did you hear that Benedick is madly in love with the Lady Beatrice?" And then she stumbled, she was in high heels and clung to a branch. And then her fingers slipped off the branch and then she hid behind a flowerpot. And then she came down and put on Misha's, the sound designer's, hat and went around with that on as a disguise. And I thought that was really funny because she was like "What??!! He loves me?" Beatrice and Benedick are both good at fighting each other with words. There is a slight chance that they might be hiding that they like each other. I think that they like each other but they don't know if they actually like each other or if they are actually enemies. At the beginning I don't think they make a good couple, but at the end they do.
Dogberry is a funny but a little bit smart character. Dogberry mostly doesn't know very much but he does know a few things. One, he knows how to sing; two, he knows how to give orders; and, three, he knows how to yell. I think one of the funniest things that Dogberry does is when he keeps interrupting people. And whenever he interrupts people everybody has to stop, so he is exactly like Polonia. My favorite scene that Dogberry is in is the court scene. So Borachio and Conrad were both in court because they had both been talking about Don John's (Josh Zagoren) mischievous plan with Hero. And the judge says that the lady Hero is dead and all the watchmen said "Darn!" And all the watchmen, who had fake mustaches on were mostly women except for one. And then Conrad said to Dogberry "You are an ass!" Which is a big insult. But Dogberry said, "Write that down. I am an ass. Well, the person that is supposed to be writing everything down is gone, so everybody remember, I AM AN ASS." Getting everybody to remember that you are an ass (which he really isn't an ass; he actually just doesn't remember many things) I think that is really funny to think that the most important thing for you to know in court is that a bad guy says that you are an ass. That is actually the least important thing to know. That the lady Hero is dead, that is one of the most important things to know in court.
Hero, on the night before her wedding day, Claudio "caught" her kissing and running away with another boy. But it wasn't really Hero; it was her cousin Margaret. She is already asleep when this happens. It is an important part to know that Claudio gets really mad at her for making out with another guy, and I think it is a weird idea to tell her on a completely different day than when he found out. Much ado about nothing means a bunch of hoo-ha for no particular reason. The play is called Much Ado about Nothing because there is a bunch of hoo-ha for no particular reason about Hero kissing Borrachio.
People who would like these shows are people who like big fight scenes, girls playing boys, and Noah Simon being the hilariousest Dogberry in the world. It is too late to see them this year, but you should see what they are going to do next year!
