Al Pacino on Meryl Streep

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How’s that for a title?

Actually, Mr. Pacino is talking about Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline doing a read-through of Romeo and Juliet this past week.  It’s actually a pretty cool idea when you think about it – can a 62yr old actress play a 13yr old girl?  Absolutely.

Pacino was in the headlines again talking about Free Shakespeare  and how, “When I couldn’t afford
anything, I was sitting there seeing George C. Scott in ‘The Merchant of Venice,’” he told Speakeasy on the lawn outside the Delacorte. “It’s Joe Papp. He was a radical and he was a visionary, and I loved him so much. It was just great being around him. You could see 50 years later, it’s still going on.”

Go read that second article in particular (it has more Pacino), and try to do it *not* in Pacino’s famous growly voice. It’s so much more entertaining if you read it in character. Random shouts of HOO-AH! are not required.

I Have A Question

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A question this morning from the peanut gallery:

If you were to direct a Shakespeare play, which, where, and why?  Which play would you direct?  Where would you set it?  And why would you set it there?

My initial response to this, knowing my audience, was “I have a bunch of people who have directed a bunch of plays, so we’ll hear about what choices they made in the past.”

Hence, we’re cutting that off at the pass.  This question must be answered in the conditional / future tense.  Which play would you direct, where would you set it, and why would you set it there?

(That word has now lost all meaning to me.  Would would would.  I hate when that happens.  Looks like mould now.)

Sir Kenneth!

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Sir Laurence Olivier. 

Sir Ian McKellen. 

Sir Patrick Stewart. 

Kenneth Branagh.

One of these things is not like the others…..
BUT WAIT!
As part of the Queen’s Birthday Honours List, Mr. Branagh can now count himself among that pantheon of Shakespearean gods – he, too, has been knighted and shall now be Sir Kenneth.
I could swear that we’d had a discussion about his lack of Sir awhile back, and I’d gone googling for whether he was or was not in fact knighted.  But now I can’t find it.  So it was a bit of a surprise to me to learn that yes it is finally official, but that it only just happened within the last couple of days.
Congratulations, Sir Kenneth!

Digging Up The Curtain Theatre

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I know I’m a bit behind on some stories.  Bear with me while I play catch-up?  You’re the best.

Archaeologists have discovered the remains of the Bard’s old stomping grounds — ruins of a famous 16th-century theater, buried below the streets of modern London. Known in its heyday as the Curtain Theatre, it’s often been eclipsed by its more famous younger sibling, the Globe.

I saw a whole bunch of links about this one but I’m going to go with the NPR story because you can get the story in whatever way work best for you – audio or transcript, with lots of pictures.

On the one hand I agree that it is cool to have this piece of history.  But I just have to admit, archaeology is not my thing.  They mention “one of the nicest things they found” was a bit of a pot being used as a mousetrap.

…

Umm…..oh.  Yay?  I guess if you can’t draw a straight line between a thing and Shakespeare (and his works), it’s just not my cup of tea.  Your mileage may vary.

Illustrating Shakespeare With Paper

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Are traditional paper books dead?  If you’re a publisher like Barnes and Noble, you have to get creative.

They already had the rights to a cheapy paperback version of the plays.  They spot an artist who works in this really cool “paper cut” style and want to work with him.  Bingo bango, a new edition of Shakespeare is born!
I don’t know that this kind of thing would make me run out and get yet another edition of one of the plays — but if I was in the market for one and I saw half a dozen different volumes to choose from?  Something like this might stand out!  (Of course, this does not get into the discussion of which volumes have the best glossary, footnotes, edits and so on…we’re talking entirely about judging a book by its cover, here.  But let’s be real, plenty of people do that.)