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Aug. 22nd, 2022 11:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsYesterday genarti and I had the nostalgic experience of waiting in line for five hours for Shakespeare in the Park tickets so that we could see the musical adaptation of As You Like It created by Shaina Taub for Public Works, which I have been wanting to experience since 2017. As You Like It is my favorite Shakespeare play and I have never seen a production that I actually liked very much, which is not surprising because it is not really a very good play and large parts of it simply don't work. However, I love it, and there has always been a version in my head that does work and someday I feel sure I will get to see it!
This version was not that version, but I did have a wonderful time, as I always do with Public Works productions, which make a hallmark of incorporating large casts of Ordinary New Yorkers to run gleefully around the stage along with the usual Public Theater seasoned professionals.genarti describes these performances as "an explosion of glittery OTT groundling joy" and it is simply impossible not to have fun watching a hundred New Yorkers in red and blue cheerleader outfits shouting enthusiastically for a Shakespearean wrestling tournament!!
However, I also wish to argue with Shaina Taub a little about our conflicting visions of As You Like It ... okay. You know how every Twelfth Night worth its salt has That moment with Orsino and Viola -- usually it comes around the Patience on a Monument speech -- where they come this close to making out and you know that the shoe has just dropped on Orsino that the person he is actually pining for is the youth in front of him and not the dream of a distant lady, and As You Like It is a much more playful show in this regard and engages much more directly with these themes and yet I have never seen an As You Like It that gives me that moment, which I do feel is a crime against me personally.
Anyway. This As You Like It does not have that moment either; it's interested in Rosalind's interiority and the fact that she is constantly playing roles to avoid honest conversations but not particularly interested in Orlando's reaction to that or in landing them in a place that's explicitly queer, and it's not particularly interested in the Celia-(/)-Rosalind relationship, either. Obviously I would prefer it to be gayer but that isn't a problem per se except that also in this production Touchstone's lover Audrey becomes Andre and Phebe's admirer Silvius becomes Silvia, which means that the queer themes in the play are all displaced out from the main cast onto the Bad Idea Comedy Couples ...
And, like, let's be clear, the Bad Idea Comedy Couples in As You Like It are always pretty bad. Is there a way to do the Bad Idea Comedy Couples well? Maybe! It'd be challenging! We spent a while trying to workshop this and came up with, maybe if you have Rosalind and Orlando really kind of engage with them as foils on the theme of love at first sight and idealization, and also maybe if nobody actually gets married? Anyway there are a lot of things that do not work in the play and Shaina Taub, given the opportunity to fill in some gaps with musical numbers, has put most of her attention on Rosalind and a little bit on Orlando and Jacques and then added a lot of jokes, which, again, is fine, but on the other hand these people already have more interiority than anyone else in the text and you could have spent some of that time bridging some of the play's twelve-foot-wide plot holes instead ... like, for example, what is with the Forest of Arden's anti-fratricidal-feelings field! We are all continually concerned about what happens when they leave and Oliver suddenly wants to kill Orlando again because he's no longer breathing in those magical forest uppers!
Also I still can't quite believe that we had a full Touchstone-woos-Andre boyband number and five minutes of Silvia valiantly attempting to make 'she Phebed me' catch on as slang and not a single musical number for Celia. JUSTICE FOR CELIA. And more gay pining for Orlando.
ALL THAT SAID, it was a great time to watch and I would absolutely recommend if you happen to be in a position to hang out for a couple hours in Central Park to acquire tickets. Other things I particularly liked:
- the fact that Duke Frederick's appearance is always preceded by a chorus escort interrupting the rest of the plot to sing "ALL HAIL Duke FREDERICK!", a fact which simply got funnier and funnier as the show progressed
- Duke Senior and Jacques had a real "someone will die"/"of fun!!!" dynamic, half our party thought that the Forest Arden's genial love cult came in too strong by the end but I truly enjoyed Shaina Taub as Jacques moping around in multicolored patchwork clown overalls to glumly inform everyone that their forest lifestyle was insufficiently anticolonial
- INCREDIBLE lion puppetry
- Touchstone and Andre's first (failed) wedding is presided over by a ten-year-old with a daisy ... all the weddings imo should have been presided over by a ten-year-old with a daisy but that goes in the notes
genarti and I had the nostalgic experience of waiting in line for five hours for Shakespeare in the Park tickets so that we could see the musical adaptation of As You Like It created by Shaina Taub for Public Works, which I have been wanting to experience since 2017. As You Like It is my favorite Shakespeare play and I have never seen a production that I actually liked very much, which is not surprising because it is not really a very good play and large parts of it simply don't work. However, I love it, and there has always been a version in my head that does work and someday I feel sure I will get to see it!This version was not that version, but I did have a wonderful time, as I always do with Public Works productions, which make a hallmark of incorporating large casts of Ordinary New Yorkers to run gleefully around the stage along with the usual Public Theater seasoned professionals.
genarti describes these performances as "an explosion of glittery OTT groundling joy" and it is simply impossible not to have fun watching a hundred New Yorkers in red and blue cheerleader outfits shouting enthusiastically for a Shakespearean wrestling tournament!!However, I also wish to argue with Shaina Taub a little about our conflicting visions of As You Like It ... okay. You know how every Twelfth Night worth its salt has That moment with Orsino and Viola -- usually it comes around the Patience on a Monument speech -- where they come this close to making out and you know that the shoe has just dropped on Orsino that the person he is actually pining for is the youth in front of him and not the dream of a distant lady, and As You Like It is a much more playful show in this regard and engages much more directly with these themes and yet I have never seen an As You Like It that gives me that moment, which I do feel is a crime against me personally.
Anyway. This As You Like It does not have that moment either; it's interested in Rosalind's interiority and the fact that she is constantly playing roles to avoid honest conversations but not particularly interested in Orlando's reaction to that or in landing them in a place that's explicitly queer, and it's not particularly interested in the Celia-(/)-Rosalind relationship, either. Obviously I would prefer it to be gayer but that isn't a problem per se except that also in this production Touchstone's lover Audrey becomes Andre and Phebe's admirer Silvius becomes Silvia, which means that the queer themes in the play are all displaced out from the main cast onto the Bad Idea Comedy Couples ...
And, like, let's be clear, the Bad Idea Comedy Couples in As You Like It are always pretty bad. Is there a way to do the Bad Idea Comedy Couples well? Maybe! It'd be challenging! We spent a while trying to workshop this and came up with, maybe if you have Rosalind and Orlando really kind of engage with them as foils on the theme of love at first sight and idealization, and also maybe if nobody actually gets married? Anyway there are a lot of things that do not work in the play and Shaina Taub, given the opportunity to fill in some gaps with musical numbers, has put most of her attention on Rosalind and a little bit on Orlando and Jacques and then added a lot of jokes, which, again, is fine, but on the other hand these people already have more interiority than anyone else in the text and you could have spent some of that time bridging some of the play's twelve-foot-wide plot holes instead ... like, for example, what is with the Forest of Arden's anti-fratricidal-feelings field! We are all continually concerned about what happens when they leave and Oliver suddenly wants to kill Orlando again because he's no longer breathing in those magical forest uppers!
Also I still can't quite believe that we had a full Touchstone-woos-Andre boyband number and five minutes of Silvia valiantly attempting to make 'she Phebed me' catch on as slang and not a single musical number for Celia. JUSTICE FOR CELIA. And more gay pining for Orlando.
ALL THAT SAID, it was a great time to watch and I would absolutely recommend if you happen to be in a position to hang out for a couple hours in Central Park to acquire tickets. Other things I particularly liked:
- the fact that Duke Frederick's appearance is always preceded by a chorus escort interrupting the rest of the plot to sing "ALL HAIL Duke FREDERICK!", a fact which simply got funnier and funnier as the show progressed
- Duke Senior and Jacques had a real "someone will die"/"of fun!!!" dynamic, half our party thought that the Forest Arden's genial love cult came in too strong by the end but I truly enjoyed Shaina Taub as Jacques moping around in multicolored patchwork clown overalls to glumly inform everyone that their forest lifestyle was insufficiently anticolonial
- INCREDIBLE lion puppetry
- Touchstone and Andre's first (failed) wedding is presided over by a ten-year-old with a daisy ... all the weddings imo should have been presided over by a ten-year-old with a daisy but that goes in the notes
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 11:48 am (UTC)like, for example, what is with the Forest of Arden's anti-fratricidal-feelings field!
I have to confess, I have never seen or read As You Like It, and I have... so many questions now.
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 11:53 am (UTC)Nonetheless, this sounds like an incredible experience. The vision of a chorus preceding Duke Frederick with "ALL HAIL Duke FREDERICK!" is amazing, as is "Jacques moping around in multicolored patchwork clown overalls to glumly inform everyone that their forest lifestyle was insufficiently anticolonial."
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 01:09 pm (UTC)RSC 1985 on this timeline
https://www.rsc.org.uk/as-you-like-it/past-productions/as-you-like-it-timeline
At least it wasn't one of the ones that put the comic people in red noses to show they are comic.
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 01:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 01:49 pm (UTC)this sounds SO FUN to watch, even if in other ways the production's interpretation of the play is imperfect!
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 03:35 pm (UTC)Lol. Love the way you phrase all this.
yet I have never seen an As You Like It that gives me that moment, which I do feel is a crime against me personally.
Oh absolutely!
It sounds like a blast!
no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 05:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-23 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-24 03:40 am (UTC)lololol so the main 'plot' of As You Like It involves an evil upstart duke who has banished his brother the rightful duke into the forest, and an unrelated evil aristocrat who has been mistreating his younger brother Orlando (the hero). The rightful duke has set up court in the forest and Orlando heads out to find them; later both of their brothers respectively go to the forest with intention to murder them and, in two separate incidents, are immediately struck by remorse, apologize, and vow to mend their ways. Why?? .... it's a comedy! happy ending!
no subject
Date: 2022-08-24 04:01 am (UTC)I was looking to see if I could find a clip of 'ALL HAIL Duke FREDERICK!!' on YouTube and I did not but I DID find a full recording of the Duke leading his forest cult in a joyous hymn to love and fellowship in Arden while Jacques complains that they're going to ruin the environment (nota bene that is from the 2017 production and Jacques' current overalls are MUCH more festive.)
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Date: 2022-08-24 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2022-08-24 07:32 pm (UTC)I saw an RSC production in which Rosalind and Celia were DEFINITELY in love, and also Duke Senior and Jacques (played by a woman) were definitely shagging, and it was understood that leaving the Forest would end this relationship.
no subject
Date: 2022-08-25 03:48 pm (UTC)Also that hymn is SO much. Everyone else is singing about how IN ARDEN they will find PEACE and HARMONY and Jacques is like "killing the deer is evil because they were here first... but also the deer are just as bad as we are!" Oh Jacques. "In Arden we shall find we're made of selfishness and pain!" OH JACQUES.
no subject
Date: 2022-08-26 01:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-26 01:43 am (UTC)--> Rosalind falls for Orlando
--> Celia is like "well FINE" and agrees to marry Oliver on ten whole minutes' acquaintance because why NOT, what ELSE is there even for her to do
--> Rosalind's 'EVERYONE'S GETTING MARRIED TOMORROW' bit is then her throwing up her hands at what she considers Celia's inexplicable decision to get married on ten whole minutes' acquaintance, in the hopes that if she makes the whole situation ridiculous enough everyone will realize this is a bad idea and nope out
--> they all get 'married' by a ten-year-old with a daisy
no subject
Date: 2022-08-26 01:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-26 02:38 am (UTC)Anyway, it makes sense that NO one realizes that this is a bad idea and nopes out, clearly they're all just playing bad idea chicken at this point. Perhaps since the marriages were presided over by a ten-year-old with a daisy they are not valid, and this can all be sorted out?
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Date: 2022-08-26 06:40 am (UTC)I love Twelfth Night, and this is invariably my favourite moment and the one by which I judge the production.
I am sorry AYLI didn't quite deliver this time. I grew up on my mother's hatred for it (A Level) and have never seen it. One day I must give it a go, especially if tbere are people who are actually fans.
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