The Hamlet Challenge Entry no 3: Curb Your Enthusiasm

Larry David as Max Bialystock in the fictional production of The Producers

Entry no 3 in the Hamlet challenge comes from an unlikely place if there is such a thing: the HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm. In the episode Opening Night, Larry David goes to New York to start performances as Max Bialystock in the musical The Producers. In the first scene of the Producers, Max Bialystock has just opened Funny Boy!, a musical version of Hamlet, the show is panned by the critics and it is closing just as it has opened. Max Bialystock laments his past glories as a legendary Broadway producer.

The real deal: David Tennant and Penny Downie in Hamlet, RSC 2008. Photograph Ellie Kurtz

 

The entry might not be profound, but its meta implications are delicious: a real person (in a fictional version of himself) plays a part in a real play (if not a real production) whose plot involves a fictional musical version of Hamlet. Which is a real play. The question remains (and it’s not “To be or not to be”): Is Larry David’s performance real or fictional? And although Funny Boy! is not a real musical, Hamlet the musical exists.

For the first entry and explanation to the Hamlet challenge visit the Hamlet Challenge Entry No 1:  Tis Pity She’s a Whore by Cheek by Jowl.

Posh at the Duke of York’s theatre – Review

Posh, written by Laura Wade and directed by Lindsey Turner, was one of my theatre highlights in 2010. It tells the story of ten overprivileged young men spending one evening in the  private dining room of an Oxford pub, where they try to capture past glories of wild nights and map their future (which, they see, as the future of the country). Things don’t go according to plan. Or do they? Having seen the original production at the Royal Court twice, I have good news to report: the production, now transferred to the Duke of York’s, has not lost its spirit or its freshness.

Posh is the kind of play that provokes different reactions to different people. Even though these young men, with their privileges, gold cards, connections and limitless sense of entitlement, are obviously figures of hate, there is something vulnerable to their bravado: they are trapped in a changing world, a world they pretend to control, but clearly nobody does. They are also monkeys in a gold cage (not least because we, as the audience, stand there and make fun of them). And often, within their outrageous self rhetoric, there are biting truths for all of us.

Posh is not subtle, but that’s not a criticism. It captures a group of people who, due to their upbringing and age, are obnoxious, brash and “in your face”. The play is equally brash, and goes out all guns blazing, and in that sense, it offers a sympathetic view of its subject: if the play is as “in your face” as they are, isn’t there a thin line between our righteousness and theirs?

The text has substantial changes from the play performed at the Royal Court in 2010: that production was playing just before the May 2010 elections, and since then a Tory government has been in power and we have all realised the economy is in bigger trouble than we thought (I ‘ll let you to ponder whether these two things are unrelated). The text has been updated to reflect these changes. One subplot from the original play has been exchanged for a new one: I liked the old subplot because it cast the long shadow of the real world, I like the new one because it pays off with the kind of moment that makes live theatre so much fun.

None of the changes alter the spirit of the play or the original production. Posh is sharply observed, funny, an interesting addition to the plays about Angry Young Men: if Jimmy Porter was angry for the opportunities he deserved and didn’t have, these posh boys are angry about losing privileges they don’t deserve, but also scared because it’s the only life they know. The ensemble cast, largely the same since the 2010 production, are uniformly excellent and there is a lot of pleasure from seeing so much young talent on stage . Special mention goes to Leo Bill who expertly and with immense confidence texts the audience’s sympathies (as well as delivering pages and pages of text) and Tom Mison who shows control and skill in projecting gravitas among the chaos. Recommended.

My submission to the Royal Court – 100 word plays event

Important Things

Man: I want to say something but don’t know what.
A Second Man: You want to say nothing then.
Man: No, I know there is something to be said.
The Second Man: But not by you.
Man: It has to be me.
(pause)
Man: I am the one who knows it needs to be said. I have to say it.
The Second Man: It must be very important.
Man: It is.
The Second Man: I only have time to hear important things.
Man: I only have time to think important things.
(pause)
Man: I only think important things. But never find time to say them.

The End

All New People at the Duke of York’s theatre – Review

Zach Braff as Charlie and Paul Hilton as Myron in All New People. Photo by Alastair Muir

There is no getting away from the fact that All New People wants to be so much  more than it is (funnier, more profound, more interesting) but generally falls short of these intentions. On the other hand, there is something heroic in the effort.

Charlie is at a beach house in the middle of the winter, ready to kill himself. He is interrupted by Emma, an eccentric British real estate agent trying to rent the house, who brings along her friend Myron (an ex drama teacher turned fireman / drug dealer). At some point, Kim, a friendly escort sent to Charlie as a present, shows up and the four of them try to negotiate the rest of the evening, with Charlie determined to his course of action.

I don’t mind unlikeable characters, but there is no sufficient meat to any of them: Myron, played by Paul Hilton, is the most obnoxious, he is also the one with the most insight and  true to himself, and I found he commanded most of my attention . Plus he is played by Paul HIlton, who is always compelling to watch. I found Eve Myles, who played Emma, annoying (the “eccentric” in her character description should have been a clue), until a revelation very late in the play, but by that point it’s too little too late. Zach Braff is a nice enough presence as Charlie, but he sits out a lot of the action, and at those times he is not interesting enough to watch. The reason for his actions (as it’s revealed late in the play) should make him a powerful and tortured figure but that doesn’t come across in the characterisation. Kim is the stereotype of the tart with a heart, and Susannah Fielding plays the part with genuine warmth and charm. There is a brief moment when the play gives us a glimpse into her character, but it’s not followed through.

There are four filmed scenes intercepted throughout the play, that add almost nothing. Joseph Millson, David Bradley and Amanda Redman appear in these scenes, which makes for a rather starry cast.

There are some nice one liners, and I enjoyed the physical comedy of the first ten minutes, which blended suicide and laughs very nicely. Ultimately though, the play doesn’t say anything new & doesn’t say it compellingly enough.

Four stars for effort, two stars for execution. The audience was younger than most West End shows, with an even split between men and women, and they seemed to enjoy it. So I might have missed the point completely.

The Hamlet Challenge Entry No 2: Copenhagen at Sheffield theatres

Before going to Sheffiled this past Thursday, I knew very little about Michael Frayn’s play Copenhagen. Something about nuclear physics and the bomb. I quite like not knowing anything about a play, all part of discovering everything in the moment.

Geoffrey Streatfeild as Heisenberg in Copenhagen Photo by Manuel Harlan

In the end, Copenhagen proved a superb play in a superb production. The play itself reminded me of Arcadia, with its visceral approach of ideas, science, morality & mortality. I think that Arcadia might be the best play ever written, so anything that comes close is a masterpiece.

You can call the production challenging, but that might miss the point. It was challenging, both because it presents something important and profound, but also because of the challenge of hanging on in a fabulous emotional and intellectual ride. Like skiing down a slope, a motif of the play itself.

I am tempted to call the production sparse, but that brings to mind something small and, well, drab. Three actors on stage for two and a half hours, with very few props, and this was as rich an experience as any I have had in the theatre. Henry Goodman, Barbara Flynn and Geoffrey Streatfeild were all brilliant, as good as each other, which is the way with the best performances.

If not all these pleasures were not enough, the play gave me the second entry in my Hamlet challenge: early in the play, Heisenberg, wanting to demostrate that the observer has an effect on the object of the objervation, says: “The whole appearance of Elsinore, you said, was changed by our knowing that Hamlet had lived there”. That kickstarts another motif throughout the play, where Elsinore is mentioned several times as the dark place of the soul. So there we are: we go from Copenhagen to Elsinore, and I would be very happy to spend more time in both.

For the first entry and explanation to the Hamlet challenge visit the Hamlet Challenge Entry No 1:  Tis Pity She’s a Whore by Cheek by Jowl.

In the mean time, you don’t have much time to catch Copenhagen at the Lyceum in Sheffield. It only runs for 11 days and finishes tomorrow.

The Hamlet Challenge Entry No 1: Tis Pity She’s a Whore by Cheek By Jowl

On Monday, I was at the Barbican to see Tis Pity She’s a Whore, a production by Cheek By Jowl. To my shame, I hadn’t seen a Cheek by Jowl production before, but on this evidence, I will be coming back. Punchy (in every sense of the word), sexy, gruesome, it was as much about words, as it was about visual beauty and bodily fluids.

In the second scene, when Grimaldi and Vasques have a bare knuckles, Fight Club style, fight, someone yells at some point “A hit. A very palpable hit“. The line, that doesn’t exist in the text, is a refernce to Hamlet, uttered by Osric at the start of the final - let’s see how many people we can kill in less than ten minutes – sword fight between Hamlet and Laertes.

Saying that Hamlet is referenced a lot  is self evident, but I always get a thrill when I spot a reference, so for the next year, I decided to play the Hamlet Challenge game.

The rules are simple:

1) For a year, I ‘ll post about all the Hamlet references I spot in fiction.

2) It has to be about something I watched or read, and can’t be a reference someone else told me about but I didn’t experience.

3) Other people can point out things and subtleties I missed.

I am curious how far I can get in a year, and which Hamlet reference will have the most mentions. “To Be or Not to Be” is the most famous quote but I think Yorick is in with a chance.

Ten Golden Rules for Twitter (that they are absolutely no use to anyone)

These rules won’t get you more followers. So there is absolutely no reason to continue reading.

1) I only follow people who I like. If I want to follow what you say but I don’t like you, I ‘ll put you in a (private) list. And I ‘ll probably lose interest very quickly.

2) No text speak. If you can’t say it in 140 characters, you are doing something wrong. I do have shortcuts I consider acceptable (“&” instead of “and”, “v” instead of “very”) but I won’t use numeric symbols unless I would use them in a normal written sentence. I don’t use long tweets either. It’s 140 characters for a reason (mainly to make you edit it a few times)

3) I don’t tweet about frustrations at work or problems with friends, lovers, family. I know some people do, and it’s fine by me, but twitter is like being in a party: you know some, you don’t know most, & I ‘ll try not bore people with my troubles. Unless I am sloshed. See rule number 5.

4) But I will tweet about frustrations with public transport. This is what twitter was invented for.

5) I don’t tweet when I am drunk. At least not when I am sloshed. But other people’s drunken tweets at 2am on a Saturday night (or rather Sunday morning) are very amusing. Especially Russell Tovey’s.

6) I don’t do Follow Fridays and don’t thank the people who include me in their Follow Fridays. The former because I don’t think they work, the latter because I am basically rude.

7) I don’t tweet during tv drama. I ‘ll tweet through any other tv programmes.

8) I still mourn the old Retweet functionality, when tweets appeared from your account.

9) I block all spam accounts religiously.

10) There is no tenth rule. But I am surprised you made it that far.

Welcome

With any luck, I might have something to write.