A weekend mistake, a sonnet fuck-up, a Wednesday party, an X-Box version of Julius Caesar, the "1984" version of Hamlet, a ditzy scene from "Love for Love," my first night out on the town in London, complete with sidecars paid for by a British gentleman that likes to dance.  Oooo, I do like it here. 

Performed Sonnet 29 in Shakespeare class.  Could have been better...a lot better...

We hosted a party on Wednesday in our flat, relaxed and spontaneous, kings and cider, some interesting flirtations to be sure.  My group is sort of like a flock of Canadian geese: we are extraordinarily loud in public places, wherever we go people stare at us like they've never heard or seen such a cacophonous mess before, and we mostly mesh together except sometimes there's that one of us (not always the same person) that's straggling behind out of laziness, exhaustion, or frustration.  I like it.

The X-Box version of Julius Caesar.  The first Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) production that we saw was...a bit of a disappointment.  In the background of the production, an amalgamation of computer-generated images distracted from the acting.  Cassius, Portia, and Caldonia each primarily screeched or spoke in one tone.  The mesmerizing death of the most engaging character, Julius Caesar (played by Greg Hicks), should have ended the play.  With his demise, the play's momentum was lost.  Of course, there were decent points as well.  Brutus had moments of profundity.  Marc Antony's speech to win over the Romans was impressive.  That said, our Shakespeare professor, Ian, says that if he had been the director he would have been really pissed when the bows were miscalled.

Some interesting facts that Ian alerted us to about the RSC:  The actors have 2 year contracts and they perform many roles over that period with the same group of people.  The plays go in cycles, so history plays are performed together, tragedies together, and comedies together, etc. 

On Thursday night, Marina, Paul, Estelle, Sean, and I decided to voluntarily see The National's version of Hamlet.  Set recently in a totalitarian dictatorship, the design with its white lights capturing stunning tableaus during scene changes and stark scenery formed a delightful support for the story of the play.  Claudius and Gertrude were weak: screechy voices, too strong of an accent, lack of strong choices (except for one moment when Gertrude saw the Ghost but denied it and was simultaneously standing on a portrait of Claudius...)  Overall, I thought Hamlet (Rory Kinnear) himself was strong, but he did have moments where he seemed like a whiny teenager instead of a 40-year-old man.  In his address of Polonius, he constantly employed an amusing, but repetitive falsetto.  It was almost too easy to see through his madness.  Ophelia was rather weak--why are all the female actors we've seen so disappointing?!?

High Comedy is growing on me.  The teaching style of our professor, primarily an actress, forms a contrast to Ian's directorial training in Shakespeare class.  High Comedy is certainly a style of theatre that is not something that we address in the United States very much these days, but it is popular in West End theatres currently.  It's a new technique for me, a new approach to comedy.  Yesterday, Sean and I did a scene together that, in the words of Paul, our resident almost fop, was a romp.  (Definition of fop: The fop was a stock character in English literature and especially comic drama, as well as satirical prints. He is a "man of fashion" who overdresses, aspires to wit, and generally puts on airs, which may include aspiring to a higher social station than others think he has. He may be somewhat effeminate, although this rarely affects his pursuit of an heiress.)

Ran in Hyde Park today and listened to Lily Allen.  It's getting better all the time.