Hedera Colchica
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Juts wodnering if anyone here saw the PACT theatre performance of R&G cos i thought it was rather terrible. Also wodnering if anyone saw the Macq performance last year?
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Did anyone see the PACT theatre performance of R&G (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Hedera Colchica
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Mistress Lilith
Member
I don't know if it was the PACT version??
But we did watch a performance, it was the funniest thing I've ever seen in my whole life.
Hamlet looked SOOOOOOOOOOOOO cool!!!! He really looked his "mad" part, it was amazing!
Besides Hamlet, I remember them saying: if you're epileptic please leave we use strobe lighting
But we did watch a performance, it was the funniest thing I've ever seen in my whole life.
Hamlet looked SOOOOOOOOOOOOO cool!!!! He really looked his "mad" part, it was amazing!
Besides Hamlet, I remember them saying: if you're epileptic please leave we use strobe lighting
Mistress Lilith
Member
Yes! that's the one!
I saw Hamlet at parra riverside, that was sooooooooooo shitty I FELL asleep!
Did they use the same hamlet in the Hamlet production as in the Ros and Guil one?
If they did, I don't know HOW it could've been shit!
Mistress Lilith
Member
Not only was he funny, but he gave me a heart attack when he jumped over my head and when he ran down the stairs and screamed in the dark, but he was cuuuuuuute as and sooooo sooooo damn good!
Man, what a spunk!
Man, what a spunk!
Hedera Colchica
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they took risks with the "Hamlet" performance (i saw it at UNSW) but I don't think it paid off for them. It wasn't the same Hamlet.
As for R&G, it was funny and entertaining, yes, but I'm not sure they got to the heart of the play? Like, I thought the director didn't understand the play at all and so she was really taking artistic license with what she doesn't understand?
As for R&G, it was funny and entertaining, yes, but I'm not sure they got to the heart of the play? Like, I thought the director didn't understand the play at all and so she was really taking artistic license with what she doesn't understand?
Mistress Lilith
Member
But the point is that there really is no heart to the play. It's an Absurdist Drama piece and so open to wide interprettation. I thought it was pretty good-- the best thing about watching it was that it helped me remember heaps of quotes coz I could play it back in my mind. It's a shame the Hamlet one didn't do that for me
ah well
Hedera Colchica
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It might be an absurdist play but an absurdist play also has lots of ideas and themes that it communicates. Stoppard is a genius, he doesn't do things lightly, if you go through the two plays again you can see that nearly every line, and def. every scene in R&G correlates to a line or scene in Hamlet.
And the things that were changed from the original, I didn't feel as though the director justified her decisions. If she had demonstrated an understanding of the play, then I could have accepted her artistic license. But the fact was that she didn't even bother to consider what Stoppard originally intended before changing the play to suit her own purposes. She almost went so far as to call on of Stoppard's decisions stupid.
That's what I didn't like about it. As pure entertainment it wasn't bad, as a performance of R&G, it didn't stay true to the text. It was more like a transformation of R&G than a performance of it. The Hamlet performance was def. more of a "transfomation". Seriously, what was with their version of the mousetrap?
And the things that were changed from the original, I didn't feel as though the director justified her decisions. If she had demonstrated an understanding of the play, then I could have accepted her artistic license. But the fact was that she didn't even bother to consider what Stoppard originally intended before changing the play to suit her own purposes. She almost went so far as to call on of Stoppard's decisions stupid.
That's what I didn't like about it. As pure entertainment it wasn't bad, as a performance of R&G, it didn't stay true to the text. It was more like a transformation of R&G than a performance of it. The Hamlet performance was def. more of a "transfomation". Seriously, what was with their version of the mousetrap?
Mistress Lilith
Member
Given that length of time to put across a whole play, I think the director did just fine.
She was true to the storyline-- however, it was her own interprettation of it, even if they may conflict with what other people think.
Like the last part of the play, when they are in the boat- she added Ros and Guil peeling potatoes, now I didn't read that in the play, but when she explained it after she just said that it would've been boring if she'd stuck to the original text and not changed it at all. She was directing this for entertainment purposes, and I think she did a commendable job.
Overall, I think she got the main points of the play across, how she went about doing that was entirely up to her- her understanding of the play obviously influenced that, but it served it's purpose...
She was true to the storyline-- however, it was her own interprettation of it, even if they may conflict with what other people think.
She did demonstrate an understanding-her own. Perhaps if she were to show every bit of the play to satisfy Stoppard's original intentions, then it would've been too dull.
Like the last part of the play, when they are in the boat- she added Ros and Guil peeling potatoes, now I didn't read that in the play, but when she explained it after she just said that it would've been boring if she'd stuck to the original text and not changed it at all. She was directing this for entertainment purposes, and I think she did a commendable job.
IMO, she didn't. She complimented Stoppard's play, giving it a new light- engaging the audience to take on a different view of the play, to enhance a better understanding. Certainly this was the case for me, after watching the performance, I read the play again, and this time, things were clearer to me than they had been before.
Overall, I think she got the main points of the play across, how she went about doing that was entirely up to her- her understanding of the play obviously influenced that, but it served it's purpose...
Hedera Colchica
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Have you seen a true to the text production of Stoppard's play? It's anything but dull! take the macq performance lst year for example, that was wonderful, true to the text, and didn't *need* to omit anything.
She said that "it was pretty stupid for them (R&G) to be in Elizabethan costume cos they're talking in modern language anyway". But sin't part of the point of the play the fact that it's set in a discordant world? Where things like that aren't *supposed* to be in harmony?
We saw it on different nights so obviously her comments would've been different. The "peeling potatoes" can be done, without the potatoes and yet not be dull. She did get the main points of the play across, after all, most of it was the Stoppard play, but she missed a lot of things which I would've thought important to the HSC course, IMHO.
For eaxple, the metatheatrical aspects and the fact that the "transition" scenes were replaced with the dramatic ones of Hamlet.
You may argue that she didn't put it on as a HSC performance, and it's true, it wasn't put on as one. But it was def. advertised as a HSC preformance.
She said that "it was pretty stupid for them (R&G) to be in Elizabethan costume cos they're talking in modern language anyway". But sin't part of the point of the play the fact that it's set in a discordant world? Where things like that aren't *supposed* to be in harmony?
We saw it on different nights so obviously her comments would've been different. The "peeling potatoes" can be done, without the potatoes and yet not be dull. She did get the main points of the play across, after all, most of it was the Stoppard play, but she missed a lot of things which I would've thought important to the HSC course, IMHO.
For eaxple, the metatheatrical aspects and the fact that the "transition" scenes were replaced with the dramatic ones of Hamlet.
You may argue that she didn't put it on as a HSC performance, and it's true, it wasn't put on as one. But it was def. advertised as a HSC preformance.
Hedera Colchica
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yeh but the video version of R&G aint too crash hot.
Fradam
Tall man
Hehe, I saw that one, was funny
Polonious ran into my arm. Didn't even notice!
wrt discussion at hand; some good Transformation notes there
jojogirl~
New Member
I saw the Erskineville one too!! the moving around was really annoying though and there was a cockroach scuttling around on the ground as well...
i thought it was pretty good and the guy who played Hamlet was pretty convincing ^^ funny as well
i thought it was pretty good and the guy who played Hamlet was pretty convincing ^^ funny as well
SaveFerris
Member
A lot of people in my english class said the same sort of thing, that they found it annoying to move around all the time. For me, I quite liked that aspect of it...then again, I'm a very restless person and find it difficult to sit through 2 hours of a play or film...
I agree about Hamlet, that guy was hilarious! The one issue I had with the play was the way they chose to end it with their own interpretation. Yes, drama is all about individual interpretation and often it adds life to a play but in this case I felt their ending (they ended with the taxi, right? I saw it back in March so my memory's a bit foggy) took away from some of the most important elements of R&GAD, especially Stoppard's point about the nature of life and death.
Overall, though, I thought the production was really good, even if it did mean we didn't get home till like 12.30am and then our english teacher expected us to be in our 8am class the next morning...yeah, I didn't go...