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Ashland keep on rollin'
Sep. 1st, 2014 09:01 pmScattered 'this is all we did today' reports.
Saturday: Two Gentlemen of Verona
This is my second time seeing the show here. (ED: To clarify, the second production.) This one is for the ladies. Seriously. It's an all feminine cast. Or, it is to say, the cast members are all female. But I don't think that had a lot of impact on the production. Proteus, the ever-changing, was more of a buffoon than an asshole, but I think that was directorial choice. There is a *lot* of wordplay. Some might say too much wordplay. I'm certain that Elizabeth's cadre of Young Wits were chortling to themselves through the whole production. But it slows down the play a lot if you're not careful. Our director was careful, which I appreciated. I still hate the magical bandit cave at the end where Valentine makes everything okay again based on his charm and flawless character. And I enjoyed this show quite a bit. You get *two* fools for the price of one, like in Comedy of Errors, except in this one you get a dog too!
Sunday: The Cocoanuts
Another of the Marx Brothers scripts, like Animal Crackers a couple of years ago, reclaiming many of the same actors. (This was Polly Potter's actress's first year, as we discovered later.) This performance pointed out sharply why the Broadway shows were so much better than the movies--film technology of the time could not contain the Marx Brothers. And our Marxes were pretty awesome. Lots of ad lib, with occasional returns to the plot line. Which is, as you know, largely something to give the other actors something to do while our four stars caught their breath. This was my single standing ovation so far--we'll see how Into the Woods does.
Monday: The Hundred Foot Journey
As is our wont, we make an effort each year to go to the Varsity Cinema and catch a flick. This year, we passed on Calvary and Magic in the Moonlight to catch this one, which included Helen Mirren, That Guy from Slumdog Millionaire and Newsroom, and The Hot French Chick in a story where a family moves from India to France so they can open up a restaurant across the street from a Michelin rated snooty French nose bag, as the young rebel upstart takes on Le Goliath until both sides learn to get along and enjoy escargot samosas. Sadly, this movie paces dutifully through all the expected plot points, carefully avoiding any real conflict, to the happy ending where the two crazy young kids get together finally. It's kind of like what you'd expect if Spielberg and Oprah got together to bring a foreign indie film with soft rounded corners to the states. If I had, in fact, known that S&O were in on this gig, I probably would have been less interested. A.R. Rahman is involved--I don't know if he did a couple of songs or worked on the score or what--but those couple of songs are kind of cool.
Tomorrow we're going spelunking and hopefully dinner with our out-of-town friend, and then Wednesday night we close up with Into the Woods.
Saturday: Two Gentlemen of Verona
This is my second time seeing the show here. (ED: To clarify, the second production.) This one is for the ladies. Seriously. It's an all feminine cast. Or, it is to say, the cast members are all female. But I don't think that had a lot of impact on the production. Proteus, the ever-changing, was more of a buffoon than an asshole, but I think that was directorial choice. There is a *lot* of wordplay. Some might say too much wordplay. I'm certain that Elizabeth's cadre of Young Wits were chortling to themselves through the whole production. But it slows down the play a lot if you're not careful. Our director was careful, which I appreciated. I still hate the magical bandit cave at the end where Valentine makes everything okay again based on his charm and flawless character. And I enjoyed this show quite a bit. You get *two* fools for the price of one, like in Comedy of Errors, except in this one you get a dog too!
Sunday: The Cocoanuts
Another of the Marx Brothers scripts, like Animal Crackers a couple of years ago, reclaiming many of the same actors. (This was Polly Potter's actress's first year, as we discovered later.) This performance pointed out sharply why the Broadway shows were so much better than the movies--film technology of the time could not contain the Marx Brothers. And our Marxes were pretty awesome. Lots of ad lib, with occasional returns to the plot line. Which is, as you know, largely something to give the other actors something to do while our four stars caught their breath. This was my single standing ovation so far--we'll see how Into the Woods does.
Monday: The Hundred Foot Journey
As is our wont, we make an effort each year to go to the Varsity Cinema and catch a flick. This year, we passed on Calvary and Magic in the Moonlight to catch this one, which included Helen Mirren, That Guy from Slumdog Millionaire and Newsroom, and The Hot French Chick in a story where a family moves from India to France so they can open up a restaurant across the street from a Michelin rated snooty French nose bag, as the young rebel upstart takes on Le Goliath until both sides learn to get along and enjoy escargot samosas. Sadly, this movie paces dutifully through all the expected plot points, carefully avoiding any real conflict, to the happy ending where the two crazy young kids get together finally. It's kind of like what you'd expect if Spielberg and Oprah got together to bring a foreign indie film with soft rounded corners to the states. If I had, in fact, known that S&O were in on this gig, I probably would have been less interested. A.R. Rahman is involved--I don't know if he did a couple of songs or worked on the score or what--but those couple of songs are kind of cool.
Tomorrow we're going spelunking and hopefully dinner with our out-of-town friend, and then Wednesday night we close up with Into the Woods.