King John and Virginia Wine

King John
American Shakespeare Center
Staunton, Virginia
November 3, 2012

Brad - A
Chelsea - B

We fell in love with Staunton, The American Shakespeare Center, and Joel at the Frederick House Inn in March.  So, we decided to turn our last trip to the only replica Blackfriars Playhouse in Virginia into a whole weekend affair.

So, we dropped the pup off at doggie overnight camp:

And then we headed out to Staunton.  We decided to do a little wine tour on our way to Staunton, yes, Virginia has wine, and we were pretty impressed.

About an hour outside DC, we stopped at our first vineyard.

Chelsea was not very impressed with the vines, but of course, it is well outside grape season.  The wine was tasty, and our wine pourer was very talkative.  In case you are curious, she has two pugs, dates the general manager of the local walmart, and teaches elementary.  She was great.  We bought a bottle of white wine and headed down the road.

About 45 minutes down the road we stopped at a much larger winery.  This place was huge.

After taking the self-guided tour, we tasted ten wines, and Chelsea had a taste of the frozen-drink-esque Sangria and Bellini, at the same time.

Once I could drag Chelsea away from the tasting counter, we headed down the road, through Charlottesville, to our last stop at Blue Mountain Brewery.

Nice mid-drift, huh? This place was awesome.  We got a flight with their nine unique brews.  

Yes, I let Chelsea taste too, but this is what happened every time she sipped a new beer:

She liked the cider; I liked the rest.  

De-lish-us.  And as you can see, it was a beautiful day.  But today would not end at a winery or brewery.  It would end in Staunton.  We got to our hotel at the Frederick House Inn.  We went and got some dinner, enjoyed one of our bottles of wine, and headed to the theatre.  Of course, before we went to the play, Chelsea read the Oxford book and explained the connections between Oxford and the play King John:

Then we headed to the playhouse.

So, King John:  The King of France --- Phil --- approaches King of England --- John --- and tells him to  give the English throne to the Arthur --- Art --- the rightful heir.  John refuses and tends to the business of his kingdom, deciding a dispute between Robert Falconbridge and his older brother Philip the Bastard. During the dispute, John and his mom realize Phil the B is King Richard I's illegitimate child.  John knights Phil-B and gains a viscious ally.  So, Phil of France lays siege to Angiers (an English controlled city) and demands they recognize Art as the English King.  John arrives and threatens war, but like most almost-wars, it is avoided because Phil's son and John's niece marry.  Moral of the story: weddings can resolve international disputes . . . Enter trouble.  Out of nowhere, a bishop arrives from Rome, tells him he appointed the wrong archbishop of canterbury, and tells him to recant.  John refuses.   From what I can tell, the bishop then issues a fatwa for John, forcing Philip of France to declare war.  War rages in England.  John goes back and forth on having Art killed, but Art accidentally dies trying to escape from a tower. Philip the Bastard non-consensually takes Louis the Dauphin's head.  John ends up dying, and his son Henry takes the throne.  

So, most of the action in this production took place in the first half of the play.  It was a epic first half, and the second half was a bit slower.  But it was great.  Chelsea's favorite actor from our entire project, the fellow that played Richard III, was awesome.  There were no weak actors.  The music was great.  They did a rockin acoustic version of Van Halen's Jump.  Like always, great cast, great music, great production.

We headed back the next morning to pick up the pup.

He was tired but happy to see us.  A great weekend. 

King Brad

Timon of Athens: Shakespeare in the Barn. Seriously.

Timon of Athens
Orangemite Productions - Dover, Pennsylvania
October 14, 2012

Brad - A
Chelsea - B

Dover, Pennsylvania is roughly two hours from Washington, DC.  This is a fact I would have never learned without having tried to see 37 plays in one year.  And Dover, PA --- originally named Jonerstown after its founder James Joner, no kidding, Jimmy Joner --- is home to Shakespeare in the Barn:

 This fall Orangemite productions produced Timon of Athens, a rarely produced gem, with significant Oxfordian overtones.  So, the play was, indeed, in a barn.

And it was awesome.

So, Timon of Athens is a story that Ayn Rand would be proud of that amply demonstrates the fallacy of altruism.  But I digress.  Timon of Athens is a wealthy Athenian from Athens.  The play starts off with Timon (the one from Athens, Greece) being carelessly generous with his funds.  He throws a dinner party, and everyone shows up and eats his food, drinks his wine, and dances his dances.  But then one of Timon's creditors demands repayment, and Timon learns he is out of cash.  Timon goes to his "friends" to collect on the loans he gave, and all of his "friends" bail on him.  So, Timon throws a second dinner party for the moochers --- read as, looters (for the Randian readers).  At the second dinner party, Timon serves rocks and tells the hangers-on that they are all worthless.  After that, he escapes to the woods and lives the life of a homeless woodsman.  But he discovers buried gold.  And he is suddenly rich again.  The parasites learn about Timon's new wealth and they come a callin.  He shoots them down, but he does fund an uprising against Athens.  Then Timon dies.  But the uprising is successful and the play ends with the new Athens leader reading Timon's epitaph.  

So, from our seats, if you looked forward you saw this:

 And if you looked to the right you saw this:

It was actually a great production. Some of the smaller parts were pretty rough, but the leads were all very good.  Flavius, the advisor to Timon who tells him he is broke, was great.  All of the actors were volunteers, and quite a few of them were still in high school.  One of the most impressive things about the play was the direction.  The director did a great job of editing the play to a manageable length while keeping all of the dialogue necessary to the play.  Great job.  And as you can see below, it was packed.

On the way home, we stopped at a pumpkin pyramid.  We went on a hayride.  We picked a pumpkin. 

And then on the way home, we listened to Walt Grace's Submarine Test, January 1967 five or six times in a row to try and figure out whether Walt died or not.  Conclusion: No idea.  Good work, Mr. Mayer.

Great Sunday.  Number 31. Awesome.

Brad of Athens

Oh hey, we got married!!

I mean Shakespeare was our main priority, but in the downtime we did plan and execute a wedding.

It. Was. Awesome. And true to form, Sonnet 116 was read during the ceremony.

After we headed for two relaxing weeks to Italy! Mostly we wandered around and watched a lot of West Wing!

But, now we are back in action!! Sorry for the unnecessary delay!

Antony and Cleopatra - why ladies rule the world!

Antony & Cleopatra
Little Washington, Virginia
September 15, 2012

Brad - A
Chelsea - B

The week before our wedding we headed 2 hours south to see some Shakespeare. We have priorities. Marriage smarriage, we have 37 in 12 months!! So, we headed out dinner-less and because we are so awesome at showing up 2 minutes before the show starts and being terrified about getting there on time we got a well balanced meal.

Coffee and dill pickle potato chips!

About the play: Antony, one of Rome's 3 leaders, has been neglecting his Roman duties to shack it up with the Egyptian queen, Cleopatra. He is infatuated and Rome is not so happy about it. The other 2 leaders call Antony back to Rome to help fight Pompey and some pirates. Cleopatra begs Antony not to go but he promises his love and heads out. Because the other 2 leaders are pretty peeved at Antony, it is suggested that Antony marry Octavian's (one of the other leaders) sister to solidify his love for Rome and commitment. He caves and marries her. Cleopatra, whose blood runs Egyptian hot, hears about the marriage. She is so mad and takes her anger out on a messenger. Meanwhile, Antony and the fellas meet with Pompey and try to call a truce. But, the other 2 leaders break the truce and a war breaks out. Antony is not in agreement. He ditches his new wife and heads back to Egypt crowning Cleopatra and himself rulers or Egypt. Octavian is not happy and goes to war with Antony. Cleopatra vows to help him but in the middle of the battle withdraws all of her people. So, losing Antony flees. Cleopatra apologizes and in the next battle she flees from helping Antony again! She is worried Antony will be mad at her so fakes her death (clearly the best decision) and sends word to Antony. Not so successful, instead he tries to kill himself and eventually dies in her arms. Cleopatra, instead of being seen as a villain, poisons herself. 

It was like a selfish annoying flighty version of Romeo & Juliet, which was kind of neat. I liked it more than Brad (which is hard to tell since he gives everyone A's) because it was the right amount of you hating the characters. Cleopatra is so selfish and bipolar. She hates him, she loves him, she abandons him, she fakes dead. She is exhausting! He is a love drunk idiot. Vows to kill her for betraying him, then loves her, then hates her. It is an interesting take on love and power. The actors were good. I would like to see this done different ways. Cleopatra is so sexual and intriguing, I bet there are awesome renditions. Funniest/awkwardest/awesomest part was that they choose to use handkerchiefs instead of swords. I mean they owned it. They did entire battles with...handkerchiefs. It was an interesting decision....we giggled.

We also had tons of leg room! Which is a plus and we snuck in candy.

Brad judged me for my candy sneaking. 

We also saw a man in a Colonel Sanders bow tie! This was us stalking him and trying to get a casual pic of his tie. 

 Basically, I wish I was as awesomely persuasive as Cleopatra.


Chelsea

Hamlet: Slings and Arrows

Hamlet
Folger's Shakespeare Theatre - Washington, DC
September 8, 2012

Chelsea - B+
Brad - A

Ahhh, Hamlet.  Here is a little Hamlet song to entertain you:

This is one of those plays that everyone assumes everyone knows and understands.  After seeing it for the first time, I am hard-pressed to believe that most people even know the basic story, let alone understand it.

Sadly, this was our last play at Folger's Shakespeare Theatre during our Shakespeare escapade.  Over the past year, Chelsea and I have come to love this place.  All of the shows we've seen there have been great, and the theatre is in a part of town we don't visit often.

And this time we discovered that they have an awesome garden:

Before the show, we thought we would be sophisticated and grab a drink at ye old wine bar a couple of blocks away from the theatre.  This place had wine on tap.  No kidding.

So, after deep discussions about life, liberty, and the pursuit of self-imposed, arbitrary year-long goals, we made our way across the street to the Folger's to see Hamlet.

Interestingly, Hamlet was put on by a traveling company from the Globe theatre in London.  We also ended up going on opening night.  The theatre was full of geriatrics and pretense, a perfect venue for two nearly-weds seeing their twenty-ninth Shakespeare play in the past ten months.

So, Hamlet:  You know what . . . I am not going to feed into the public's belief that the plot of Hamlet is common knowledge.  So, if you want to know the story of Hamlet, you need to read it or go see it or . . . get on Netflix and watch the first season of the Gemini Award Winning (that's a Canadian Emmy) Slings and Arrows.  Slings and Arrows is a dram-edy that follows the trials and tribulations of the fictional New Burbage Shakespeare Festival.  In the first season, conflicted actor/director Geoffrey Tennant re-invigorates the festival by putting on a stripped down, visceral version of Hamlet.  Yes, Chelsea and I watched Season One (and two and most of three).

But I digress...

This performance was great.  The actor who played Hamlet was awesome.  During most of the play, actors in the background would step into the background of scenes to do sound effects.  But unlike Comedy of Errors, they were great.  They truly added to the supernatural scenes.  Hamlet nailed his monologues.  And like Slings and Arrows, it was a stripped down, fast-paced visceral play.  The grave diggers scene was awesome (and full of legal jargon).  Great play.  Great production.  Chelsea and I brought down the average age of the audience by about 10 years.

Good bye sweet Folgers.

Brad-let

Coriolanus...in a Parking Lot.

Coriolanus
New York City - Lower East Side
August 11, 2012

Brad - A
Chelsea - A

After Jersey we headed into the big city! Luckily, we got to spend a couple of hours visiting with these 2 awesome people - and yes, I chose this pic because you are petting a cheetah!!

After that we subway'ed like true New Yorkers to Shakespeare in the Park...ing lot. It truly was in a working parking lot. Multiple times during the production cars parked directly behind the stage. One guy actually changed shirts, I watched his shirtless body...it was awkward.

Story! Coriolanus is...awesome. He is a soldier who comes home to Rome where there are strikes because of a grain shortage. He is celebrated from a victory against the Volscian army. His mother convinces him to run for political office, although he is purely a soldier at heart, he agrees to appease his mother. He wins the support of the Senate and the commoners until two of the senators, Brutus and Sicinius, conspire to get public support against Coriolanus. He gets so mad that he rails on the public and politics, gets banished from Rome, and decided to join up with the Volscian army to take down Rome. Rome freaks out and tried to dissuade Coriolanus from taken them down. After talking with this mother and wife, he takes pity and arranges a peace treaty between Rome and the Volscains. When he returns to the Volscains, they kill him for being a traitor.

So sad! We really liked this! It was set in modern times with the occupy movement and it fit really perfectly. It was in a parking lot...literally, we sat on a blanket but the actors were legit! They all were really great!!! The actor playing Coriolanus was amazing. He was young and played a strong military guy so well. You felt for him and agreed with him. He was just a good guy trying to do the right thing and his death was really sad. It was also awesome to see such a unique setting with such good actors for free! I mean at one point in time he climbed a sign and they told you to go to McDonald's to use bathrooms. It was straight up great!

We finally made it home at around 3AM so, the next day Brad looked a lot like this:

Whirlwind NY trip, ROCKED!!!


Chelsea