Mid-Winter Night's Dream

Midsummer Night's Dream
Shakespeare Theater - Washington, DC
November 18, 2012

Brad - A
Chelsea - B

Ok, we are SO incredibly behind, I'm sorry. This thing called the holiday's happened and it kicked our butts. But, we made it through, including a Brink ski trip that involved no skiing and a vegan Thanksgiving! But, before we even hit Thanksgiving we shuffled our way to the Shakespeare Theatre to see Midsummer Night's. I say shuffled because we have seen 30 odd plays this year....it was wearing on me. I loved this project but sometimes I just wanted to stay home and watch a Real Housewives of somewhere instead of watch community theatre. But, this night it was worth it! The Shakespeare Theatre always makes things interesting so I'm glad we went!

Here is the premise...it's a weird one! So, there are 2 plots going on together. One plot: Hermia doesn't want to marry the guy her dad picked out for her because she loves someone else but her dad calls upon an old law that says she has to marry him or face death! Ok, so here is a confusing 4-some: Hermia loves Lysander, but her dad wants her to marry Demetrius, who also loves Hermia. Helena, Hermia's friend loves Demetrius. Got it? Hermia - heart - Lysander. Demetrius - heart - Hermia. Helena - heart - Demetrius.Oh, young love! They all escape into the wood basically all chasing each other.

Meanwhile, a group of actors decide they will put on a play for Hermia's family.

Also, meanwhile we are introduced to the people who live in the woods. Oberon is the king of the fairies and Titania is the queen. They are NOT on happy terms. Oberon decides to punish Titania so asks Puck (the only name I had actually heard) to help him trick her with a love potion. Uh-oh love potion, what confusion with ensure?! Well, Puck makes Lysander fall in love with Helena, Demetrius fall in love with Helena, and Titania fall in love with a donkey face from the group of actors.Totally makes sense. Well all of this leads to hilarity.

It ends with all being restored, a group wedding for the 2 couples, the actors put on their play, and Oberon and Titania make up. Confused? You should probably just find where it is playing.

This production was interesting. Instead of fairies and the woods. It was burlesque dancers and an old backstage of a theater. It was a different thought but it still seemed to work with the plot.

At one point in time there was a lady mud wrestling scene that was really funny!

The group of actors putting on the play in a play were definitely my favorite. The put on the worst play (and we have seen 37) I have ever seen and they were really really funny. All and all I enjoyed it! The Puck in this spoke like Alf, who eats cats, so that threw me off a bit but all of the actors were really good. Mainly, Shakespeare Theatre is a guaranteed good show, albeit a bit weird.

Here are the pic's we took. I feel like this post especially shows our lack of photography ability.

We also took some pictures at intermission. This is the snack bar, for Shakespeare lovers Falstaff is a very important character and also a large man!

I was also trying to show how great this theatre is, the wall behind me is completely glass and looks out on the center of Chinatown in DC. The picture doesn't show how great it is, but it is great!

I can't believe we are almost done!

Chelsea