Shakespeareances Update
No Promises, But...
It's the lot of the Alzheimer's caretaker: a perfectly planned day goes off the rails within minutes of the day's start. Imperfectly planned days inevitably go off the rails, too, for that matter. Heck, even days I approach with a mindset of, "whatever happens happens" end up in a "what just happened?" surreality.
Concerning Sarah, her worsening cognitive functioning and personality shift necessitated her moving to an assisted living memory unit three weeks ago. My caretaking days are not past, of course, but I do have some time now to devote to myself—and to relaunching Shakespeareances. No promises, no timeline, but I have actually begun the task of redesigning the site. In the meantime, I'm reconnecting with our linked theaters and updating Bard on the Boards. That's the only updates you'll see on the site until I'm ready to relaunch on…whenever. Nevertheless, as theaters get back on their feet, I intend to support their efforts in what little way I can while I , wobbly kneed, get back on my feet.
—Eric Minton, February 25, 2022
End of the Trump Era?
Beyond Shakespeare's Villains
The presidency of Donald Trump has been something of a renaissance for William Shakespeare. From the moment of Trump's inauguration four years ago, scholars, commentators, and yours truly have found parallels, if not outright depictions, of the 45th president of the United States in Shakespeare's characters. Yet, these straight-up comparisons between Trump and specific characters have always bothered me. Scholastic discussions, while exploring the various angles of personalities, can trample on the nuanced breadth and depth of the personalities that make Shakespeare's characters so fascinatingly—and sometimes frustratingly—rich. Commentaries also focus more on the singular characters rather than their contexts, contexts that include not only the other characters on stage but the audience in the seats, too. It's in those roles where I believe Shakespeare's most vital lessons lie as we move forward into the next administration. For the full essay, click here.
Happy New Year?
The Worst of Times Still the Best of Times
When Sarah broke her ankle—this was after she broke her wrist—I was ready to throw in the towel. But there were no towels in the laundry basket that she, without a workable left arm to support herself, attempted to carry down the stairs. While I had no towel to throw in literally, figuratively I gripped the towel of surrender that evening. I took stock of how my wife's mental and physical misadventures derailed Christmas on top of everything else 2020 had derailed in our lives. "Hang in there," my spiritual voice told me: "There's only three weeks to 2021 and your promise of a new beginning." 2020 did get worse: three weeks was too much time for it not to. Then, 2021 launched with compounding crises. Nevertheless, I'm here to tell you I have put away the towel. I'm also here to tell you of the impending return of Shakespeareances.com. Click here for the full essay.
Shakespeare News: Stratford Festival
Stratford Festival Puts Season On Hold,
Shutters
New Tom Patterson Theater
After weeks of consultation and deliberation, Stratford Festival Artistic Director Antoni Cimolino, Executive Director Anita Gaffney, and Board Chair Carol Stephenson have concluded that the Stratford Festival's entire 2020 season must be put on hold, with a plan to revisit programming as soon as it is safe to gather in theaters. While they anticipate that theaters will not be able to reopen until next year, they have not ruled out the possibility of mounting specially scheduled fall or holiday programming should public health conditions allow.Click here for the complete story.
New Feature: Sarah's Chronicles
The Tide of Truth
A significant element of my chronicling the Shakespeare Canon Project in 2018 was the onset of Sarah's seizure disorder and a worsening of her cognitive capaiblities. Loyal readers and the theater people Sarah and I encountered during that year began sharing their concern and prayers and taking inspiration in our determination. I continued posting updates on Sarah as her seizures were finally diagnosed as epilepsy, and then, subsequently, she was confirmed to have dementia. The latter has impacted every aspect of our lives, including my efforts to keep Shakespeareances.com going. Meanwhile, Sarah had become a hero in the Shakespeareances.com community, and my accounts, always grounded in some Shakespearean allegorical strand, were appreciated as life lessons. One reader even described it as a "Beautiful script in the process." "Sarah's Chronicles" will be an ongoing account of our journeys' benchmark moments, charting how dementia takes further hold of her and messes with me. It's a Shakespearean-inspired, front-row view in real time into humanity's duality of strength and frailty. For the full introduction and first entries, click here.
Shakespeare News: A Plague Upon Our Houses
Coronavirus Threatens
Shakespeare Theaters
Shakespeareances.com is on the mailing lists of 239 North American, European, and Australian theaters on our Theater Links page, and I've received a large number of emails the past couple of weeks related to coronavirus and COVID-19. They've pretty much said the same things: how the theater is still open for business, is monitoring the status of the virus’s spread, is following the guidance of local public health service, is taking extra sanitation procedures, and asks patrons to do the same when attending plays. The tune and tone changed today in an avalanche of messages announcing cancellations and postponements. But one message, hearkening to how Shakespeare himself handled theater-closing pandemics, offers hope and guidance. Click here for the full story.
Blackfriars Cancels Season, Other Pandemic Updates (March 17)
More Shakespeare Theaters Announce Closings Due to Coronavirus and Decrees
(March 14)
On Stage: A King and No King
Shakespeare Meets
Arrested Development
Call this the reluctant review. Sarah and I are sitting in the lounge of the Stonewall Jackson Hotel in Staunton, Virginia. We’ve just come from a show at the American Shakespeare Center's Blackfriars Playhouse, A King and No King, a 1611 play written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher. Per our normal routine, we settled into the hotel’s lounge for a glass of wine and to relax, reflect, and converse about the show. For myriad reasons I wasn’t intending to review this production. Yet here I am, hot wife opposite me, bedtime beckoning, and I've got my iPad set up on the marble tabletop writing this review. Some productions and performances simply are worth scaling a mountaintop to proclaim their merits to the world. The brilliance we’ve just experienced is in the play itself, in the actors’ individual and ensemble interpretation of the material, and in the performances, especially as this was a first outing for the cast, demonstrating how talented and tight an ensemble this is. For the complete review, click here.
Production photos added to the review of A King and No King at the Blackfriars Playhouse.
On Stage: Hamlet
Hark! How These Angels Sing
My parents and I shared similar cultural tastes, including Shakespeare, though I came to the Bard independently of their lifelong appreciation for his works. They influenced my love for classical music, and my brothers and I turned them on to rock ‘n’ roll. They especially loved opera, but that was the one genre I couldn’t cotton to. I tried over the years, and when I was a professional music critic I at least came to appreciate the skills if not the art form itself. Finally, my father got through to me. After Mom died, I, being the good son, accompanied Dad to a Met Live production of Giacomo Puccini’s Madam Butterfly and had the transformative moment that great art can lay on a man. All of which comes into play every time I attend a Shakespeare Opera Theatre performance, the company's current production of William Shakespeare’s and Ambroise Thomas’s Hamlet being my fourth. Shakespeare Opera Theatre productions can expand your Shakespearean dimensions (sometimes to a frustrating extent, as with Hamlet) while exposing you to opera’s prevailing glory, especially those pieces, well known or not, inspired by Shakespeare. And, as always happens with Shakespeare Opera Theater, this production has some glorious moments. For the complete review, click here.
Commentary: The Tragicomedy of Errors
A Passion Play
Of all the existential questions I’ve pondered in my sixty-one-and-a-half-year journey through life, this is the most difficult I’ve yet addressed: How’s Sarah? The query comes once or twice a week. How’s Sarah? I am never sure how to answer because “She has dementia” sounds so stark, though honest. The intent behind the question dictates my answer, and now I'm ready and able to tackle one intended purpose of the question How's Sarah?—when it is used to mask the question, How's Eric? For all the answers in this commentary marking my return to Shakespeareances.com after a three-month absence, click here.
Review and Interview
On Stage: Richard III
Crowning Chutzpah with Crutches
The stage, hemmed in on three sides by blackish metallic walls, is bare except for a steel barrel at the back and a shovel off to the side. A skull inside a glass box hangs from the center ceiling. A woman wearing a white shroud, bent under the wearying weight of a tragic life but fiercely determined to not yet die, shuffles across the stage. This ghostly figure finishes her passage, and the theater lights go out. When the stage lights come back up, a grave has opened up near the front of the dirt-covered floor. We wait. Richard pops out of the grave like a delighted Dick-in-the-box.“There’s a different Richard every night,” says Aaron Monaghan, who plays the title character in DruidShakespeare’s production of William Shakespeare’s Richard III at John Jay College’s Gerald W. Lynch Theater as part of the Lincoln Center’s White Light Festival. With a glorious command of Shakespeare’s verse that he sometimes plays like a jazz musician’s approach to a Mozart score, Monaghan presents a Richard living in the moment: his moment, the character's moment, and the real Richard III's moment. “Literally, when I pop my head up, I don’t really know what way it’s going to come out.” For the complete review, click here.
Interview: An "Endlessly Fascinating" Richard III
DruidShakespeare's Aaron Monaghan
Channels a Memory and the Real Richard
In an exlusive interview with Shakespeareances.com, Aaron Monaghan describes how the ghosts of Antony Sher and the historical King Richard factor into his performance of Shakespeare's iconic, monarchal villain. We discuss the Ireland-based DruidShakespeare's approach to Shakespeare, the actor's night-to-night approach to Richard, and Richard III's haunting approach to politics on both sides of the Atlantic. For the complete interview, click here.
Commentary
As Flies to Wanton Boys Are We to the Gods
Attending a World Series has been high on our bucket list for decades. When our Washington Nationals evolved into contenders, we became annual season ticket holders expressly to get priority seating and discounts for postseason games. We were in the stands for the team’s tragic meltdowns in the division series of 2012, 2014, 2016, and 2017. Tonight, finally, the World Series comes to Washington, D.C. And this morning, as I write this, Sarah and I are on an airplane heading for Honolulu, Hawaii. We’ll be on O'ahu through next week. This is not a trade-off of one paradise for another, I assure you. Instead, we’re at the mercy of, and paying devotion to, the baseball gods. And so are the Washington Nationals, I dare say. For the complete commentary, click here.
The Bardroom
King Lear's Sad Time: What Must We Obey?
A reader, after watching the Anthony Hopkins portrayal of King Lear on Netflix, puzzles over the play's last quatrain, which happens to be the only passage in William Shakespeare's entire canon that I've memorized. To read our discussion in The Bardroom, click here. And join in!
Commentary: The Comeback
A Tragedy Overtakes a Blissful Comedy
Now to answer several pressing questions. How is my wife, Sarah, doing? Why has Shakespeareances.com lay fallow for more than three months? What’s next? And, perhaps the primary question for readers of Shakespeareances.com, what was William Shakespeare’s most popular play the past year? These questions all are interrelated because Shakespeareances.com resides at the intersection of all things Shakespeare and all things life. Not all the answers are within my grasp, but as Shakespeare does, we can present life’s pressing questions, and do so by starting with a stupid joke.To continue reading this update, click here.
On Stage: The Merry Wives of Windsor
Digging Up Shakespeare Gold in Alaska
William Shakespeare coined so many famous phrases that at least one or two popped into your head as you read this sentence, maybe four and then a fifth. Some readers might already have left off this review altogether to recite dozens more. I bet, though, that one particular 2 1/2-word phrase hasn’t yet entered any readers' minds as a famous Shakespeare quote, even though it can be one of the funniest three words in Western literature. “A buck-basket?” Granted, conditions have to be just right for this phrase to attain immortality, and in this Fairbanks Shakespeare Theatre production of Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor, conditions create a perfect storm of laughter. On an outdoor stage in a stockade-like, 200-seat theater surrounded by skyscraping pines, a hardy company of actors performs in the universal light of the almost-midnight sun, presenting a slap-happy but serious-edged Merry Wives, audacious in presentation but textually pure in execution. For the complete review, click here.
