I’m trying to figure out what exactly this is. There’s going to be movie versions of Shakespeare plays shown nationwide? At a movie theatre near me? That could be cool. I wonder what movies …
“…the series will kick off in June with The Merry Wives of Windsor followed by Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2 in August and closing in September with Henry VIII. “
…Oh. Not really sure how this is going to play to a nationwide US audience. Why those in that combination? They couldn’t squeeze in a tragedy, or a better known comedy?
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20110602006410/en/Shakespeare%E2%80%99s-Classic-Works-U.S.-Movie-Theaters-Nationwide
I'm psyched that they're having them at all. Count me in!
I think this is akin to the Met Opera at-the-movies that's been, I guess, fairly successful, since they've been doing it for a while now.
And now, to pester my local cinema to get these. 😉
This is exciting. There's more info here:
http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/theatre/on-film
I think these are perfect intros to Shakespeare. Falstaff is awesome (and in this version he's played by one of my favorite actors). There are so many sight gags in Merry Wives that I think it'll be fun. I've got Monday June 27 already marked up for this one and I'm looking forward to the other shows (I think they're one night showings in the movie theatres).
I like the "Henry IV" plays pairing, although I think they're best presented as a double bill. Unfortunately, too many American audiences only get to see "Henry IV, Part 1," so now they'll have the chance to see what a great play "Henry IV, Part 2" is, especially with Hal's repudiation of Falstaff at the end.
Well, those are major Shakespeare productions they staged for 2010's Kings and Rogues season. They also did a production of Macbeth early in the season, but it wasn't brilliant and wasn't filmed.
In 2009, for their Youngs Hearts season, they staged Romeo and Juliet, As You Like It, Love's Labour's Lost, and Troilus and Cressida and filmed the first three of those for cinema and eventual DVD release.
This year, it's the Word of God season and the major Shakespeare productions they're staging are All's Well That Ends Well and Much Ado About Nothing. Should they continue with their "filming and releasing in cinema and on DVD" experiment, try not to have a blog entry next year asking why they've only bothered doing two plays, and why isn't there any Tragedy or History. 😉
Now you've just made me super sad they didn't film Troilus and Cressida.
Thanks for the story, Weez. Although I'm still curious how they batch them together. Is this basically "the Falstaff show"? It's not like they had a whole bunch of plays to choose from with kings in them, or anything 😉
I think Cass's comment puts it in perspective. When I first hear about Shakespeare coming to my local movie theatre I think "Woohoo! Mass audience appeal! More Shakespeare for everybody!" but then when I see the playlist I think "Nobody who's not already a Shakespeare fan is going to go see that." Very much like the Met Opera's experiment. I go to the movies, I see the ads for the Opera campaign, and at no point do I say "ooo! Opera! Let's go to that!" But I expect there's many opera fans who think "Oh cool, here's a chance I don't usually get! I'm excited!"
The Globe seemed to be going through a phase of reviving successful Comedy from two years prior, so after The Merry Wives of Windsor went down a storm in 2008, it made sense to revive in 2010 to go with the Henry IVs, though I don't know if the H4 idea came first or the MWW revival idea. I presume they decided on Henry VIII because of his 500th anniversary, although they were a year out, and Macbeth is Macbeth and can be relied upon to pop up at various semi-frequent intervals whether you want him or not. 😉
They had two spearate Falstaffs, and Roger Allam – who played him in the H4s but not MWW – was AMAZING. I now have a fear I will never see a greater Falstaff in my life. O_O
Just saw Merry Wives. It was great. Really captured the flavor of seeing a production at the Globe.
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