I’m going to say something up front because I had it said to me (well, I read it), and it helped me enjoy the movie “Sing Sing“. This is a true prison story. But there are no riots, no escapes, no makeshift shivs sticking anybody in the back. It’s not that kind of story. That’s not a spoiler, that’s permission to breathe, relax, and appreciate what’s really going on in the movie. You don’t have to watch in fear that something bad is going to happen.
I admit that I dismissed Sing Sing at first as just another take on “Shakespeare Behind Bars,” which I first saw twenty years ago. That was a mistake, I’m happy to say.
Sing Sing is the best movie I’ve seen in a long time. Too often I’ll watch a movie in that half-listening, “put it on in the background” way that we sometimes do when we treat an item like a todo-list box to be checked instead of an experience to be savored. Not this time. I was hooked in the first minutes. I put down the computer and sat on the edge of my couch cushions straight through to the end.
This movie tells the story of Sing Sing prison’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) program. It focuses on the story of John “Divine G” Whitfield, a playwright himself and original member of the group, played brilliantly by Colman Domingo. We also learn that he’s incarcerated for a crime he didn’t commit, and on a continuing quest to prove his innocence.
We open with the close of the group’s most recent performance, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and the addition of new members to the group. Here we meet Clarence “Divine Eye” Maclin, playing himself. One of the fascinating aspects of this movie is that it’s based on a true story and played by many of the actual original players. If, like me, you’re wondering how the two main characters ended up as “divine” something? Well, that’s not the writing, that’s the reality. Those were their names.
Despite Divine G’s insistence that Divine Eye be admitted to the group, there’s some immediate animosity at Eye’s strong new personality. G is thrilled when the other members of the group suggest they perform one of G’s original plays next, only for Eye to sway the group that a comedy is the way to go. But then they both audition for the only dramatic role in the script (an original, created by the group’s director).
This sets up the first of many confrontations between the two. G loves the program and knows what it’s done for the other inmates. Eye comes from a world where if someone so much as walks too close behind you, your life might be in danger. The evolving relationship between the two is the our major story arc.
What About The Shakespeare?
This is a Shakespeare blog, so let’s talk about Shakespeare. This isn’t a Shakespeare movie. They don’t perform Hamlet in the big final act. But somehow, that makes it an even better depiction of why Shakespeare is universal.
We find out that Eye became interested in theatre after stumbling across King Lear as one of the few books accessible to him. Unprompted, he quotes, “When we are born, we cry that we are come To this great stage of fools” with no fanfare, no “Look at me I’m quoting Shakespeare,” no flourish or fanfare. His interpretation actually made me laugh, saying that “whoever wrote this, man, had to did a bid before.” The idea that Shakespeare can just pop into your life, at any time and place, and you don’t even know what it is, but it still resonates, no matter who you are? Come on now. What have we been trying to say all these years?
There is more Shakespeare than that, not to worry. Despite the play being an original time travel comedy featuring time travel, pirates, and zombies, it also features Hamlet. (If that makes you think of Hamlet 2, you’re not alone.) Eye, of course, is playing the role – which affords G the opportunity to direct him. The actual director of the group is not an inmate, so while he can speak to the theatre, he can’t speak to the experience. That’s where G shines. He helps Eye break through from “I walked on stage and said the lines” to “I am the character.” It’s really quite a thing of beauty to behold.
I’ve often said that a key to understanding Shakespeare is realizing that, underneath the words, “there are people in there.” Well, that’s true here, too. These are prisoners, but they are people. There are multiple scenes where they talk about their children, their lives outside the prison, and how they got there. There’s a scene where they all meditate on their “happy place” and talk about it, and an inmate realizes that his happy place is right there, right now. He is happy where he’s found his people.
I could keep on like this, describing the scenes I loved, but I’ll tell the whole movie. There is a story that we want to see resolved. Eye, knowing he’s innocent, struggles to get out – no matter how much value he’s found in the RTA program. G, who slowly but thankfully becomes part of the RTA program, can’t imagine any world other than the one he’s made for himself. Both these characters are changed individuals by the movie’s end credits.
One more scene, and then I’ll wrap up. During an early confrontation, Eye is still throwing around N-words like they’re part of the normal prison vocabulary. “We don’t say that here,” G tells him. “We say beloved.”
I get it, I think, at least as much as a white person can. Both, in their way, are expressions of a bond that exists, a way of saying, “We are the same, we come from the same world, there are things that we share that not everyone shares.” But they can achieve the same purpose and still be completely different ways of doing it.
And at first, you think, “Yeah, sure.” This is the guy still packing a knife in his waistband, ready to cut one of his fellow actors just because the blocking called for him to get a little too close. But you know what’s going to happen, And when it does, it’s … just so natural. The director doesn’t call your attention to it with over-the-top background music. There’s no meaningful pause for the audience to have their “Ohhhhhh, ok!” moment.
That’s why I love this movie. You don’t spend the whole time thinking, “Somebody created this story, somebody wrote a script, somebody directed it and told the actors what to do and where the camera should look.” This isn’t just a real story, many of the original actors perform the story including Divine Eye. If you love something about it, love it more because it really happened. It’s not someone’s wishful thinking. Score one for Shakespeare.
The actual play performed by the inmates is … something.
For Christmas this year, the geeklets all got together and sent us to Broadway to see Romeo and Juliet, starring Rachel Zegler and Kit Connor! Of course, being the wrong generation, we don’t have any context for who these two young actors are, but it’s Shakespeare on Broadway; that’s all that matters to me. I might be the only one who feels that way, but I don’t care!
A quick word about the theatre (Circe in the Square), because it’s important context here. The most important thing they wanted us to know is no cameras, at all. Don’t even take your phone out. If we catch you, you’ll be kicked out. They said this multiple times. They walked around carrying big signs that said it. When the lights went down, they shone flashlights on people who didn’t listen (or didn’t care), but I didn’t see anybody kicked out.
I say this to excuse the lack of pictures. The few I added here, because a blog post demands at least one picture, are grabbed from the official website. You can check it out (linked above), for more “official” photos. I’m sure they put this policy in place because if they didn’t, it’d be nothing but people trying to record the young stars. It is a shame because it makes it seem like they’re hiding something. Do you know another reason for not letting people record? It’s when you don’t think you have a quality product and don’t want the word to spread.
On With The Show
The theatre is “in the round,” so we’ve got a plain black disk of a stage dead center and seats all around. There are exits/entrances at opposite ends, with elevated platforms. There’s some sort of “stuffed animal” theme going on, with a shopping carriage full of them on stage, and a giant one (as in, more than human sized) taking up one of the elevated platforms. I’m guessing this is supposed to remind us that these characters are children. But they don’t otherwise play much of a role, they’re just there.
Then comes a fascinating move I’ve never seen before, and probably cost a lot of the budget. Picture a flat black disk, like I said. Now imagine it’s a piece of paper, folded down the middle. And one of the pieces starts rising up like you’re folding the paper in half. WTF is going on here? From where we sat it reminded me suddenly of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, talking through the wall. But as it comes all the way down we see that underneath is something I can’t quite explain. It’s all multicolored, perhaps like a garden? Wildflowers? It also looks a bit like a whole bunch of stuffed animals. But I’m pretty sure it wasn’t that — pieces of the floor go flying every now and then (sometimes thrown) and it appears to just be multi-colored foam.
This was a practical choice because this is where all the fight scenes happen. Whenever somebody’s getting thrown around the stage, they’ve got a soft landing. Other than that, I couldn’t entirely place what “scene” it did or did not represent.
The big centerpiece was Juliet’s bed / balcony. The first time it comes down from the ceiling on big heavy columns, complete with a ladder for her to exit. That’s kind of cool. Later it comes down on metal cables and I wonder why the difference, but then I see — the cables bring it all the way to the floor, where they are unclipped (or reclipped, when it needs to go back up). (In one scene, much of the cast quietly assembles under the bed, presumably as a safety measure. I do admit to wondering what would have happened if a cable or clip failed.)
Give The People What They Want
Ok, let’s talk about the performance. This crowd was clearly there to see the stars. The young woman behind us had already seen the show but was now seeing it again, because she did not get Rachel Zegler’s autograph at stagedoor. Sadly, a predicted winter storm came in during the show, and stage door was canceled for this performance. Maybe she’ll get to go again while it’s still up.
But seriously. When they hand Zegler a microphone, the crowd goes crazy. Is this a musical? There were hints that this was a musical. It’s a musical in the sense of “People want to hear Rachel Zegler sing,” which she does a few times. There’s more music in the form of a few group dance numbers. But nobody’s singing any dialogue.
Was That Always A Laugh Line?
This was a funny production. We laughed, a lot. The comic timing and delivery of the stars was spot on. They could get the audience laughing in the silences as well as the spoken dialogue.
But … maybe a little *too* much? The balcony scene, for example, was a laugh riot. People laughed at “She speaks!” and “But she says nothing” and “Speak again bright angel.” Hmm. They laughed when Mercutio died. They laughed when Nurse found Juliet’s body. I understand that laughter is the easiest way to interact with the audience, but i definitely think that sometimes they forgot to stop playing it for comedy.
Meanwhile the lines that Shakespeare did write as laugh lines? Like when Juliet says, “How can you say you’re out of breath when you still have enough breath to say you’re out of breath?” Got *nothing*.
A Rumble Ain’t A Rumble Without Mercutio In It
There are no swords in the play. Also, no guns. The violence for me was kind of like West Side Story meets Outsiders? Whenever Capulets and Montagues met, there was a fight. Many bodies going at it, wrestling, tossing each other around, throwing punches. Several times characters are bloodied. I’m fine with this, this works. You get the feeling that nobody’s thinking about this anymore, nobody (except Benvolio of course) is thinking, wait, why are we fighting? It’s become animalistic. No problems with that.
But people have to die in this play, and that’s where it gets confusing. Were Mercutio and Tybalt stabbed, or only beaten to death? We need a weapon because Mercutio needs to be mortally wounded in one quick instant. So there is a blade brandished at one point, to establish that it’s in play. Maybe it was the blocking, maybe it’s where I was sitting, but I never saw the mortal blow. I saw Mercutio show the audience that there was a knife, then there’s a tussle, then everybody’s screaming and parting and there’s blood and a dying Mercutio. The Tybalt fight was even worse from my angle because we clearly got to watch Romeo pummeling Tybalt into a bloody mess and you really did think that he was going to simply beat him to death.
Double, Double …. Double, Double
Ok, now let’s talk about the questionable decisions. This production was doubled like nothing I’d ever seen before.
Mercutio / Friar Lawrence / Prince – In a practical sense this one can work, it was just weird. For one, there’s not actually a Prince character. The actress handling this triple role acted more like a narrator, holding a hand mic we could all see, and turning the prince’s parts into almost Chorus-like parts with lines line, “And the Prince decreed….” This includes the wrap up at the end. But for Friar Lawrence and Mercutio, the major difference she went with was voices. Lawrence was more high-pitched and a little nerdy. Mercutio, sadly, was “stoner bro.” While worked to illicit laughs from the audience, it reduced Mercutio to *only* laughs from the audience. “Bro, I am hurt.” *laugh* “Tis a scratch.” *laugh* You don’t get the full gravity of what just happened if you didn’t see Mercutio as a fully formed character.
Paris / Peter – This one doesn’t impact the story much, it’s just confusing for the audience if they’re not familiar with the scene. There’s this guy that sometimes pops up (it’s not like either of those characters gets much stage time) and, especially as Peter, doesn’t get much introduction. So in one scene he’s asking for Juliet’s hand, and in another he’s following around Nurse as her servant. This is the stuff I think about. Who in the audience is trying to follow the story, and losing track at times like this?
Lord / Lady Capulet – One male actor played both of Juliet’s parents, and it took me a little while to understand what they were doing. At first, I thought they were doing single-parent and just giving one actor all the lines, fine. But then there’s costume / attitude / accent change and I think, two gay dads? That’d be a fun new twist. But no, the text is still mother mother mother, and we still have the “I was your age when I got married” scene and all that. So we’re still to imagine Juliet’s two parents (Romeo’s parents, by the way, are both cut completely), just portrayed by the same actor doing a different voice. Bit hard to follow, and Lord Capulet definitely gets the better end of the deal.
Tybalt / Nurse – Ok, here’s the big head scratcher. You’re going to use the same actor to represent both the arguable villain of the story (and certainly the center of all the violence), with the crazy horny old lady with no filter? Half the time I’ve seen Nurse she’s dressed in long flowing robes and looking vaguely like a nun (ironically, you’d think, given some of her comments).
Here’s our Nurse:
Slash Tybalt:
The actress did an admirable job with the role, don’t get me wrong. I question the choice to double, not the performance. When Tybalt (who is 5’11”, by the way, from her bio) enters, you get a clear feeling of, “Oh shit, Tybalt’s here, things are going to get violent.” But then with a quick costume change (often into what I believe was a sort of corset and skirt) she’s supposed to be this woman who takes care of Juliet that’s supposed to at least be old enough to be her mother but instead comes across more like the old “gay best friend” trope. Not to mention the obvious confusion where we watch Tybalt die, violently, only to then see Nurse enter, still bloody, screaming that Tybalt is dead.
Yes But How’s The Shakespeare
Not every production strives to be great Shakespeare. We speak of the difference between “Shakespeare productions” and “productions that use Shakespeare as a scaffolding from which to tell the story they want to tell.” This one’s the latter, and that’s fine. It knows its audience. They want to hear and see their young stars, and they want to laugh. They got that.
But I wanted to see some Shakespeare, too. How was it?
Well, it was chopped into pieces, as I already mentioned. No Prince. There are no Romeo’s parents, so there are no scenes with Romeo’s parents. Perhaps the most significant cut was in the whole end sequence, where guess what? Paris lives! Paris was almost an afterthought in this one, they probably would have cut him completely if he wasn’t necessary to move the plot along. There’s no scene where Nurse betrays Juliet and says to marry Paris. There is no Romeo / Paris confrontation at the end. He’s really more like a concept, here. He exists just so Lord Capulet can tell Juliet what to do.
It’s Not Delivery, It’s Digiorno
Speaking of which, let’s talk about delivery. Maybe it was the accent, but Kit Connor was the only one that felt like he was in a Shakespeare production, to me. When he was talking, I was thinking, “I’m watching Shakespeare.” When everybody else was talking I was thinking, “I’m watching people try to speak Shakespeare’s lines.”
Many of them seem to have gone to the school of shouting and pausing. If you’re angry, shout. If you’re saying something deep, pause. It gets the point across, but so does a sledgehammer. The most obvious example was the loudest line of the night….guesses, anybody? You’ll never guess it … Lord Capulet’s “But fettle your fine joints ‘gainst THURSDAY NEXT!!! … to go with Paris” I mean, he screamed those two words for some reason. But later, when talking about the play with my kids, my wife said, “Her father was really horrible to her in that scene.” He certainly got his point across.
Another weird and really out of place one came from our Romeo when he saidscreamed, “Is it even so? Then I DEFY YOU … … … stars.” I remain lost about that decision. It’s a famous line, go ahead and blast it to the back wall. But why’d stars get the short end of the stick? I don’t understand the thinking there.
I Die, Horatio
One more and then I’ll wrap it up. Oh, the ending. Ms. Zegler’s got great comic timing, no question about that. Thankfully, there’s no (intentional) going for the laugh in the final scene. But she’s got to go back to the drawing board on her death scenes. I’ve seen Nick Bottom do a better death scene. I’ve seen Bugs Bunny do a better death scene. She’s alone in the tomb with Romeo’s body. We get none of Friar Laurence running back and forth telling her to flee, it’s just cut down to “Romeo enters, Romeo dies, Juliet wakes, Juliet dies.” She finds the dagger, holds it aloft and announces, “O HAPPY DAGGER!” again so loud that I leaned over to my wife and asked, “Who is she talking to??” and runs herself through.
She then takes what felt like 20 or 30 seconds to die, grunting and groaning and staggering back and forth. Where it got ridiculous for me, though, was that they’d clearly been directed to end with some sort of tableau of her body draped across Romeo’s. Well she’s a tiny little thing and maybe she was in the wrong spot or maybe they just didn’t rehearse it enough. But with her last gasp after all that gasping and wheezing she literally leaps up and hurls herself backwards across Romeo’s body. She doesn’t collapse, she launches herself. You know that thing where you get home from school and you run into your room and you dive into it, landing backwards on a pile of stuffed animals? Basically that. Only she landed on a dead Romeo.
Wrapping It Up
Listen, I’ll never fault people for attempting Shakespeare, especially young actors with a long career ahead of them, Look at how many Shakespeare movies Claire Danes made. Actors work with what they’re given. If you told me that either of the two stars wanted to try their hand at more Shakespeare, I’d check it out. Especially if she doesn’t sing.
While watching the 1935 Midsummer last week, I spotted something interesting. Act IV, Scene 1, we’re starting to wrap up the story. Oberon has drugged his wife Titania and taken what he wanted (the changeling boy), and now he begins to have something resembling guilt about it. (It’s far from a healthy relationship if you ask me, but that’s a different story. )
So, he wakes her up and releases her from the love potion. Here’s where it gets interesting, depending on how we read the text.
Option 1
OBERON And now I have the boy, I will undo This hateful imperfection of her eyes: And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp From off the head of this Athenian swain; … Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.
TITANIA My Oberon! what visions have I seen! Methought I was enamour’d of an ass.
OBERON There lies your love.
TITANIA How came these things to pass? O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!
Here, Oberon asks Puck to turn Bottom back to normal. Then he wakes Titania, who presumably sees a human. Sure, she’s still grossed out by it, but she can walk away from the experience, thinking that the whole “donkey” thing was just a weird dream.
Option 2
OBERON There lies your love.
TITANIA How came these things to pass? O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!
OBERON Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head.
Oberon tells Puck again to fix Bottom. It’s perfectly in character for the boss to tell the mischievous sprite twice before he does something, so I’m not looking at this as a mistake of Shakespeare’s. But this second one implies that he hasn’t done it yet. This means that Titania wakes up and sees Bottom in his full donkey-headed glory, which means it wasn’t a dream. Poor Titania will be in therapy over that memory, I’m sure.
Which Do You Prefer?
According to the text, the second line implies that the first wasn’t enough, and therefore, #2 is the “correct” interpretation. But we could snip out “Robin, take off his head” and give Titania a break.
Which have you seen most often in performance? Which do you like better? I think this is a modern addition to how we look at the scene, I don’t think it crosses Oberon’s mind. It’s not like he waits for Puck to fix Bottom’s head before waking her up. If he wanted her to see him that way he could have waited before giving Puck the order. But that’s part of the fun and why we keep doing this, looking for little things we can change that make big points about the character.
Some ideas you know you’ll never execute on. Better to free them into the universe and see if they take on a life of their own.
I’ve always been fascinated with the character of Francisco in Shakespeare’s Hamlet. He’s only got eight lines in the first scene when Marcellus, Bernardo, and Horatio relieve him at his post. If it ever comes up in trivia, Francisco delivers the line “Not a mouse stirring.” Then, he leaves and isn’t seen for the rest of the play.
Here’s my question. Did Francisco see the ghost? I like to think he did. Why not? Why would the ghost pick and choose which random guards he appears to? I have to believe that he keeps showing up, figuring that eventually, someone will get Hamlet. Or in this case, Horatio, who says, “We should get Hamlet.” Luckily, Marcellus had Bernardo to say, “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” But poor Francisco didn’t.
And thus my idea. I’d like to see a one-man show centered around Francisco. We open with Francisco on stage and play the same scene from his point of view. But instead of Francisco exiting, the others exit, leaving him alone. What does he do next?
Maybe he doesn’t know what he saw. Perhaps he’s seen the ghost multiple times, and it’s become obvious. Francisco can’t exactly tell anyone. They’ll think he’s gone mad. So he’s left to deal with it himself. The ghost isn’t going to speak with him, just like it didn’t speak with Horatio.
The whole play would be about mental health and what it’s like inside someone’s head who feels like they’re alone in the universe and dealing with things beyond their ability to understand or control. Sometimes, he debates whether to tell someone but always concludes that no one is to be trusted. He’s not that close to anyone. So then he ponders how to handle it himself. Can he talk to the ghost? Can he prove to himself that the ghost is even real? But everything he tries fails, keeping that “Is any of this even real or am I going insane?” thought alive.
Ultimately, sadly, I think this story ends with Francisco committing suicide. This reinforces a similar theme in the main story. Did Ophelia, alone in the world, take her own life? Though he may have soliloquized about it, Hamlet ultimately moves on from the thought because he latches on to Horatio. Whatever’s in Hamlet’s head, he tells Horatio. He has that outlet. I’d say it saves him, but, you know, obviously not. Maybe more accurate to say having that close confidante, something that Ophelia and Francisco didn’t have, but even Marcellus and Bernardo did, saved him from himself.
<shrug>
Just an idea that came up in conversation last night that I thought would be fun to flesh out and document for posterity. In college, I saw a few of my plays performed, and I’d absolutely be writing this down if I still had that option. Maybe somebody else out there is still in that environment and wants to run with it. Just give me a shout-out in the credits and send a link!
These are so few and far between now that they’re older, I must post them when they appear!
My daughter was convinced to stage manage her college theatre production because she would share the duty with a friend as co-managers. As the weeks of rehearsal went by, we didn’t hear much about the co. As they approach production this week, they’re in something called “cue to cue,” which is apparently a grueling amount of work.
“Weren’t you supposed to have a co-stage manager?” I asked.
“Funny story,” she said, “turns out she had an operation on her knee. So she, like, basically can’t move.”
Now, you might think you know me, and you might think my following line as a Dad indeed had to have been, “Tell her that’s not what break a leg means.”
But that’s not what I said! Mostly because I thought of it too late. What I said was this. I took the Facetime call from my wife’s hand, turned the screen to face my geeklet, and said, “Well, you tell her that in the 1935 Max Reinhardt film adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a 14yr old Mickey Rooney played Puck with a broken leg and had to be wheeled around the set!”
I got back a blank stare. “Why,” she said, “do you just know that off the top of your head?”
