I’m a big fan of Netflix’s original series, both House of Cards and Orange is the new Black. Kevin Spacey, star of the former, has been on all the talk shows saying how it is basically Richard III. Well, more to the point how he based his character on R3.

So when I saw this piece on why you need to read Shakespeare to understand Orange Is The New Black (or OITNB for short) new (second) season, I was all over it.  The idea put forth (using Macbeth as an example) is that in Shakespeare’s world, there is a natural order to things. When something comes in to disrupt that natural order, there is chaos while the world attempts to correct itself and restore order.  That is season 2 in a nutshell, and I agree completely with the article’s argument.

WARNING – that article is 100% spoilers. You’d better finish season 2 before you read it.

When I spotted the summary of a story focusing on Rosaline I thought this must be an update on the upcoming movie about Romeo’s “ex-girlfriend”.

Nope! “Searching for Romeo“ is a new stage musical that tells….well, basically the exact same story. Why does everybody go for Rosaline? She’s not even technically a character, she’s a name. It’s easy to say you’re walking in Tom Stoppard’s shoes, but at least Shakespeare gave him some Rosencranz and Guildenstern to work with. Stoppard didn’t, for example, invent a new character for Paris’ mother.  (Yes, Searching for Romeo offers us Paris’ mother.)

For some reason the article decides to pull in Ophelia, which I thought was interesting.  Spinning off a play about Ophelia is more in the Stoppard vein, I’d say.  (Personally I even tried my hand at writing such a play back in college.  The premise was that Ophelia was in on Hamlet’s feigned madness, and they were both having a good joke at the expense of their respective parents, until Hamlet really does lose his mind.)

What I don’t understand is the author’s summary of Ophelia’s existence:

Curiosity has long surrounded Hamlet’s love Ophelia, who dies after speaking about 170 lines in a play with more than 3,800. 

“She just seems to go mad out of nowhere,” said Emily C.A. Snyder, who directed a production of “Hamlet” in which she give Ophelia more time onstage to create a stronger connection with the audience.

Ms. Snyder missed the part where Hamlet went crazy, said he never loved her, killed her father, got banished to England.  Out of nowhere? Really?

Let’s have less invention of Rosaline and other characters, and more exploration into Ophelia’s character. I’m all for that idea.

Too easy. 

When I spotted a reference in one of my news items suggesting that the mayor’s story was Shakespearean, I thought “Oh this will be good, somebody’s actually going to argue about how tragic the whole thing is.”  Nah, they just went with the big jolly drunk angle.

That’s not to say there’s not some smirks to be had in the article:

“Falstaff from Shakespeare,” McCaig said in a telephone interview. “He’s very Shakespearean or operatic. He’s our modern tragic hero…”  They do know that Falstaff isn’t a tragic hero, right?

“It’s a timeless story. Actually, it’s been written 100 times — it’s this rise to greatness and then a huge, huge fall due to your own weaknesses. God, this story has been written 100 years ago, you know what I mean?”  Sure, absolutely, written 100 years ago.  That’s why you earlier compared it to Shakespeare, who was writing 450 years ago.

All in all, the musical looks like an even better train wreck than its subject.

Summer is the season of Shakespeare in the park, and I can’t possibly write about all the stories that come across my newsfeed. However, I wanted to give a special shout out to this Rochester production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream:

Haggerty describes this “Midsummer Night’s Dream” production as “history-making.” A senior lecturer in the theater department at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, Haggerty is directing the play with a double cast of hearing and deaf actors — 33 people in all. Each role is played by a voicing actor, who has a signing (American Sign Language) actor assigned to him or her. So there are two languages in use onstage simultaneously: Shakespeare’s, and American Sign Language.

While I certainly think that this is a step beyond “have a translator standing at the edge of the stage”, I think this is the more “history making” part:

The fairy characters communicate in sign language, because they cannot speak to the human characters. But they do sign to one another what it is that the humans are saying. Among themselves, the fairies sign to each other, and voiced actors reenact what the fairies are thinking and signing for the audience.

So then if I understand it correctly, the sign language translation is actually performed by the fairies (who, presumably, are going to be onstage throughout the play)?  And that the fairies’ lines will be signed first, and then “translated” into speech by the other actors?  I love how that idea equalizes the two languages.

For more information: http://www.rochestercitynewspaper.com/rochester/a-midsummer-nights-dream/Content?oid=2402655 

I’d seen the commercials for Cirque du Soleil’s new show Amaluna, but I had no idea it was their interpretation of my favorite play The Tempest!

Set on a mysterious island governed by goddesses and the cycles of the moon, the story of Queen Prospera (Shakespeare’s Prospero), a shaman with magical powers, unfolds. The queen conjures up a great storm in preparation for the coming-of-age ceremony of her daughter, Miranda. The storm leaves a group of young men, led by Prince Romeo, shipwrecked on the island. An epic romance between the prince and Miranda ensues.

(I admit, “Prince Romeo” is a bit cringe-worthy. You kept Miranda and Prospera but felt it necessary to not only change Ferdinand, but to borrow from a completely different play?)

Playing in Boston now, but only through July 6 so I can’t possibly get there. If it comes to your part of the world, let us know how it is!

For more information : http://www.bu.edu/today/2014/the-circus-comes-to-town/