The Tempest LIVE!

My amazing Hubbin and a couple of friends took me out the other night to a fabulous dinner, and a killer performance of William Shakespeare's The Tempest.  The Tempest is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays and seeing performed live was the best.  A quick summation (and SPOILERS) of the play is as follows.

Prospero, a magician and his daughter Miranda have been marooned/exiled on a magical isle for years.  Prospero was the Duke of Milan before being exiled by his brother Antonio.  He learns that that his brother and company are on a ship and he raises a tempest to wreck the ship on his island.  Prospero commands the spirit Ariel and tasks it with several jobs concerning the shipwrecked crew.  Antonio's son Ferdinand is separated from the group and put to work by Prospero.  Meanwhile, Caliban, a native of the island, and a slave of Prospero's who falls in with a drunk and a clown from the shipwreck.  The three form a drunken agreement to overthrow Prospero, adding some much needed humor tot the play.  Antonio and his group experience several difficulties and finally end up with Prospero through the machinations of Ariel.  They discover that Ferdinand and Miranda have fallen in love and want to be married.  Prospero forgives all who have wronged him, sets Caliban free and enjoins Ariel to make ready good sailing weather.  Ariel is finally freed after this last task and Prospero renounces magic by breaking his staff.  This is but a brief synopsis if you want more...well go read or watch it :-).

The production of The Tempest I got to see was put on by the Shakespeare Theatre Company and was very well done.  The best part of the whole production had to be the set.  The stage and theatre itself was super cool to begin with, there were no bad seats and it was just awesome.  The sets themselves were extremely well done.  They utilized the entire stage, including the wings, which made for a very dynamic staging.  The main set was an impressive shipwreck on a mound of real sand, with a sun that traveled across the sky.  The casting and costumes were pretty well done,  I really liked how they showed Prospero's magic using actors as spirits that blended into the island background and were almost always present.  They did what Prospero bid but were supposed to be "invisible" to the characters, which was pretty cool.  The only real problem I had was with the

character of Ariel.  This is my favorite character in the play and I have a very definite preference for how the spirit is played.  I like it to be played androgynous, wild and elemental.  This is totally a personal preference.  This Ariel was played a bit to saucy and comical for my taste.  They had her on this really cool rope system to fly around the stage, and they made the rope a part of what tied her to Prospero, which was a great way to incorporate a necessary part of the staging.  The actress felt to practiced in her movements, I could almost see her thinking about each move "place this hand here, extend toes now" and so on and so forth.  Considering the rest of the blocking, this could have been how the director wanted it played as most of the characters moved in a very deliberate and pointed manner, but for me the character lost a lot of it's wildness and elementalness.  I felt like instead of a captured spirit of the wind, I was watching a Christmas angel.  Overall I very much enjoyed the play and cannot wait to go see another one.  Happy Reading Everybody!

When Loves Collide

I love it when two of my favorites come together and Eyes Like Stars does just that.  This book beautifully combines my love of books and my love of theatre, and as an added bonus Shakespearean drama is featured heavily in this story. 

This book is set at the Theatre Illuminata (isn't that the most wonderful name...happy sigh) and tells the story of Betrice Shakespeare Smith, or as most people know her, Bertie.  For as long as she can remember Bertie has lived in the theatre, but this isn't just any theatre, this is a magic theatre (though I would argue ANY theatre is magic).  In this theatre all of the characters from any play ever written
are actual living, breathing beings and the plays that are put on are not by actors but the characters
themselves.  Bertie is the only member of the theatre who is not a character from a play, but this does not stop her from having many many friends within the theatre.  The centerpiece of this magical theatre is The Book, which contains any and every play ever written, this is also the source of the theatre and all the characters.  Bertie is informed by the Theatre Manager that she will be forced to leave if she does not find some way to make herself an integral part of the theatre.  Bertie decides to re stage one of Shakespeare's great plays Hamlet, but place it in Ancient Egypt.  If Bertie can pull of a successful show she will be considered a Director (the first in the theatre, because usually the characters do not need to be directed, they just do their thing.) Throughout all this Bertie is being wooed by Nate, a pirate from the play A Little Mermaid, and seduced by the wild and mysterious Ariel
from The Tempest.  Ok I have to stop right here and admit I am a little bit in love with this version of Ariel, he is fey, dangerous, roguish and oh so mysterious, he has that pull that all of us geek girls can't resist...Ok girly moment over, moving on.  This love triangle is a tad more seductive then I thought to find in a novel like this, but it was all in theatrical tradition.  Near the end the play gets put on, but with a twist that Bertie was not expecting.  I have to say, it took me a page or two to catch on to what was going on, but when I figured it out it was pretty cool, I won't spoil it for you, but it explains Berties origins beautifully.  After this major revelation Bertie sets out to further her quest and Ariel finds a way to go with her, oh yeah and somehow Nate got disappeared by a Sea Witch so that is part of her quest is to find him again.
I really loved 99.9% of this book, it combined so much of what I love and used magic to tie it all together.  I love books that are set in a world that does not have to follow the real world rules, it makes it much easier to suspend belief and just dive right into the middle of the world (it also gives me a chance to say world like 19 times in one sentence).  The descriptions were beautiful without being over the top, there were pieces of dialog that were written as script which made me very happy, but the style was used sparingly so it didn't get annoying.  The love story was theatrical and melodramatic just like any good play, and like I said earlier I want to carve my initials in a tree with Ariel's.  The only major problem I really had with this book is when I picked it up I did not realize it was going to be a series.  The book had a beginning, middle, and fairly wrapped up end, the story was amazing, the setting magical and then BAM the last couple pages opens everything back up again.  I have not had a chance to read the second one yet, mostly 'cause I'm scared it can not live up to the first book, on the other hand even if it sucks the first one holds up as a standalone story so I will always have that to hold on to.   Over all I give this book 8 out of 10 standing ovations and strongly encourage anybody with a theatre, literature, or Shakespearean background to get there hands on this book.  If you just really like a magical world and awesome quirky characters you should also read this.

What books combine your loves?  Who do you prefer the Dashing, Heroic, Kind, Solid Pirate Nate, or the Wild, Arrogant, Self-Serving, Mysterious Spirit Ariel?  Are you ever disappointed when a book is a series?