Shakespeare & Co.'s Taming of the Shrew
Jul. 17th, 2005 06:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xiphiasSo, as I said, we went out to Lenox to see the production of Taming of the Shrew.
Tina Packard, the founder and heart of Shakespeare and Company, hates the play, and so, any production they do has to be really damn good to make up for that. And this was really damn good.
Let's start by talking directly about the reason people hate this play. The first time I saw it, when I was in junior high school, I was a little less aware of how the Scientologists, and cults in general, and Guantanamo Bay, and so forth, work. I didn't know how brainwashing and psychological torture are done.
PETRUCHIO
Petruchio's methods are starvation, sleep deprivation, and keeping Kate away from her family and friends. That's all there is to it: the actions which we nowadays call brainwashing, torture, and abuse.
So how do you deal with that, as an acting company, and as an audience?
Does the name "Christopher Sly" ring any bells?
I've gotten the impression that Christopher Sly is cut from many productions of Taming of the Shrew. Because he doesn't seem to add anything to the play, and, in fact, it seems rather as if Shakespeare forgot him halfway through writing the thing.
But, as written, "Shrew" is a play-within-a-play. Christopher Sly is a poor broken-down tinker who passes out drunk in front of a lord, who thinks it would be really funny to pick him up, stick him in a good bed, and have all his servants pretend that the poor guy is a rich lord who was out of his wits and only THOUGHT his was a poor tinker.
Comedy gold, right? I have to admit, it struck me pretty strongly that this was written for an audience that thought bear-baiting to be great fun.
In any case, a bunch of actors show up, and the (real) lord decides to have them put on a show for this fellow. And the show they put on is "The Taming of the Shrew."
And Sly has no further lines after the play-within-a-play starts, except once, at the end of the first scene of the first act of "Shrew":
And that's it.
So plenty of people cut the character, because he doesn't really add much.
Except he does.
He adds distance.
For me, in many of the most uncomfortable scenes of brainwashing and abuse, I was able to look at Sly sitting there in the upper loft on the set. watching the play, and I wasn't watching brainwashing and abuse -- I was watching a FICTION about brainwashing and abuse. Sly and the page sitting there helped keep that from being as painful: they were a strong presence keeping it from being as real as it would otherwise be.
They also used him quite well later on when. . . but I don't want to give THAT part away, because it was so funny. Although I think Lis may mention it in HER review, because she got some fantastic photos of that scene.
They also did one other bit to finish off the play that also helped redeem it. And, again, I don't want to say too much about it, because I want people to go see this production and I don't want to spoil it. But, in the program, there is an actress listed only as "A Surprise Visitor", who also helps deal with the abusive messages in the play.
I'll write more later, I think, about "Tamer Tamed", which we saw the next day.
Tina Packard, the founder and heart of Shakespeare and Company, hates the play, and so, any production they do has to be really damn good to make up for that. And this was really damn good.
Let's start by talking directly about the reason people hate this play. The first time I saw it, when I was in junior high school, I was a little less aware of how the Scientologists, and cults in general, and Guantanamo Bay, and so forth, work. I didn't know how brainwashing and psychological torture are done.
PETRUCHIO
Thus have I politicly begun my reign,
And 'tis my hope to end successfully.
My falcon now is sharp and passing empty;
And till she stoop she must not be full-gorged,
For then she never looks upon her lure.
Another way I have to man my haggard,
To make her come and know her keeper's call,
That is, to watch her, as we watch these kites
That bate and beat and will not be obedient.
She eat no meat to-day, nor none shall eat;
Last night she slept not, nor to-night she shall not;
As with the meat, some undeserved fault
I'll find about the making of the bed;
And here I'll fling the pillow, there the bolster,
This way the coverlet, another way the sheets:
Ay, and amid this hurly I intend
That all is done in reverend care of her;
And in conclusion she shall watch all night:
And if she chance to nod I'll rail and brawl
And with the clamour keep her still awake.
This is a way to kill a wife with kindness;
And thus I'll curb her mad and headstrong humour.
He that knows better how to tame a shrew,
Now let him speak: 'tis charity to show.
Petruchio's methods are starvation, sleep deprivation, and keeping Kate away from her family and friends. That's all there is to it: the actions which we nowadays call brainwashing, torture, and abuse.
So how do you deal with that, as an acting company, and as an audience?
Does the name "Christopher Sly" ring any bells?
I've gotten the impression that Christopher Sly is cut from many productions of Taming of the Shrew. Because he doesn't seem to add anything to the play, and, in fact, it seems rather as if Shakespeare forgot him halfway through writing the thing.
But, as written, "Shrew" is a play-within-a-play. Christopher Sly is a poor broken-down tinker who passes out drunk in front of a lord, who thinks it would be really funny to pick him up, stick him in a good bed, and have all his servants pretend that the poor guy is a rich lord who was out of his wits and only THOUGHT his was a poor tinker.
Comedy gold, right? I have to admit, it struck me pretty strongly that this was written for an audience that thought bear-baiting to be great fun.
In any case, a bunch of actors show up, and the (real) lord decides to have them put on a show for this fellow. And the show they put on is "The Taming of the Shrew."
And Sly has no further lines after the play-within-a-play starts, except once, at the end of the first scene of the first act of "Shrew":
First Servant
My lord, you nod; you do not mind the play.
SLY
Yes, by Saint Anne, do I. A good matter, surely:
comes there any more of it?
Page (disguised as Sly's wife)
My lord, 'tis but begun.
SLY
'Tis a very excellent piece of work, madam lady: would 'twere done!
And that's it.
So plenty of people cut the character, because he doesn't really add much.
Except he does.
He adds distance.
For me, in many of the most uncomfortable scenes of brainwashing and abuse, I was able to look at Sly sitting there in the upper loft on the set. watching the play, and I wasn't watching brainwashing and abuse -- I was watching a FICTION about brainwashing and abuse. Sly and the page sitting there helped keep that from being as painful: they were a strong presence keeping it from being as real as it would otherwise be.
They also used him quite well later on when. . . but I don't want to give THAT part away, because it was so funny. Although I think Lis may mention it in HER review, because she got some fantastic photos of that scene.
They also did one other bit to finish off the play that also helped redeem it. And, again, I don't want to say too much about it, because I want people to go see this production and I don't want to spoil it. But, in the program, there is an actress listed only as "A Surprise Visitor", who also helps deal with the abusive messages in the play.
I'll write more later, I think, about "Tamer Tamed", which we saw the next day.