Playing Shakespeare
Oct. 20th, 2012 08:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impulsereaderI've been spending a lot of time with various bits of Shakespeare lately, mostly for the story. This led me to discover today that Playing Shakespeare is now streaming on Netflix. We'd had the discs in a couple of years ago and I'm ever so pleased that it's now easier to watch it all.
If you've not seen this before, it's absolutely the funnest thing in the world. Basically, John Barton, who was a co-founder of the RSC, got together a bunch of RSC actors and proceeded to tape about nine hours of talking about acting in Shakespeare's plays. You get young Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan, Judi Dench, Ben Kingsley, and David Suchet to name just a few. The episodes are split up into five or ten minute lectures/discussions regarding the specific technique or topic and then some actual acting goes on. I highly recommend it to anyone who is even vaguely interested in Shakespeare or who enjoys British drama.
I apologize for the poor quality of this video. I taped it with my camera because while there are some clips out there on youtube, I particularly wanted to share this speech from Henry V. This is one of my favorite plays, probably because it is one of the first I ever saw performed live. It has stuck with me and I love it dearly. Also, I feel this bit really gets across how much fun these people are all having while doing this. Lots of background Patrick Stewart does not go amiss either. :-) Incidentally, Michael Williams, who takes the role of Henry here, was Judi Dench's husband. I fear he's not terribly well known (at least as far as I can tell this side of the pond) but he and Judi did a cute little show called A Fine Romance together.
And because within one of the episodes of Playing Shakespeare John Barton directs our attention to this little gem of a piece by Fry & Laurie, have that as well.
If you've not seen this before, it's absolutely the funnest thing in the world. Basically, John Barton, who was a co-founder of the RSC, got together a bunch of RSC actors and proceeded to tape about nine hours of talking about acting in Shakespeare's plays. You get young Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan, Judi Dench, Ben Kingsley, and David Suchet to name just a few. The episodes are split up into five or ten minute lectures/discussions regarding the specific technique or topic and then some actual acting goes on. I highly recommend it to anyone who is even vaguely interested in Shakespeare or who enjoys British drama.
I apologize for the poor quality of this video. I taped it with my camera because while there are some clips out there on youtube, I particularly wanted to share this speech from Henry V. This is one of my favorite plays, probably because it is one of the first I ever saw performed live. It has stuck with me and I love it dearly. Also, I feel this bit really gets across how much fun these people are all having while doing this. Lots of background Patrick Stewart does not go amiss either. :-) Incidentally, Michael Williams, who takes the role of Henry here, was Judi Dench's husband. I fear he's not terribly well known (at least as far as I can tell this side of the pond) but he and Judi did a cute little show called A Fine Romance together.
And because within one of the episodes of Playing Shakespeare John Barton directs our attention to this little gem of a piece by Fry & Laurie, have that as well.
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Date: 2012-10-21 08:17 am (UTC)Michael Williams did a lot of Shakespeare, and indeed played Henry for the RSC at one point in the 70s I think.
Patrick Stewart is also amazing in this, and the man standing at the end of the row looking on as they heckle is Michael Pennington who has my first Hamlet in 1981.
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Date: 2012-10-22 03:03 am (UTC)I'm endlessly amused that Barton himself resembles nothing so much as a Muppet, and unbelievably awed at the brilliance he brings to this project.
My guess is that Michael Williams did more theatre than anything else and that is why I cannot find things online to catch me up. I'm having the same issue with productions of Much Ado - they were done on stage and no one recorded them. I love seeing theatre done live, but someone should be recording it as well.
At least some of it is being captured these days - but not enough! Record everything, people! If nothing else, record it and sell it. Someone (like a madwoman such as I) will buy it eventually.