... and jubilee
issue memorizing the 453rd birthday. (Even though 401 is a better number, I’d
rather celebrate the birthdays.)
This
post and, as I suppose, several ensuing will be about „The Tempest“ of which I
have just seen the recent production by the RSC in the „Cinema“. And the first
thing about it I am infinitely pleased with is that it made me reconnect with
what I set out to do when I started my blog, and which became such an
unexpected adventure: READING SHAKESPEARE.
It was
even just before I saw the play that I realized how little I wanted to deal
with the experience that “Shakespeare” had become less important for quite some
time. Of course I was wrong, but it appears to be something I keep forgetting.
I obviously have to make this experience time and again. (What did I just write
on the issue of love and texts? It’s never about possession, it’s about DOING
it.)
READING
“The Tempest” again I felt completely lost. This time there wasn’t even the
excitement of reading it for the first time. And I know: I always put everything
on hold I “know” about a text, especially reading something that is already
choked with meaning like Shakespeare. I always put everything on hold and
mistrust every kind of opinions or beliefs that are not my own – which means
that they have “proved” themselves by inciting a genuine human reaction on my
part. This has become a well-tried technique of reading by now but it doesn’t exactly
make it easy. “The Tempest” was one of these plays where I became particularly
mistrustful and perceived the whole place as littered with prejudice. But still
I had it in the back of my mind that the play is supposed to be so special, and
why.
Be this
as it may, this time reading it felt like going over a particularly bumpy
patch. Already that first scene about the tempest … well, this is certainly not
the greatest thing to READ, but it already began difficult AND boring at the
same time. And, even though I did my best to keep an open mind, reading on
didn’t get any better. Even watching it being performed wasn’t really an
improvement. The version from the complete Shakespeare by the BBC turned out to
be particularly uninspired. The recent production by the Globe Theatre, which I
have on dvd, was much more fun, but it didn’t really yield any ideas about what
might be the POINT of this play. I mean: Why do all this? Raise a tempest, go
to all this length with conjuring up spirits, take so much pain not to hurt
anybody, even “rescue” the wardrobe from being destroyed by sea-water… “To
please” certainly doesn’t cut it – though it turned out to be more central to
the play than I was inclined to think. Okay, there is this rather important
issue of setting things right – in real life! But it appears to be a bit “thin”,
or rather general, for a play.
The only
thing that appeared rather obvious and important to me is that the play somehow
is “about” the theatre. And the only pleasant discovery was to notice how
important the wardrobe appeared to be. I thought, if there would ever be a
“Tempest” for me – because understanding a play for me means to see it before
me on a stage, even if it is an imagined one - there would be a big wardrobe on
the stage, and Prospero would be a harassed director running to and fro between
all the props and clothes. I still think that the theatre angle is important
but, as it turned out, the much more important discovery about “The Tempest”
became the distinct impression that I DIDN’T GET IT. I didn’t get it at all.
And I knew that there had to be a “point”, as there always is in “Shakespeare”,
and I knew that I utterly and completely MISSED it.
In the
same way as with “Lear” or “Hamlet” there must have been deep-routed opinions –
mostly negative – about this play that I wasn’t at all aware of. Looking back,
I can see that I mistrusted and questioned EVERYTHING about it and didn’t even
know why. (In the case of “Hamlet” and “Lear” I at least had a few ideas.) But
I remember that my “theatre partner” and I agreed that we didn’t much care for
the play. Like most people I probably hated Caliban, not as a “person” but as a
“stage-creature”. I obviously even disliked Ariel, mistrusted him, as well as I
mistrusted and disliked Prospero – and all the other people I judged to be
either horrible or unimportant.
I am dealing
with this at such length because it appears to me more and more important for
how I perceived the play in the beginning and how much it meant when I somehow
“turned the corner”. How much more I was able to see then. The next thing was
that they showed a short interview with the RSC’s artistic director and the
lead actor, Simon Russell Beale. I like Simon Russell Beale immensely as an
actor but, for some reason that wasn’t completely unfounded, didn’t expect him
to be a good “fit” for Prospero. I was pleased with his interview as well as he
is obviously the kind of actor I like: being very precise and rational about
what he does and then going completely mad on a stage or before a camera. Though,
where he is concerned, “going mad” is reserved for very special occasions. Anyway,
I know I shouldn’t watch these interviews even though it proved useful in this
case. But what I thought when I heard him talking about the play being about
forgiveness and so on was: O please, not the usual crap! - or probably
something slightly less disrespectful and more rational, like the conviction: There
must be something MORE INTERESTING about this play! And I have to write this
because I still cannot quite measure how pleased I am that he was so right
about this, and that I was so WRONG!
The
artistic director of the RSC, Gregory Doran, I never liked. I see him every
time there is a play by the RSC in the cinema (or on dvd) and find him
invariably dull and naïve, and not even the conviction that I am most assuredly
wrong about this ever changed this impression. His own productions were always
very good as well, and the only actual fault I can find with him is that, being
the partner in life of Anthony Sher, he always gets him into all the roles he is
wrong for … (well, I realize that elaborating on this would get me far too far
away from my topic, and I totally loved Anthony Sher as Thrain in “The Hobbit”,
not only because I was so infinitely grateful that Peter Jackson hadn’t
“skipped” Thrain. But this was the only time I did, and I know this would
probably not be complimentary.) Anyway, I KNOW that I am unfair and wrong, not
only because Gregory Doran’s work is top-notch as to what I consider to be good
theatre but mostly because he obviously does what Shakespeare himself must have
done (– and which might go wrong more often than not): TRUST THE ACTORS.
“The
Tempest” on the Stratford stage began as boring as all my present experience
(with the exception of the production by the “Globe”) had been. But it got very
much better very fast. As with almost all the other aspects of this play I had
been skeptical when I heard that they used computer generated special effects
big time and felt that I had been right seeing the first apparition of Ariel as
a giant, completely computer-generated character. In the beginning the stage
was too dark to see the “real” Ariel in the background. But this was great – to
become gradually aware of this larger than life “second” reality. In this case
the effect wasn’t just there “to please” but from the beginning it carried
meaning. One of my problems with “The Tempest” certainly was that the things
you don’t see, or have difficulties to imagine just reading it, are so
essential to “build up” the semantics of the play. To understand what Prospero
is about it isn’t enough to see Prospero acted – it is to see what he can do.
To be drawn in and CONVINCED by the magic.
So it
became quickly less boring, and for the first time I loved the “mini-opera” and
the ballet because in this production you easily understand why it is so
essential to make the most of it. (And what I liked immensely was that they
took so much time for doing everything properly – without unduly extending the
play.) It is of course essential to see EVERYTHING the theatre can provide for
one last time. And of course it has to be as perfect and beautiful as can be.
Because when Prospero has done all his magic can do he can safely retire onto
the things that are REALLY important - but I am jumping ahead …
The
first thing I noticed about the production was that I disliked the actress who
played Miranda and, as I had almost expected, wasn’t that pleased with Simon
Russell Beale as Prospero. And it is important to explain why – even though I
reversed the judgement about Prospero following the play - because this turned
out to be crucial for my perception of this character and this production. The
reason I wasn’t that pleased in the beginning is that Simon Russell Beale is
one of the least “showy” actors I have seen on a stage. Still I like him that
much, so much that it might be called “reverence” (which is quite unlike me). But
in this case there was even “less” than usual. I thought: This will be boring,
HE ISN’T ACTING!
I really
like to see Shakespeare being played “naturally” but, at the same time, want to
see something that is actually impossible to do with a “big” role like this.
As, when I am reading, I feel that every half-sentence Shakespeare has written
carries weight and meaning I expect that everything should be PLAYED – not just
stated. And even I, who hasn’t got a clue about acting, can see that this is an
impossible thing to do on this scale. Nonetheless it is an ideal, and I still
believe in it and know that it is possible to get really close to it, as I have
seen recently, for example in Lucian Msamati’s Iago or Ralph Fiennes’ Richard
III. And I judge “Shakespeare acting” according to it. And in this respect
Simon Russell Beale falls utterly short. He speaks the text naturally but
monotonously, kind of carelessly – as if it wasn’t Shakespeare!
And
somehow one expects Prospero, the great magician, to be impressive himself, and
so there was a measure of disappointment, but at some point I began to forget
about it, drawn in by the magic … And, following the play, by subterfuge I got
used to the little human being, patting about the stage on his naked feet, commanding
giant spirits to get everybody in the right place at the right time and taking
care of everything that might ruin what he has cunningly set in motion.
Sometimes annoyed, sometimes impatient or angry, never quite on top of it all. And,
of course, without Ariel, his “lead actor”, who in fact is “a miracle”, who can
do EVERTHING that is asked of him utterly convincingly, and whom Prospero
TRUSTS IMPLICITELY, he wouldn’t have achieved ANYTHING!
I wrote
“by subterfuge” because I took note of all this without really understanding
it, or understanding how RIGHT it was. In fact, what I would have done wouldn’t
have worked because, in some cases, bringing Shakespeare closer to our time
isn’t necessary as nobody since his time has ever written anything more “post-post-modern”
than this. (I must admit that I have no clue which period we are currently in,
and if it even matters. Post-modernism, in any case, was a long time ago.)
Doing it, we rather run the risk of destroying the semantics of the play
because he already set up so carefully where the line between stage and reality
has to be and is playing so cunningly with it that playing with THIS might
become obstructive. It is important that Prospero is the “director”, but it is
even more important that he is this little, quite fallible HUMAN being. But I
didn’t get this – not until Simon Russell Beale did what he always does. Of
course it isn’t always the exact same thing, but he kind of always does it, and
this time it was just so impressive. And it was the SECOND TIME – after I had
seen him in “Lear” standing on the stage, looking up and almost whispering:
“Not mad! Please … not mad!” (The “please” I might imagine, but it WAS there …)
He ALWAYS does it, and it is of course why I like him so much, and why he is
this actor a director can (and should!) trust implicitly. And it is something
you cannot explain, but some actors just know … when they are RIGHT and when
they are not. From my point of view it is even the most important talent an
actor can have. I am loath to call it “instinct” because it is so much more,
but it probably is. And Simon Russell Beale possesses this instinct in such a
high degree that he can do away with a lot of other things that I, or other
actors, would judge to be important. Without being any worse for it - on the
contrary! In this case, what he did was: He deferred the reaction to Ariel’s
suggestion that he would forgive the people who ruined his life – IF HE WAS
HUMAN. Instead of readily agreeing he just stood there and roared. Twice.
And this
was the moment he put this play together for me.