Intro and Memorable Preformances

Hi! I’m Rebecca and I created this blog for an English Project for my English 338 course at Saginaw Valley State University.

This is going to be my Performance Journal, where I’m going to discuss various things from class readings to live performances I will see throughout this semester. I have not done very much blogging before; only briefly for another course assignment so this medium of writing and responding will be new to me as well.

I am very interested in theater and drama and have seen a lot of random performances over the years with my family. I have been to the Whiting in Flint many times and to several small community theaters. My most memorable performances would probably be the two Shakespeare performances I seen in Stratford Ontario in 2008.

My parents took me to see Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet as high school graduation gifts. These performances were memorable because it was the first time I had seen Shakespeare live and it is very different than the sad attempts we use to make acting it out in class. My opinion changed completely on Romeo and Juliet, having thought the play ridiculous and that much tragedy occurring to one couple over the course of a week was unrealistic. After seeing it on stage, I became totally absorbed in the star cross lovers and found myself crying during the final scene. This is a big thing, because I am not easily moved to tears.

That performance of Romeo and Juliet was interesting also in the fact that they started out in modern dress with guns for the first few scenes before going into traditional dress. By the end though, in the tomb scene they had once again returned to modern dress. The changes were so effortless though, that had you not been paying close attention to the characters, you hardly would notice because you were so absorbed in the passion of their performances.

Hamlet was also equally spectacular. Hamlet is my favorite Shakespeare play, so I was very excited to see it, and the actor performing Hamlet did not disappoint at all. Though they did nothing different about dress of set in this performance, it was amazing to see the play I had read through several times and loved being acted out with such passion.

I think what made these performances so memorable was the skill of the actors and I had never seen Shakespeare preformed professionally before. Once you see Shakespeare preformed live, your views of the plays are changed forever. They come alive and you are suddenly aware of the dept and the passion many of the lines and soliloquies have.

After Stratford Ontario, I was converted into a Shakespeare Nut, and have been devouring it as often as I can.  If only I had a few more hours in the day!