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| Beyond the Beautiful Forevers |
Not many people in the theatre tonight. The two of us enjoyed the production. Only a scattering of other people were there. So in no special order:
1. Duncan, at the last scene, when the boy jumps from the bridge, did you recognize the technique, the same one that is used in Les Mis? That jump from the bridge and then the darkness.
2. Did you get there, Xavier? For some reason I hadn't expected the self immolation or suicide by poison scenes. I didn't even see those coming, even though this was India.
3. The woman who described birthing her child right outside of one of the beautiful five star hotels was shocking -- picking up that baby out of the mud and thinking it looked like a rat.
4. I watched the footwork of the people who did the round-dance. I tried it in my mind to see if I could do it when I got home, on my own. Now I have to give it a try before I go to bed.
5. Nice to have two judges make an appearance on stage. The first one was a caricature that must have made your Mom shudder. And the sentence from the second judge was such a reversal. I was not expecting that.
6. A big wow to the set design: the hospital bed; the jail with just a small hole in the grate to pass through food; the reform school; the girls in the lavatory talking about their hopes and dreams being dashed. You can probably add more. Oh yes, the boy who had worked in the hotel for 8 days before he was fired? Him bringing back hotel etiquette to the slum. That is, serving the chips on a napkin.
7. I loved the thoughtfulness in our young male protagonist -- the fact that he had never been to school, didn't know how old he was, and loved jail for it was the first time he had been able to use his mind / or have someone allow him to see a bigger dream than the one he had.
8. Wasn't that a funny joke when the man was proud to have his name be the same one that the black president of the U.S. has?
9. Painful to watch the Husain family loose their money and status in the film.
10. And the interview with the director, Rufus Norris? That wasn't bad either. How does a person get a good job like that?
And now for the coming soon:
April 16: The Hard Problem by Tom Stoppard
March 26: A View from the Bridge by Arthur Miller
May 14: Man and Superman by Bernard Shaw
October 15: Hamlet by William Shakespeare
well... we went! loved it. though it was not an 'easy' play...
ReplyDeletewe talked lots on the way home about the metaphor of 'water' and 'ice'... and of how hard it is to stay 'clean'. While not a totally sold out crowd, there were lots of people there. :-) Might go again in April
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed you reviews.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was reading the reviews, many of them alluded to the universal ethical problem of doing what is right. And then when the metaphor of water was picked up -- making a living from garbage, trying to transform ones self while working with what one is, the seeming impossibility of upward movement for women ....
ReplyDeleteI think I will get twice as much out of the play if I see it again. Having so much action on the stage? I will try to look different places next time. And I had to face up to how hard it was to learn the characters' names -- I finally gave up and identified them as friend of sister of protagonist, husband of lady with one leg, etc. Not the best way. I will go better informed next time.