Richard III

Mrs. Jogger and I went to see a fantastic production of Shakespeare's Richard III last night. It was put on by a touring company from the American Shakespeare Center out of Staunton, Virginia. These guys are terrific. If you're a Shakespeare fan, and they come anywhere near you, go!

This play is absolutely carried by Richard, of course. He's on stage almost the whole time, and when he isn't, he's manipulating the characters from off stage. This Richard was subtly clever, repugnantly evil, and more than a little bit crazy. It was just a joy. There were only eleven players to play 52 speaking parts, so they did a lot of quick switches. It was sometimes a bit confusing, but they handled it really well. It was astonishing how the same actor could come back on and be so incredibly different.

The show did not sell well (alas!) so we got pretty good seats, even though we didn't get them until last week. It turned out not to matter, since we walked in and saw a sign that said "Feel free to sit on stage." They had two rows of seats on either side of the stage. We were early (of course) so we took two right in front, stage right. We were so close to the action we could have reached out and touched the players. I swear, one or two times I moved my feet, afraid of tripping someone. This is all part of their idea of recreating Shakespeare the way he was meant to be played: up close and personal. Sometimes on an aside, they'd look me right in the eye and tell me what they were up to.

Mrs. Jogger and I have always loved the theater in general, and Shakespeare in particular. We met in college backstage at a production of Hedda Gabler. We spent a semester in London, where we were required to see -- I think -- three plays, one by Shakespeare. We actually saw about a dozen, eight by Shakespeare. Lots of places, you could show up on the night of the show with your student I.D. and get whatever seats were left over dirt cheap. We were acutely conscious of the fact that, even if we someday made it back, we'd never be able to do so much so cheaply.

We just had a great time. I'm so glad we got a sitter. We need to do more of this.