Quote:
Originally Posted by Cloud
Shakespeare is universal enough to be re-imagined and performed in many different ways.
If you are arguing for some kind of "purity" in performing Shakespeare, you are defeated from the beginning, because there was never any attempt in his own day to portray the times where plays were set accurately.
This is part of the 6-month Shakespeare in Washington festival. I almost went to see King Lear there in my trip, but unfortunately I got snowed in. That performance was by the Harlem Classical Theatre and was set in ancient Mesopotamia (as opposed to ancient Britain as Shakespeare wrote it). So what? Did you know that for 150 years King Lear was performed with a happy ending?
See first statement.
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If it's reimagined and played in many different ways, it ain't Macbeth. A million plays, movies, and TV shows have done the same basic treachery and tragedy, of the rich and famous, story line without alluding to being based on Macbeth. But of course they didn't have to fit into the theme of a, "6-month Shakespeare in Washington festival". That would sort of explain it.
I don't give a hoot about keeping Shakespeare "pure", they weren't meant to be "the classics" in their day, as I understand it. Just entertainment for anyone willing to cough up a coin to keep Willie from starving or getting a day job.
It's going to take a hell of a lot of re-imagining to make Macbeth a musical, in the Tlingit tradition. Are you sure those red devils aren't stealing our culture?
