[ATTENDED: November 14, 2013] Much Ado About Nothing
Despite all of my reading, I am fairly ignorant of Shakespeare. I’ve read or seen most of the big ones, but I don’t know a lot of his works first hand. As a young reader I realized that reading Shakespeare was hard—as, really, any play with dozens of characters tends to be. It’s not easy to keep character straight when there are no descriptors about them. So I more or less gave up on reading Shakespeare and decided I would watch him when I could.
When the Princeton University theater offered us tickets to see Much Ado About Nothing, it seemed a great opportunity to brush up.
This was a student production, and I have to complement all of the students on their wonderful performances. They never broke characters, and their Shakespearean dialogue was flawless (as far as I know). What I found interesting was that it took about fifteen minutes before I was absorbed in the dialogue and understood, well, about 45% of it. Well, maybe 60%. They did speak a little fast sometimes.
What was incredibly helpful about the dialogue was…the actors. Duh. But really, the language comes to life when you see people actually performing the lines (making Shakespeare’s bawdy jokes that much more bawdy). And while some of the performances seemed almost over the top, I have little doubt that that is how it was performed back in the day—why would they go for subtle when there’s jokes about sex? (more…)
SOUNDTRACK: ARCADE FIRE-Neon Bible (2007).
I was pretty excited when this album came out. I really enjoyed the last Arcade Fire album, especially “No Cars Go.” And then I found out that “No Cars Go” is redone on this one. I have not had quite the visceral reaction to this one as the previous album. I fear that it may 
be a little too “polished,” that some of the highs and lows and harsher edges have been trimmed down. I guess it’s a bad sign when you listen to the whole album and it’s really only the one song that you already know that makes you pick your head up to listen. Having said that, the album is pretty solid, and if you were a little put off by the totally indie, shouty singing of the first album, this one may be for you. I don’t want to make it sound like the album is bad, because it’s still better than most of the things you’ll hear on the radio. And, I’m really happy for them that they hit number one on Billboard. I just hope the next album gets a little more edge back to it. Of course, having said all this, I’m going to be listening to it again tonight on the way home from work, so I’ll see if maybe it’s better in the dark.
I Just Read About That... 