Propeller troupe's Richard III at the Huntington Theater

I went and saw Richard III last night at the Huntingdon Theater in a lovely trip organized by captainecchi*-- so glad she suggested it! In fact, you can read her impressions of the show here, which match up very much with mine, so much so I was tempted to just let her speak for me and agree with everything she wrote! But for posterity I am recording my own thoughts, given this show impressed me as much as any show I've ever seen.

The show was given the aesthetic of a Victorian insane asylum, and I don't need to tell you how creepy that can be, with the men in white masks, the primitive steel medial instruments, and the constant presence of sterile plastic and black body bags. It even seemed that at the imprisonment of Clarence he was given a partial lobotomy! There are many gorey murders in this play, with tons of stage blood and every onstage death committed in the most gruesome way possible-- drilling into a man's eyes, guts torn out with a hook, and a chainsaw dismemberment behind a plastic curtain that was sprayed with blood. Despite the potential over-the-topness of it, I actually liked it and thought it worked with the stark brutality and sociopathy of their Richard III.

The cut of the script was excellent, keeping the length and frequent dryness of a Shakespearean history down to a minimum and maintaining an engaging pace. The storyline was easy enough to follow, though I had read it before, and despite a handful of confusion regarding people's relationships, it kept remarkable clarity. If I ever were to put on Richard III, I would try to emulate this cut.

Interestingly, this was an all-male Shakespeare troupe. The acting was phenomenal across the board-- Richard Clothier as Richard III in particular with his powerful voice. But as one fequently cross-cast myself, I am always interested in how it's done. I thought it was notable that while the men playing women were dressed in period female costume and affected feminine carriage, they did not much attempt feminine voice, and they all had their normal masculine hair. That disconnect was a little jarring, but their acting was excellent, if representative rather than emulative. It also pleases me to see men effectively to play women, when I am so much more used to the other way around.

The tech was excellent, particularly the sound design; the effects were organic and expertly timed, plus the singing! The entire troupe sang to punctuate the drama and over the transitions, usually psalms or Victorian-sounding caroles and folk tunes. Their voices were exquisite, and it was incredibly atmospheric. I particularly enjoyed when they sang something in contrast to what was happening, like a merry folk song over somebody's brutal murder. There was even a minute when they rendered "Bloody, bloody England" as a kind of rap set to an electric guitar! Out of left field, certainly, but I kind of liked it anyway. :-)

This may have been the best Shakespearean production I've ever seen. I enjoyed it immensely, and now I want to see the Comedy of Errors this troupe is also putting on. Alas, it may be out of my price range, but I will look into it anyway.

Lovely weekend with Jared

Goodness me, wonderful weekend! Jared and I have been making the most of his visit, running around seeing friends and doing things. Saturday was mostly spent trying to hang out with people. We had a great lunch with a bunch of our undergrad friends in Usdan during the day, and a dinner with a different group at night. God, I wanted to invite everyone I knew to this dinner so they could hang with Jared, but sadly it's tough to host more than ten at a time at Elsinore. This is a primary reason I am endeavoring to have a rotating guest list. But being limited to ten was a real shame, especially because of how fantastic the dinner was.

Last week sometime, you see, I was struck with an idea of culinary genius. I would make a meal consisting entirely of different toppings for crostini. I would toast a big old basket of bread, and make three different kinds of spread to eat on top of it in whatever combination the guests pleased. I roasted eggplants for eggplant caviar with carmelized onion and toasted walnuts, I chopped up tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella cheese for a caprese, and sauteed mushrooms, leeks, and shallots in marsala wine for duxelles. I was particularly proud of the last one, because I changed the recipe I was using to include the marsala reduction, which I think improved it vastly, as well as pureeing it at the end. It's only recently that I've felt confident enough in my culinary knowledge to alter recipes, so I'm really pleased. Also, I tried a slightly experimental service option. I gathered up my rather large collection of ramekins (recently joined in the cabinet by a couple brought my Charlotte) and divided the various toppings between them, and had them placed one each of them at various intervals across the table. This made it so all the guests had easy access to a small amount of each spread, and everyone had knives and spoons with which to spread the deliciousness. The lovely guests brought amazing spreads as well-- garden-fresh-tomato puttanesca and roasted garlic and white bean from captainecchi* and electric_d_monk*, hummus from morethings5*, tapenade from in_water_writ*, and sweet potato-carrot from lightgamer*, all unique, all delicious. I am going to give this experimental dinner style a big thumbs up, and I will certainly be doing it again soon.

Sunday Jared and I went with April to acousticshadow2*'s new larp, Nepenthe a Surcease of Sorrow. It ran at WPI, and EB lent me a wedding dress for my costume. I painted my face with white greasepaint and wandered around with the air of a broken little girl whose sanity has gone just a little over the edge. The larp reminded me in many ways of Alice, a gothic game with strong literary roots-- as a big Poe fan, I was pleased by many of the references --but a lot of the darkness in it was kind of over-the-top, which gave the game much more of a "pulp" and "melodrama" feel as opposed to that of "tragedy." Given the connection with Poe, tonally that is fitting. We all had fun, and I encouraged EB to bid it for Festival this year.

Jared will be leaving this afternoon, leaving Boston and leaving me bereft. I am always so sorry to see the end of his visits, but as always I must just look forward to the next one. It's been wonderful having him here again, so I will try to let that carry my spirits.

Style Challenge: Summer Black-Out 2010

So I read a style sometimes blog called Already Pretty, which I like for it's theoretical style advice and applaud for its positive body image outlook (even if I don't always necessarily agree with its approach on that front.) The writer has issued an interesting personal challenge to herself-- could she not wear any black clothing at all for two entire summer months and rely solely on more vibrant colors to create interesting, seasonally-appropriate looks? She calls it her "Summer Black-Out 2010 Challenge," and exhorted her readers to give it a try as well, not for the entirety of June and July, but just for the week of Monday, June 7th to Monday, June 14th.

Now I love my neutrals, especially black. Black looks good against my pale skin, and being a goth deep down in the depths of my tormented soul, it is a color that suits my tastes. But I depend an awful lot on it as a standby when I can't think of anything else, so it might be a fun challenge to cut it out entirely as an option. I certainly couldn't go two whole months without it, but a week could be interesting. So I thought what the hell, I'll give it a try. From the 7th to the 14th, expect to see me trying to creatively work around including any black in my outfits.



We could all use a little more color in our lives. :-)

And until then, I will be wearing ALL MY BLACK.

The design Charlotte painted on my back

I like its kind of gothy aesthetic. Certainly suits my tastes. Charlotte is one talented young lady.

Halloween this year

I just found out I have Columbus Day off. Cool. Brandeis and it's ultra-PC "Columbus is responsible for the destruction of native lives and culture" stance on not celebrating the holiday has made me forget that normal people don't have to work that day.

Now that I have given myself a reason to dress up, I need to figure out a Halloween costume for this year. The last time I wore anything was two years ago when I was directing Hamlet, and since we had to have rehearsal that evening, I had people come dressed up. I wore the costume Frances would be wearing in the show, so I was basically her Hamlet for Halloween. :-) This year I'm not sure what to do, though. The easiest thing to do would be to just goth it up and dress slutty, but that's gotten to be kind of my standby and I don't want to become boring and predictable. I may still do that if I can't figure out anything else, but I'm going to try to be a little more original. It occurred to me that I could be Alice, but Christ, that's not exactly a separation from the goth thing, and talk about the laziest costuming ever. So, no. It might amuse me if someone else was Alice, heh, but not me. Any suggestions are welcome.

Too sad for a goth club

*Sigh* There's XMortis tonight, and at least one fun person I know is going, but I'm missing Jared kind of keenly right now and the idea of going without hm just kind of kills the mood for me. Haven't spoken to him since Tuesday, and he won't be back until Sunday yet.

Heh. It occurs to me I'm too sad to go to a goth club. :-)

Been kind of stressed out lately, between missing Jared, looking for a job, and the various other unpleasantries in my life. I am resolved to try and be more mellow about it today; yesterday I was kind of a grouch about everything. It was relieved in large part by a very nice dinner with witticaster*, who ate pork chops with me-- I never had to really make an endeavor to hang out with her when she lived with me, but now that she's not just the next bedroom over, I am resolved to actually PLAN to see now and again. Then I went to the first full session with the new group on Kindness's game, and it was a lot of fun. I'm still trying to find Arien as a character, but I'm enjoying the process very much. Good group, good DM.

Need to be less of a grouch. Today I'll try to do that.

Good goth night

Had a really great evening last night. Had a goth night out with Bernie and Marissa, and not only did I enjoy going out and playing pool, the company was incredibly nice. Getting to wear a hot gothy costume and have good conversation is basically my ideal evening. I wonder if that's not something worth getting together more often. It also doesn't hurt when random strangers walk over to tell you you're gorgeous. I know, I'm pathetic. But I like it. :-)

Today, not quite so nice. Threw up twice today. Not sure why, but then, when am I ever? So I'm feeling kind of gross. If I seem unusually blase about this, it's because, having what seems to be the world's most delicate stomach, I throw up fairly easily and probably more often than most. Still, usually not more than once in a day. :-P

Redgoth hair stylist

So I tried the new hairdresser and I am very pleased. I got this girl named Kristen who was a lot of fun. I liked the look of her 'cause she was just a little bit punked out, and she was wearing the most awesome red goth boots. I said to her, "Nice goth boots, where'd you manage to find red ones?" She was delighted by the compliment, told me about this place in New Hope, and then said, "Oh, my God, you're a weekend goth, aren't you?" I laughed and said yes, and she was like, "Me too!" Although to be honest she wasn't really all that weekend, she had lots of piercings, spiked red-streaked hair, and of course the boots. And she asked me what kind I was, then said, "No, wait, don't tell me-- you're a lily, aren't you?" I'd never heard that term before. She said lily goths are the pale, delicate ones who dress more on the pretty side and show a lot of skin. And I was like, "Oh, you mean gloomcookie," which, yeah, that's totally me. She, interestingly, is a red goth-- she dresses in the punk goth style, but everything's always in red, including her hair, eyeliner, everything. She showed me a picture of her and her heavily tattooed boyfriend in her getup. I'd never actually seen a red goth before; I liked it. We got into a fun conversation about different kinds of goths and the various combinations thereof. I'm a pretty/perkygoth, while she's a perky/punky/redgoth.

And on top of it all, she did a great job with my hair. She touched up the layers and styled it really nicely. I'm very pleased, and I love finding fun people in unexpected places.