I'm familiar with most of Shake­speare's plays, but not only had I never seen Cymbeline before today, I knew nothing about it. While the per­for­mance we saw was enjoyable, I began to see why it's one of the lesser-known plays. It's one of Shake­speare's later, minor comedies, with such familiar elements as a cross­dress­ing heroine, confused and separated lovers, false ac­cu­sa­tions of infidelity, stolen princes, a knavish villain who gets his come­up­pance, and a loyal servant. It's easy to see a tired Shake­speare trotting out yet another comedy to amuse the groundlings.

We saw the Greenstage production at the scenic Lake Wilderness …continue.

I mentioned three weeks ago that I was putting together a group of people to see Greenstage's production of Shake­speare's Comedy of Errors at the Seward Park Am­phithe­ater. Six of us braved the rain last night, ate our picnic, and enjoyed an hour and a half of ribald slapstick.

Almost all of the cast cross-dressed. The main male parts, the two sets of identical twin brothers, were played by women, The wife, her sister, and the courtesan were played by ugly men in the best panto dame tradition.

The play, like so many of Shake­speare's comedies, requires an endless series of confused identities, which could be cleared up in moments if only …continue.

We saw The Seafarer at the Seattle Rep this afternoon. Two brothers, Richard and Sharkey, share a house in north Dublin. There's little love lost between them. Richard, recently blinded, is con­trol­ling and wheedling. Sharkey is trying to stay off the gargle and it's not easy when Richard and his crony Ivan drink like fishes.

Sharkey's old rival, Nicky, arrives on Christmas Eve, bringing a stranger with him, Mr. Lockhart. They settle down to a game of poker and Sharkey privately learns that he's met the stranger once before. For Mr. Lockhart is the devil and he wants to collect the old …continue.

(Originally posted to Toast­mas­ters at EraBlog on Tue, 07 Oct 2003 06:53:32 GMT)

I gave the following speech to Toast­mas­ters on October 1st, 2003, as Speech #5, "Vocal Variety".

SPOLIN GAMES

Spolin Games. That sounds like it could be a new set of titles for the Xbox.

Far from it.

The Spolin Games are a set of improv theater games invented by Viola Spolin in the nineteen-thirties, and refined by her for the next six decades. These games are used in im­pro­vi­sa­tion­al work, to help bring out creativity and spon­tane­ity. Viola's son, Paul Sills, founded the Second City improv theater company in Chicago back in the nineteen-fifties.

I was first introduced to the Spolin Games …continue.