G&S

Off to the Epsom Odeon earlier in the week for one of their cinematic relays of a live performance of the 'Pirates of Penzance' at the Coliseum.

Our screen was more or less full, mostly but not all grey hairs. But next to us a party of three or four boys, nine or ten years old out with a mum for what may well have been a birthday treat. Which it might of been for them, but the boy next to us, rather overweight, was rattling a particularly noisy sort of sweet paper, more or less through the show. I think the mum knew but did not know how to deal with it and eventually I tried a tap plus a word which did calm him down a bit. All rather tiresome, and my guess is that the birthday boy had selected the show on the strength of the word pirate, thinking that there was going to be a lot of swash and buckle and was probably rather disappointed.

And I was disappointed too. Not a great G&S fan in the first place, but I did not think this one translated very well to a gala performance at the cinema. The thing was too light weight to be accorded this sort of treatment. And I have never been keen on cameras zooming in to the wart on the end of the trumpeter's nose. Much better live and much better suited to a village hall, or at least a much smaller theatre.

Whereas the Billy Budd which I saw a year or so worked much better (see reference 1).

But it is a cheap and convenient way of taking in shows which we would not otherwise get into London for. On the strength of which we are now booked up to see the latest RSC version of the 'Merchant of Venice', not globular, having thought that quite apart from whether one liked current globe productions or not, a globe production would not work very well on the big screen. The globe really is intended to be consumed live. And hopefully the RSC show is set in Venice rather than Las Vegas. And hopefully in vaguely Elizabethan costume, rather than in black leather or black suits.

I note in passing that I once read in the TLS, ages ago now, that the 'Merchant' was not so much about Jews, although they were a convenient peg on which to hang the story, as about the money lenders, promoters and financiers, cut throat, native breeds all, of Elizabeth London. Must see if I can turn it up as part of revision.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/to-clapham.html.