Yes, there is. There's a hurry, Xander. I'm dying...I may have as few as fifty years left.

Anya ,'Same Time, Same Place'


We're Literary 2: To Read Makes Our Speaking English Good  

There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."


deborah grabien - Jun 17, 2004 9:14:31 am PDT #3426 of 10002
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.

The director, accepting his Oscar for "Shakespear in Love" thanked Paltrow, whom he said "glowed like uranium" whenever she was onscreen. I have to agree with that assessment. Has she ever done it again onscreen? The glowing thing, I mean?

Oh, there was another thing I liked in the Gibson Hamlet: Glenn Close went to her very famous doctor father - the man in charge in Zaire when Ebola first broke out - to ask how to play Gertrude's death by poison scene. I think he gave her some very good advice; her blue-lipped, terrified "SHIT! I've beenh POISONED!" realisation was very convincing.


juliana - Jun 17, 2004 9:14:32 am PDT #3427 of 10002
I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I miss them all tonight…

Oodles of fun, but I didn't get the ending, unless they were going in an odd "Tempest" direction.

It's the beginning of Twelfth Night, without the captain, right?


Vortex - Jun 17, 2004 9:14:35 am PDT #3428 of 10002
"Cry havoc and let slip the boobs of war!" -- Miracleman

a superb soundtrack and (I know, I know) one of my favourite renditions of Ophelia ever.

I couldn't concentrate on that, I was too busy being confused when they moved scenes around. I was furious when I left the movie.


deborah grabien - Jun 17, 2004 9:15:31 am PDT #3429 of 10002
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.

juliana, yep - "the Queen desires a comedy" and he starts with Twelfth Night.


Lilty Cash - Jun 17, 2004 9:15:40 am PDT #3430 of 10002
"You see? THAT's what they want. Love, and a bit with a dog."

Should I even bring up "Shakespeare in Love"? Oodles of fun, but I didn't get the ending, unless they were going in an odd "Tempest" direction.

I adore Shakespeare in Love! As for the end, Shakespeare is writing "Twelfth Night", and sees Gwenyth as Viola; I think what we are to take away is that, after that, all of his plays are for her.

ETA: Yep, x-posty goodness.


Frankenbuddha - Jun 17, 2004 9:16:07 am PDT #3431 of 10002
"We are the Goon Squad and we're coming to town...Beep! Beep!" - David Bowie, "Fashion"

(I think there was also a Nicol Williamson Hamlet, but I disremember.)

There was - very early 70s, filmed at the Roundhouse theater in London. Anthony Hopkins was a very young Claudius. I can't remember who Gertrude was, but Marianne Faithful was Ophelia.

My favourite Lear was the one Olivier filmed for the BBC in the seventies.

Was that the one with Diana Rigg as Regan and Leo McKern as Gloucester? Or was that a later version Olivier did for the Beeb?

Also, I'm with P-C on TITUS, and just about everyone on RAN.

Problematic as the play is, John Cleese in the Beeb's (I think Jonathan Miller directed) TAMING OF THE SHREW was quite good as well, though I've completely fogotten who played Katherine.


deborah grabien - Jun 17, 2004 9:18:23 am PDT #3432 of 10002
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.

I couldn't concentrate on that, I was too busy being confused when they moved scenes around. I was furious when I left the movie.

I totally grok that. But if you can, separate the soundtrack from the movie and give it a listen; it isn't Henry V or The Lion in Winter (best soundtrack ever!), but it's damned close.

I think what we are to take away is that, after that, all of his plays are for her.

Yup - that was my take, as well.


JohnSweden - Jun 17, 2004 9:19:50 am PDT #3433 of 10002
I can't even.

And I will stand at your back with my crossbow and defend your right to watch it. The minute you tell me I have to love it because it's all modern and metaphorical and stuff, though? Bad Things.

Total wroditude. I saw an interesting Edwardian King John at our Stratford once, but generally I much prefer the more traditionally staged versions. I usually find the retellings to be painful, even I am sympathetic to the attempts.


deborah grabien - Jun 17, 2004 9:19:58 am PDT #3434 of 10002
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.

OH! There is one extremely well-done Hamlet version that I nearly forgot about entirely: Kevin Kline, on Broadway, filmed for PBS. Judith Ivey as Gertrude, and (swooning here) Diane Venora as Ophelia. I think she later went on to do the play in men's clothes, and played Hamlet herself.


Connie Neil - Jun 17, 2004 9:21:26 am PDT #3435 of 10002
brillig

The scene I love best in "Shakespeare in Love" is when he's explaining how "Romeo & Juliet" will end, and (I've forgotten the character's name) Paltrow closes her eyes in pain when he says R&J kill themselves.