What's your favourite play?

[Salty]

I've realised that theatre seems to be less appreciated in todays world - people seem to spend more time at nightclubs than watching such masterpieces as Macbeth or The Crucible.

This Tuesday, a play that I (*big grin*) was starring in was stopped due to the enormous royalties that the creator was imposing on us (as well as difficulties in getting more men in the cast). And that was a real shame. Not just because the company could face going into debt if they put it on, but also because it was one of the best musicals (in my opinion) of the 20th century - 'Oh What A Lovely War.'

It's a bit like Blackadder Goes Forth meets Monty Python - a WWI-themed musical with some good comedy. But alas, it went down the pan...

Anyway, what play (or plays) do you like? A wee bit of Shakespeare - Hamlet or A Midsummer Night's Dream? Or is something a bit more modern suited to you tastes?

[Rincewind]

"Rosencratz & Guildenstern Are Dead", by Tom Stoppard. Honourary mention to "On The Razzle" by Stoppard, "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Wilde and "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare" by-I-can't-recall-whom-just-now. Oh, "Waiting For Godot" prods buttocks as well.

As you can see, I'm a comedy kind of guy. Maybe because they are easier to act in...

[SquidDNA]

I prefer comedies with starkly serious moments. It's a way of sneaking the truth in. Take The Twelfth Night, or What you Will which had one of those good period-adjusted film adaptations that came out of the 90's. There has been a running joke on the steward, Maelvolio, the entire duration of the play to make him think that Olivia, the lady of the house, loves him. When finally, he confesses his love and she rebuffs him, he is enraged, hurt, embarassed, frustrated, forced by circumstance to leave his position. While we were laughing at him for acting like a fool the entire time, in the end we see him hurt by a malicious jest, and the perpetrators almost remorseful of it, in a moment when the laughing dies down.

[Gyokuran]

I've been to 2 plays that I can remember in detail which was West Side Story and Don Quixote, which I both enjoyed a lot. Though I haven't seen them performed, I really enjoyed reading Death of a Salesman and Hamlet.

[Caesar]

Our school play was shutdown because it was opening on Broadway that month. Apparently, there's a law prohibiting people from performing the same play at any level within a certain radius from where the professional version is being produced.

Personally, I enjoyed The Crucible. I loathe Shakespearre for producing generic drivel. I much prefer the Roman and Greek playwrights that he ripped off to make his plays, i.e T. Maccius Plautus, Aristophenes, Euripides and others. You can actually download .pdf versions of these plays for free, and legally, online. The Miles Gloriosus is a good starting point. Also, make sure to read a little on how Roman comedies and dramas were performed and how the stages were set up as there are no stage directions at all, just dialogue.

[Vaarok]

I really like Much Ado About Nothing, and most of Shakespeare is fair good. Beyond that, not much appeals to me.

[ChunkyMrEvil]

Plays... not a fan, we're forced to read through a few in school but I've never seen one first hand. Musicals though, kind of the same thing, my favourites are Rocky Horror and Hair.

[Scribble]

As a prole. Ive never seen a play In my life.

[eventhorizon]

why did you feel compelled to share that with us?

anyway, i would say either of mice and men, romeo and juliet or the secret diary of adrian mole, aged 13¾

[Scribble]

Just disguising a sence of intellectual inferiority with belicose affermation.

Though I have read all of Euripedes, and Shakespear makes me laugh; amazing stuff.

[HunterX]

I saw the play Copenhagen two weeks after it opened on Broadway. It's about the Manhattan Project and the scientists involved/the atempted building of a nuclear device by the Germans. The theater was set up so that part of the audience sat on stage, as part of the set, to look like the jury of a tribunal. Probably my favorite play of the past 15 years or so.

My absolute favorite of all time is Macbeth. Unfortunatly I have never seen it performed well.

[Dino Dude]

My favourite play (which we are studying in English at the moment) is 'An Inspector Calls' by John Preistley. It's set in 1912 and is about a neuvo-reiche (not aristocratic but is very rich) family who have all been connected to a girl who has just commited suicide. An Inspector calls (hence the name) and he questions them all and reveals their inner selves. The story has mandatory twists and shocks and although not 'exciting' in action movie terms it is a very tense 'who-dunnit' play.

I would say more but I don't want to ruin the story for anyone.

[boolybooly]

anything that is well written and acted (and directed) is a pleasure to watch, the same play done badly can be painful

I think the play that most moved me was "The Rules of the Game" by Luigi Pirandello at the Haymarket with Leonard Rossiter, a long time ago. He was an excellent 'straight' actor as well as a fine comedy actor.

[n0z3k1ll3r]

I've been in a production of Louis Nowra's Cosi, as well as playing Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Also considering joining up with Unseen Theatre Company, who perform stage adaptations of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.

So yeah my favourite plays tend to be ones I was in ;)

[TheLoneKnight]

My favorite play is the tragic one.

[Mac_Bug]

scrooge

[The Preacher]

Definitely "Rosencratz & Guildenstern Are Dead".

[Retroboy]

http://www.execulink.com/~lmjost/

Priceless low-key humour done exceedingly well. The only actor in the locally staged version of these plays, Rod Beattie, puts on about a dozen very distinct voices and personalities to enroll us into the misadventures of a city-slicker-finding his roots who routinely flubs up his "hobby farm" [his two horses are named Mortgage and Feedbin, and he once bought a bunch of breeder chicks that turned out to be turkeys] in a small close-knit hayseed community.

Shakespeare and company may have depth, but these one-man plays are a delight. Northeastern Americans should watch out for "Wingfield" on their local PBS channel during the fundraising drives to see what I mean.

-- Retro

[Salty]

Originally posted by HunterX

My absolute favorite of all time is Macbeth. Unfortunatly I have never seen it performed well.
I've seen it in Stratford. Pretty crap performance. I thought that the film was rather good though.

Originally posted by n0z3k1ll3R
...as well as playing Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream

I played Egeus. Had to look angry most of the time. Grrrrr...

[n0z3k1ll3r]

I played Egeus. Had to look angry most of the time. Grrrrr...We renamed our Egeus "Egeo", which annoyed him for some reason. Then we threatened to do it onstage.

[Salty]

Why the rename?

[Kheturus]

My favourite play is the quarterback sneak.

[jetfx]

Julius Caesar, Merchant of Venice are some of my favorites, and Aechylus' Orestia trilogy of revenge was also really good.

[Tiresias]

Oooh too many to choose from... The Homecoming by Pinter, or A streetcar named Desire, or even Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. Waiting for Godot does deserve a mention though...

[Captain Pierce]

I mostly go for Shakespeare, myself. Henry V is a favorite of mine, because it manages to balance the glory to be won from battles and the terrible things that you sometimes have to do to win them. (Branagh's film, in this case, does a better job of covering both of those extremes than Olivier's 1944 version, which is more of a propaganda piece for the obviously-upcoming invasion of France than anything else...) A theatre professor of mine back in college always wanted to do the play; we had wild ideas of some sort of post-apocalyptic "Mad Max" version, but bowed to reality and did a period version since we could borrow costumes from a nearby college's production of Henry IV a few years earlier. ;) I managed to play three roles and be an assistant director even though I'd graduated two years before (the one good thing about having my whole life fall apart when it did ;) ). Hamlet is a good one as well; the same prof actually managed to do a filmed version of that a couple of years after Henry; I played the Player King and a last-minute, vaguely Klingon, Fortinbras. :D

Speaking of Klingons in relation to Shakespeare, my grad school advisor in Theatre always wanted to do a Klingon version of "that Scottish play" ;)... the semester before I started grad school, he did a 1920's "flapper" version of Hamlet that was very interesting, so I think he could have pulled it off.

Other than Shakespeare, The Crucible is a good one... in grad school, I read Agnes of God (among many, mostly forgettable, others--including Angels in America, back before anybody other than theatre majors had even heard of the thing; I have to say that I didn't really like it) and was impressed (since you can completely ignore the fact that Jane Fonda was in the film when you just read the play :D ).

The only musical I really like is Little Shop of Horrors; I played the lead in that back in my undergrad days (although I really wanted to be the Dentist; ain't typecasting a bitch? :D ). I have to say though that I have a certain liking for Grease, mostly because of the lyrics to "Greased Lightning..." ;)

[Tails]

Hay wasn't there a play called "The Vagina Monologues?"

I know that for weeks Los Angeles was plagued with signs and posters that advertised the play "ORGASMS!"

[Handarazuur]

I've been in four musicals and a Shakespeare play. Best one's a tie between Jesus Christ Superstar and Grease. We're doing Guys and Dolls next June. That'll rock too.

Saw Cabaret on Friday. ;)

[the_living_god]

My shcool did a musical called "Bats" earlier this year, I thought it was quite good...
But then, i've never been to see a real play.

[Captain Pierce]

Vagina Monologues, the way I understand it, is not so much a play as a dramatic reading... it's basically just three women who sit onstage and read monologues; the touring version, IIRC, had three "parts:" two women who toured full-time, and the third filled by different "local celebrities" at each performance...

[General Blaze]

2 years ago, our school play did King Lear. It was my favourite because not only because King Lear was one of Shakesphere's interesting works, but the good memories I shared when I was involved in said play. I WAS going to play the role as Edmund, but because my voice was inconsistent, I played the role as the servant instead, who gets tripped by the Jester to amuse the King. :p
At least I get to knock out the guards who were holding the King captive. :D

We got second place in the quarter-finals just because the play we did wasn't "locally traditional". So for last year's play, we had renamed "Merchant of Venice" to "Merchant of Santubong", which, to me, was a stupid method to get the "seal of approval" from the judges. :p

[Salty]

"Merchant of Venice" to "Merchant of Santubong"
What did you rename the Rialto to? 'Some shack on a bridge'?

Just kidding. ;)

So, what is the bloodiest play that you guys have seen? Surely there is one that qualifies as the bloodiest play ever performed, where gory murders happen every few minutes...

[Captain Taco]

Crimes of the Heart is the play that seems to be my life right now. Damn theatre.

[Lord_Kane]

Death of a Salesman, always loved that for some reason.

[Tiresias]

Miller sometimes annoys me, I can't really pin down why...

[Void]

Well i've mostly been to 'local'(as in not international ) plays...some are brilliant. Oh and i've seen some shakespear ones too

[hisnOObness]

'waiting for godot'

by Samuel Beckett.