ArtsBeat Blog: Theater Talkback: A Final Scorecard for the RSC

The British are going! The British are going!Actually, the 41 actors and 21 musicians of the Royal Shakespeare Company have upped and gone, <a href="http://afashionbuy.com/"><strong>Buy Discount Replica LV Handbags</strong></a> having concluded their unprecedented six-week repertory season in New York at the Park Avenue Armory on Sunday. All that remains is to disassemble the purpose-built replica of the company's Stratford-upon-Avon theater and ship it off to Wales, where it will rest in a warehouse until the company's next major tour stop of similar ambition.The season, presented by the Lincoln Center Festival and the Armory, was an unqualified success in terms of ticket sales. Overall attendance was at an impressive 98% of capacity. Some 32 of the 44 performances were sold out, many before the stand even began. And audiences at the performances I caught were wholly enthusiastic, obviously excited to be witnessing Shakespeare performed by this renowned company in a theater that maximized intimacy even at nearly 1,000 seats.But in some senses the season was a victim of its own success. I heard persistent grumblings about the scarcity of tickets and unsatisfying seat locations. And that was just from my critic colleagues! Some potential patrons were also put off by the high ticket prices. The best seats sold for a daunting 250 – roughly twice the price of a Broadway ticket. And the prices included an "embedded contribution" to Lincoln Center that it wasn't possible to politely decline to make. (For instance, those top tickets were 200 with a 50 contribution added.) Rush tickets were available to most performances for 25, but there was no mistaking that the high ticket prices for the prime seats made the season something of an elite event. I've rarely seen more well-heeled looking patrons filling the seats around me at the theater.The unforeseen logistical problems of the theater's design were the real bugaboo. Until the theater was built the sight lines weren't firmly established, so it was discovered after the fact that certain seats that had been sold at full price afforded only partial views. The solution didn't satisfy some patrons I heard from: since many performances were sold out the Lincoln Center Festival offered full refunds or a 15 per cent refund of the price if patrons chose to keep their tickets. Neither was a satisfying option for those who wondered why they had the misfortune of being stuck with the bum seats.Setting aside matters of money and logistics, the season was, from a critic's perspective, a mixed blessing. It was exciting, to be sure, to see a company of this caliber present five Shakespeare plays in quick succession in full-dress productions. The more you are exposed to Shakespeare, the more you appreciate the wonder of his achievement and the endlessly fertile riches of the plays. The Public Theater has recently been on something of a Shakespeare roll – both of its Central Park productions this summer were fine, making for some well-timed competition for the RSC – but the opportunity to witness such well-trained classicists perform such an ample selection of his plays is almost unheard-of even in the country's theater capital. The friends who accompanied me to performances were often more impressed than I was by the quality of the performances, having grown numb to Shakespeare by being exposed to too many verse-mangling productions. A lot of homegrown Shakespeare doesn't even achieve the minimal requirement of simple comprehensibility; if you can't understand a word the actors are saying, you're not going to reap much from a Shakespeare play. The actors in the Royal Shakespeare Company spoke the language with a clarity and incisive thrust that made every word tell.Truly accomplished Shakespearean acting requires more <a href="http://www.afashionbuy.com/"><strong>polo t-shirt wholesale </strong></a> than just clarity of speech, of course. An ability to draw out all the psychological and emotional dimensions of the characters is equally necessary, and by these criteria the performances were sometimes disappointing. I would like to have seen a little more aching majesty in Greg Hicks's King Lear, more buoyancy and playful warmth in Katy Stephens's Rosalind.Sometimes it seemed that the fashionable convention of tilting against traditional interpretations of the plays got in the actors' way. Michael Boyd's production of "As You Like It" willfully underscored the dark shadows that are usually swept to the side in this festive comedy. Rupert Goold's flame-throwing "Romeo and Juliet" foregrounded the violent conflict between the Capulets and Montagues, and turned the young lovers of the title into petulant teenagers who came across as far too wised-up to sacrifice themselves on the altar of newly discovered love. For me the most satisfying production was David Farr's thoughtful, elegantly staged "Winter's Tale," in which actors and roles were perfectly matched.Although using a small company to stage five plays probably made the season financially viable, it also meant that actors were sometimes squeezed into roles they were ill suited for. I was also inclined to wonder if the long commitment this traveling repertory season required might have precluded the participation of first-tier actors who could not or would not make a commitment of more than two years to the project. This company debuted with “Winter’s Tale” in Stratford way back in spring 2009, and the productions later traveled to London.But while the season left plenty to quibble about, now that it is in the rear-view mirror it is hard not to look back with a sense of gratitude, even nostalgia. The theater itself, majestically rising inside the armory like a magic castle within a castle, was a real marvel. The fanciful dream I once had of keeping the structure intact as a permanent New York playground for classical <a href="http://afashionbuy.com/"><strong>Wholesale Replica LV Handbags Online</strong></a> theater was of course a quixotic idea. But we can hope that the popular success of the company's season in New York will at least inspire return visits, perhaps next time allowing for more performances and more equitable ticket prices. The sooner the better.What were your impressions of the Royal Shakespeare Company's visit? Favorite production? Gravest disappointment?