I came here to drink retsina and kill my relatives

The new Bridge Theatre is beautiful. The interior is reminiscent of the candles from the Great Hall at Hogwarts, and there’s a good collection of bites that you can order – from raw vegetables (sardines, organic carrots, and organic turnips is one dish) to an order of half-a-dozen freshly-baked madeleines. And walking out the doors, you’re immediately confronted with an intimate view of Tower Bridge. 

I had standing “mob” tickets to see Julius Caesar, and was only supposed to go see it once. However, I happened to be free the night before, and decided to treat myself. I’m glad I did, because I discovered there are “good” and “bad” spots to be standing – especially for someone who isn’t very tall.

SPOILERS BELOW

For example, if you want to be witness to both David Calder (Caesar) and Ben Whishaw (Brutus)’s expressions during the stand-off right before “Et tu, Brute?”, a good spot is near the side of the raised platform close to Ceasar’s throne. (Incidentally, it’s also a good place to get splattered with a little stage blood.)

If you want to get a good view of the final confrontation between Brutus and Lucius, don’t stand right near the collection of jumbled trench metal that’s part of the war staging; you’ll only be able to see the actors’ backs.

If you want to get a good view of Brutus and Cassius’ confrontation during the stress of war, a good side to be is at the far end (where Caesar’s throne used to be), not at the side closer to the entrances. 

For the record, the stage management crew did an excellent job squeezing amongst the crowd and shuffling everyone around. Platforms fell and raised themselves; new rugs and desks and sofas appeared seemingly out of thin air. When the jagged trench metal appeared to divide the stage during the battle scenes, I was shouted at “Do you want to die?” as an incentive to get out of the way. Stage crew discreetly and expertly handed out at least two or three different types of posters that members of the crowd raised at appropriate key moments of the play, which was impressive to see from the vantage point of the gallery seats, and I know this because  –

Ah, yes. Later, I went back a third time and watched the performance from the seats. :)

If it’s at all possible, I would recommend both ticket types.

From the “mob,” nothing can beat the experience of:

A) watching the actors’ expressions up close, meters away

B) watching David Calder, Michelle Fairley (a most excellent Cassius), and Ben Whishaw spit at each other as part of their passionate enunciation, and hoping not to get in the way of the spittle. (I forgot this was a thing!)

C) I will say again: watching the actors’ expressions up close. 

However, there were a few things that I missed from the vantage point of the mob. Until I was in the seats, I didn’t realize that there was an actual jeep that drove out in the last scene, and I didn’t notice the “fire” burning near the entrance. From the seats, I was also able to notice better the stage changes – such as the actors rushing to throw furniture into a crate on the cusp of the last stage change.

Watching Ben Whishaw live

This was my first time seeing Ben Whishaw act live. Most notably, I saw in Brutus echoes of Richard II from The Hollow Crown (his head shake) and his character from Lilting (his expression of sudden grief mourning Portia’s death). Also noticed the darting eyes and rippling of emotion during Lucius’ guitar song, reminiscent of at least some notable scenes from London Spy and the monologue in Queers. 

Struck me how practiced acting can be (like the darting eyes), though of course it takes skill to make it look natural.

I heard one commentator say that Ben Whishaw gave a masterclass in acting, and I am tempted to agree based on his micro-expressions and micro-movements. Randomly, I remember one particular scene where he tapped someone naturally on the shoulder, when all the other actors were standing still.

On the rest of the cast

Michelle Fairley and Adjoa Andoh gave very strong performances as Cassius and Casca. 

Cassius felt like the lead of the play, and a little like Cassandra: she had the wisest ideas, but everyone listened to the ineffectual, overly intellectual Brutus over her. 

David Morrissey played a convincing populist Mark Antony. 

Adjoa Andoh as Casca had fewer lines than the leads, but delivered arguably the best (snarkiest) lines and was able to draw out a reaction from the audience every time. 

David Calder played a believably old/retiring Caesar lured by the temptation of the crown.

Abe Popoola played Trebonius, one of the conspirators. Most notably, he was the lead singer in the band playing at the beginning of the show. He’s a damn good singer.

Leaphia Darko played a believably hurt Portia, wife of Brutus, who had the challenging task of going through a wide range of emotions in one short scene.

Wendy Kweh played a believable (though tragic) Calpurnia, wife of Caesar. It was also very cool seeing her as one of the soldiers in Brutus’ army.

Fred Fergus, who played Lucius, played an absolutely beautiful yet sleepy cover of Nick Drake’s Day is Done. It was short, but I thought it better than the original.

Kit Young I did not realize was Octavius until the very end, but he did a great job.

Sid Sagar was great as various characters. (Also: was he Cinna the Poet? I couldn’t tell.)

Hannah Stokely and Rosie Ede both had impressive stage voices.

END OF SPOILERS

I discovered Ben Whishaw rather recently; half a year ago, I fell and tripped into the James Bond fandom, and suddenly found myself a fan too of the actor who played Q, for:

A) his expressiveness/ability to emote, and

B) how he’s come across in the interviews over the years – not as a typically gregarious actor, but as a more relatable person who’s a little awkward in interviews, and has been described by interviewers as closed-off. (Imagine that: a shy actor! Okay, I don’t believe for a minute that this 30-something-year-old actor is actually shy now, but my point is that his ability to transform himself in performances is inspiring.)

Was also inspiring to learn that Ben Whishaw’s breakthrough performance of Hamlet in 2004 inspired other now-arguably-more-famous actors to follow in his footsteps, from Kit Harrington to Eddie Redmayne to Joe Alwyn.

Meeting a favourite actor in person

There was a small roar of excited chatter when Ben Whishaw stepped out, and all at once he was surrounded by a crowd of people asking for signatures and photos. Many of them were young women.

It was interesting to see the discrepancy: a few of the other actors (not the leads) were also there, and people walked up to them, but they didn’t get nearly as much attention. A couple of the actors looked as if they were there for moral support or waiting for him to finish so they could get a drink all together later. 

Clearly, Ben has many fans. Then I heard one young man ask him about hearing that he had been having trouble memorizing lines for this play (which made me cringe a little – what a question to ask), which he refuted. 

More pens borrowed, more photos taken. 

To be honest, I felt a little bad: the actor looked pretty tired in the middle of one group conversation, and wasn’t making eye contact with some immediate people waiting to meet him nearby.

What does one say to a favourite actor? To a celebrity?

When I eventually got the chance to approach, I admitted that I was a fan, told him that I was looking forward to his future work, and thanked him for being a wonderful performer. Felt weird to ask for an autograph or photo, so I left it at that. 

Last Thoughts

Seeing Julius Caesar three times underscored the impressive amount of repetitive work put into the production every time – five or six days a week for twelve weeks, sometimes with two performances a day.

so, the standard rule is that if you say ‘Macbeth’ or quote from it while you are in a theatre which is not performing it, you and your fellows will receive bad luck, which, according to some, can be counteracted by performing one of several rituals. My question: ‘is the Macbeth curse activated in the following circumstances?’ : 

Someone saying it to you over a phone while you stand in a theatre. 

Receiving it as a text or social media message. 

Listening to a recording of a person saying it.

Quoting or naming Macbeth in sign language. 

A parrot quoting or naming Macbeth with no understanding of its significance or meaning (is that ‘speech’ and therefore ‘quoting’, or just mimicked noises?)

The first thing we have to decide is precisely how the magic works; it could be the intent and awareness behind the utterance, or the simple act of speaking, or the syllables themselves.

If it’s the sound itself, then the parrot can cast the curse, as could the recording and the person on the other end of the phone, but the sign language and the social media posts would be inert. If it’s working on sound alone like this, then translated quotes from the play would not cast the curse, nor would paraphrases or misquotes, but strings of text that are contained within the text of the play and spoken (or played) out of context or without an awareness of the phrase in the play would also cast the curse. Every instance of “who comes here?” and “God save the king” and “good morrow, noble sir” and “knock knock” would cast it. So, since Hamlet and knock knock jokes do not carry a similar curse, we can rule out the sound only method, at least for quotes.

If the magic works on the speaker’s awareness of the context of the utterance, then the parrot and recording can’t cast it, but the sign language should be able to. The phone might work, if the caller is aware that their voice is being transmitted into a theatre. The person in the theatre should most likely be able cast the curse by posting to social media or sending a text message. Reading a post social media post might work, depending on the OP’s awareness that a potential reader might be in a theatre. Same with reading text messages. However, by this method one could theoretically think “Macbeth” hard enough to cast the curse without actually saying anything, and a text message or social media post could cause one to do so. (If you’ve read American Gods, there’s a bit where a character thinks “snow” hard enough to make it actually snow. If the Macbeth curse works on thinking “Macbeth” hard enough to fit that thought to speech, then it could theoretically work without any speech involved at all, at least for certain magically inclined persons).

If it’s the act of speaking – the act of tying the thoughts to the words – then, like the awareness/intent method, the parrot and the recording do nothing while the sign language and text in translation are effective. Receiving it as a text message or viewing it on social media would likely do nothing, the sender/OP not tying the thought to the world while being in a theatre, but if you sent or posted the text from the theatre it would depend on how your thought-to-text process and how closely that mimics speech. Small tangent: when I type, I think a thought and as I fit the words to the thought those words spill out my fingers in almost exactly the same way spoken words spill off my tongue, so I’d consider my own typing to be an “utterance” and capable of casting a speech-based curse like this. But when I write by hand or use the touchscreen keyboard on my phone, it’s not as fluent and not as similar to speech, so I could cast the curse by typing on a laptop, but not by writing on paper or sending a text message from my phone. Different people would be able to cast it using different methods. The phone is again a bit trickier, and might work if the caller knows you’re in a theatre.

On to what counts as a theatre for the purposes of the curse. There would have to be something magically different about a space where plays are performed that would affect magic, sort of how how churches are consecrated and assorted gooblies can’t enter them, or how vampires can’t cross thresholds of homes without being invited. Conceptual lines are drawn between or around spaces to mark them out for certain purposes, and magic does different things within different space. Like how temperature influences what water can do (eg, be solid or liquid), the presence of a threshold line or inside-a-theatre-ness would influence what magic can do.

A non-theatre space being temporarily used as a theatre would pick up a sort of temporary consecration (I don’t think I have a secular term for the concept, so “consecrate” will have to do) that would make the curse work when it is determined that it shall be used for a production, or when the rehearsals or other production-related activity starts there, and then afterwards the consecration would dissipate as the production infrastructure is removed and the space is used for other activities. Or at least, I’m assuming it would. It is possible that the threatre-ness would linger, at least for a time.

What about buildings that used to be theatres and are now used for other purposes? Does the curse work in them? And how about land that used to have a theatre built on it? How does a space become a theatre, for curse purposes, anyway?

I would assume that when a space is intended to be used for productions of plays, it picks up a bit of theateryness from that intention, more depending on how distinctly the space is delineated (so buildings get the most, since they’re delineated by solid walls and roof, and meadows and naturalistic parks get the least, since they don’t have solid lines), and then rehearsing and performing and watching plays in that space creates more theateryness, until there’s enough for it to heavily influence magic. Then, after a building is torn down or abandoned or repurposed or a production moves on from a temporary the space, theateryness would begin to dissipate, and it could be thoroughly gone within days (for a single short-lived production in a poorly delineated space) or it could take centuries (for a building which was a popular theatre and busy theatre for ages).

ex-librīs [Latin, “from the books of…”], is usually a small print or decorative label pasted into a book, often on the inside front cover, to indicate its owner.