After reading the wonder play of Merchant of venice I was eager to see the BYU production. When I found out it was a traveling production geared toward children I was intrigued. How would they present the themes in a way children could understand and enjoy them? The play ended up being very clever and well done.
The setting of the play was perfect they had the children sitting on the stage right in the middle of the action. They used them as characters and engaged them in the story. Before starting they even let them name the places and cultures of which the play would revolve around. I thought this was quite clever since a fight between a jew and a christian might be to mature for them.
Lets be serious a lot of the themes in this play might be to much for children. So the company decided to make bullying, something many kids can relate to, the main theme of the play. I thought this was really effective because the children weren't stir crazy and I believe they enjoyed it as much as I did.
The acting was parr(Shylock my favorite)they stuck with the original language for most part, which I appreciated. Also, I liked that they didn't make the production silly and to kiddish. THe production of taming of the shrew the company did last year was overly juvenile and I had a hard time sitting through it let alone enjoying it. over all the production quality was exceptionally good.
No comments:
Post a Comment