Matt and I attended yet another fabulous performance of Portland Actor's Ensemble. This time they were presenting Twelfth Night. We last saw PAE this summer performing Hamlet in July and we last saw Twelfth Night with Northwest Classical Theater Company's 2010 production, memorable for the famous "hiding behind a pillow" scene that still makes me laugh when I think about it.
This was a very good production, with very good singers. And they sang a lot. Here we get pre-show entertainment from the actors themselves: Danielle Frimer (Olivia) and Britt Harris (Viola) are accompanied by Max Maller (Sir Andrew) as they sing "Emmylou." (by First Aid Kit) And this is what I liked about this production: we hear a lot of versions of "Sigh No More" when watching Shakespeare which is fine, but when we get to hear contemporary music, I'm quite happy.
This was a very good production, with very good singers. And they sang a lot. Here we get pre-show entertainment from the actors themselves: Danielle Frimer (Olivia) and Britt Harris (Viola) are accompanied by Max Maller (Sir Andrew) as they sing "Emmylou." (by First Aid Kit) And this is what I liked about this production: we hear a lot of versions of "Sigh No More" when watching Shakespeare which is fine, but when we get to hear contemporary music, I'm quite happy.
It's Carson Cook! (who we last saw in NWCTC's Much Ado About Nothing) He's playing the guitar as the whole cast sings "Ho Hey" (The Lumineers). Very fun.
Okay, the play begins. Here we can see the ship just as it is beginning to wreck, casting Viola to the seas and separating her from her twin brother Sebastian.
This is the famous scene where Malvolio finds a letter planted by Maria, Sir Toby and Feste which makes him think Olivia is in love with him.
Here the team cleverly evades detection as Malvolio reads the letter. (In the NWCTC production, this was the famous "hiding behind the pillow" scene.)
This gentleman sat on his suitcase for the duration of the play. I couldn't decide if he was coming home from the airport/other travel and happened along the play and just sat to watch, or if that was an intentional seat.
Feste pretends to be the priest. I loved how the box that contained Malvolio was broken at just the right point so he could stick his head out.
1 comment:
What fun! This was one of our shows in the recent past. It is so much fun. I love that they include contemporary music. I think that is one of my favorite things about Shakespeare, just how malleable the plays can be. If you change the setting or modernize something, they still work. You cannot say that about all playwrights!
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