What to do, what to do!

I have figured out a way to adapt Murder at Vinnie's for the stage! I'm finalizing the stage version, and I'm very excited about it. I don't think we'll put it on ever, but I am planning to do things with it.

The ESU Contest is coming up and I've been trying to pick what monologue I'd like to do for it. I'm thinking of using Lady Percy's "Why aren't you in my pants?" speech or Lady Anne's "Why are you asking to be in my pants when you just killed all the important men in my life?" speech.

The Rudesby Dinner was this thursday, but like, no one went. Oh well. But we did manage to watch several episodes of The Monkees thanks to Massiel's undying love for them and somewhat discussed what project we should do next. Assuming we would stick to doing Shakespeare, here are some of the plays that were suggested at some point and what I think about producing them (by the way, Krystal and Aaron may join our cast, so we're keeping that in mind.)

Much Ado About Nothing

Pros: I think this is a really good choice because it's a likable play and it wouldn't be too hard to produce. Also, I'm very acquainted with it because I read it sophomore year for Decathlon. Without doubling up, we'd need about 23 people to pull this one off, and that's a pretty good number. There are about seven or eight characters that can probably be played by people not in those scenes, so I think we can manage this one. It's funny and it's not very long.
Cons: It's one of those plays where the sideplot is more interesting than the main plot (there are a lot of those, by the way) and that may or may not work for us. That could mean too much dependence on the Benedick-Beatrice relationship, meaning too much emphasis on Mark and myself, considering we're the only people who could pull off both ends of the BB chemistry. Also, we may not be able to full utilize all the talent we have and besides Marmer for Benetrice, which we're kind of forced into, there aren't many shoe-in parts.

As You Like It

Pros: From what I've heard, this would be a fun play, too. There are many 21-27 characters needed, so it isn't too bad. And it's not very long. Only a bit over 2610 lines.
Cons: I don't know anything about this play except one monologue by Phebe (thanks, Joelle.) =/ And pretty much every scene is "in the forest." I havent' read this, but just by looking at all the settings, it could possibly make movement monotonous considering our poor resources. It could make creating the set easy because it'll always be in the same place, but forests are potentially very annoying to make. It seems like a pastoral play, and I'm not sure if I dig that.

Hamlet (as a comedy, most likely.)

Pros: Well, it's a great play. And tragedies are easy to make fun of.
Cons: 4072 lines. The bulk of it considered to be some of Shakespeare's greatest work. It's too dominated by a singular character, and finding the right person for that role could be difficult. 34 characters. We're gonig to study this for AP English, and Miss Smith loves this play so she'll quite possibly go "mad in depth, yo," and we'll all be sick of it (we'll love it, but later, a few months later.) Also, thanks to Reduced Shakespeare, I'll be too tempted to do the whole thing backwards.

The Winter's Tale

Pros: It's got that great stage direction, "Exit, pursued by a bear." It has 19 characters (not counting the ones without a role written by them from the Open Source; otherwise, its 34.) It's 3470 which is a moderate length, and is doable with significant cuts.
Cons: I don't know anything about it. Making a bear could be complicated, even if its just a bunch of people dressed in brown. Look at what we had to do with the sea monster (a bunch of people in black with tape attached to their arms.) I mean, I originally planned to put a large sheet over them. Also, because I haven't read it, the cut from 3470 to something much shorter and the cut from 34 to 19 might not go as smoothly as we think.

Cymbeline

We shot this down after finding out it had 40 characters to start with.

Two Gentlemen of Verona

Pros: I had proposed this before. It has only 17 characters, I believe, which is a good number considering our cast. It's also one of his shortest plays if not the shortest (I don't remember.) It could prove quite easy to produce. Also, it's always nice to do a play you don't hear about a lot.
Cons: I don't know much about it. Also, we might not have enough characters with substance after cuts and such, and I don't want to do that to our lovely cast. Also, it names TWO gentlemen in its title, and of course, that means at least one girl character will probably be involved, but I just want to avoid any plays with major emphasis on any one to three characters. Twelfth Night had Viola, Orsino, and Olivia, but the subplot was pretty hefty and comfortably accomodated our cast.


I think that's it for Shakespeare stuff. I also suggested doing a bunch of short plays and just showing them right after another, which could make rehearsal easier and makes it more likely that everyone can feel like they're playing someone important. However, if we end up needing people to do multiple roles, that could seriously complicate things. Also, we might not be able to find enough content, although I do have Murder at Vinnie's the stage version now as well as Strawberry Fructose. And I am currently working on Moran, but that will most likely have to be seriously expanded.

I think the hardest thing will be accomodating our talent.