Once Upon a Bookshelf

Last night, I totally went to see Rent with Rachel in Toronto.

Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp were reprising their roles as Roger and Mark.

And have I mentioned how much I (a) love RENT and (b) adore both Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal? Because I really really really do. And yet I’ve never seen it live before. (I’ve seen the film of the last Broadway performance but that totally doesn’t count.) And as much as I love RENT, it totally wouldn’t be the same seeing it without Anthony Rapp or Adam Pascal in it, because it was their voices that I feel in love with in the roles of Mark and Roger. (Tangent: Rent is also kind of what made Rachel and I friends in university!)

So yay, when Rachel and I were at Word on the Street last year, and realized that they were going to be in the Broadway tour that would be going to Toronto, well! It was quite possibly one of the most exciting moments of my life.

And I’m still both totally fangirling over and totally speechless about last night’s show, so this is going to be not much more than gushing. Because that’s what I like to do best. And these are going to be my random thoughts about it:

• First of all: OMG RENT!
• Anthony Rapp was brilliant! Adam Pascal was brilliant! (I don’t care what Kat says, he was brilliant!)
• The whole freaking cast was phenomenal – not one weak performer in the group.
• The audience was insane – a lot of teens who were actually cheering out loud. On one hand, yay teens are enjoying theatre! On the other hand, it’s so strange to hear for cheering in the middle of a show.
• I liked the girl-who-was-playing-Mimi’s voice so much more than the one on the original cast recording
• I didn’t cry once! I expected to cry! I think I was just way too in awe of everything!
• Last night totally reminded me of all these songs on the soundtrack that I love love love!
• Also has reminded me of why I didn’t like certain things about the movie – the removal of some of the smaller songs, changing of some of the singing into talking, etc.
• AndOMGItotallysawAnthonyRappandAdamPascalinRENT! Insert little fangirlish squeal!

I feel like my life is now complete!

Friday night, my mother and I went to see what will most likely be the last play I see at this season’s Stratford Festival – The Importance of Being Earnest. This was the last play that Oscar Wilde wrote, and it apparently premiered only weeks before he was tried and found guilty of, well, being gay. (Hrmph. So glad we don’t live in a society like that any more.)

Anyway!

I had never read or seen this play before, and had never seen any movie adaptations of it, so I knew very little about the story going into it. Basically this is a comedy in Victorian England about two men who are in love with two women, and both the women believe the men that they are in love with is someone else – a man named Earnest. And hijinks ensue. And there is a lot of eating of muffins and cucumber sandwiches. And arguing. And other wonderfully funny stuff.

The extremely talented Brian Bedford directed this play, and had the role of Lady Bracknell (the mother of one of the women in love with one of the Earnest’s). I try to see at least one of Bedford’s plays every season – he is by far one of my favourite stage actors, and I love love LOVE the stuff he does at the Festival. Unfortunately, he wasn’t at the Festival last year (sob!) so I was super excited to have the chance to see him in this play this season. This particular play showcases his brilliance with comedy as well as his ability to take on any role and completely make it his own. And let’s face it, this was his play. The other actors were fabulous, but when Bedford was on stage, all of my attention was focused solely on him.

This was definitely one of the highlights of the summer for me, and oh, I so want to read the play now!

This past weekend, I got to see West Side Story at the Stratford Festival. Loved loved loved it. I’m always a sucker for musicals, and West Side Story is one of my favourites. Plus, Stratford always puts on a good show.

I’m sure everyone knows the story – a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Takes place in New York in the 1950’s, and there are these two gangs: the Sharks (the Puerto Ricans) and the Jets (those who considered themselves “true Americans”). They’re fighting over a bit of land, when Tony (one of the Jets) and Maria (the brother of the head of the Sharks) fall in love. Blah blah blah, star-crossed lovers, death, murder, tears and lots of singing. OH YES.

The thing I don’t really get is that I HATE R&J, and yet love West Side Story. Hate that R&J is considered romantic when they both end up killing themselves. Maybe it’s because they don’t actually kill themselves in West Side Story – someone else kills Tony, and Maria lives at the end. I don’t think it’s romantic, it’s completely tragic, but I positively love it. Maybe it’s because everyone isn’t always raving about how romantic it is, so I’m not so up-in-arms about it. And then again, maybe it’s because there are song and dance numbers in it, and I really can’t not enjoy a good song and dance number.

So, the last time I saw West Side Story live was also at the Stratford Festival, but I sadly don’t remember much about it, so I don’t have too much to compare it to. Needless to say, though, this production was FABULOUS. Not the all-time-best performance of any play that I’ve ever seen at the Festival, but I can definitely see why it is this season’s hit. The actors were all amazing – especially those playing Maria and Tony (Chilina Kennedy and Paul Nolan). They completely blew me away!

And the dance numbers were of course gorgeous:

There was one scene that I did NOT enjoy one bit… During the song “Somewhere,” they had this little kid singing the song, Bernardo and Riff were on stage for part of the song along with all of the rest of the cast, and it was just a bit too sentimental for my liking. Urgh.

But, other than that, everything else was fantastic! Loved it, and definitely highly recommend going to see this production of the show.