August 12, 2011, by Peter Kirwan
Something to get excited about
Cheek by Jowl are doing ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore. This is a very good thing.
http://www.thestage.co.uk/news/newsstory.php/33195/cheek-by-jowl-to-stage-tis-pity-shes-a
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A couple more for you, from a fellow traveller round the unpoked corners of renaissance drama.
James Shirley – The Lady Of Pleasure @ Kennington White Bear. On now.
Massinger – A New Way To Pay Old Debts @ Bankside Rose. Sept.
Just noticed you collected the full set of Shakespeare in the dell last week. Snap. So rarely done is TNK that I imagine we weren’t alone. (As you probably know …) the RSC performed about 20 mins of Ed 3 in Westminister Abbey a year or two back, as a bonus extra on an adumbrated Histories redux. If Shsp only wrote 20 mins of Ed 3, then perhaps that counts. The other extra-First Folio plays, since canonised (by Arden at least) Thomas More, Cardenio and Pericles I’ve snapped up at the RSC and in London in recent years. But a full scale Ed 3 would be very welcome, perhaps in double bill with Ed 2, ending as it does with the coronation of Ed 3.
Great blog.
Thanks CMC, and congratulations to you too! I’d seen SOME version of the main 38 by the end of the Complete Works Festival, but had been waiting several years to catch full, off-script productions of everything. And an Edward II/Edward III double-bill would be quite a thing. I’m definitely going to try and see the Massinger, but afraid I’ll miss the Shirley – will be delighted to hear if it’s any good!
The Shirley was good, I saw it last night, very effectively set in the Swinging Sixties, though I confess my interest wanes as we slope towards Restoration Comedy and Shirley’s clearly paving the way (though I’m not an academic, or actor, just an enthusiastic punter.) Old Debts I’m looking forward to. Wikipedia says it’s a partial reworking of Middleton’s Trick To Catch The Old One which I remember as the best of the five or so Middletons in the Globe’s Read Not Dead season a few years back.
While I was glad to see TNK, I deliberately hadn’t read it so I was also a little sad that I can never be surprised by the twists and turns in a Shakespeare play again.!
or at least until someone finds Loves Labours Won.
The Rose website has been updated with a listing for the Massinger:
http://www.rosetheatre.org.uk/whatson/index.php
Update: the Rose Bankside website has now been completely revamped and is now also listing a production of Measure For Measure from 4 November – 4 December:
http://www.rosetheatre.org.uk/