Tweet

Globe to Globe blog: Week three - an offer Dan & Giles can't refuse...

Muse of Fire producers/directors/actors Dan Poole and Giles Terera continue their guest coverage of Globe to Globe, the staging of Shakespeare’s plays in a different language courtesy of 37 visiting international theatre companies as part of the World Shakespeare Festival until 9 June 2012.

Dan and Giles are at Shakespeare's Globe to see I Termini Company perform Julius Caesar in an Italian translation by playwright Vincenzo Mann.

DAN: We have been so lucky with the weather - we haven’t been rained on once (I never have at the Globe). We have come to see Caesar get Whacked. Shakespeare’s most paranoid play. They check our bags on the way in and I wonder if the play has already begun. I was hoping the dark day would save itself for Titus Andronicus (my favourite play of the man from Stratford) but in actual fact for a tale of conspiracy and murder like Caesar the weather couldn’t be more apt. The sky is expecting trouble. With its clear -cut lines of decit and battle Julius Caesar is one of the more straightforward to understand at school. And with so much unrest in the world today it seems pertinent to us right now. What happens when you rid your state of its leader? And who exactly makes that call?

GILES: The man sitting behind us pipes up to his mate: “Reckon it will be the whole play?” Mate: “Hope not”. Odd that. Come and see a play, then hope for the curtain sooner rather than later.

GILES: Suddenly the rest of the mob enter - Brutus, Cassius and Calpurnia - through three doors that will be used throughout and suddenly we feel like the badly under-dressed guests at the funeral of a king and they resent us for it. We are dressed for drizzle, they are dressed to death.

DAN: It’s dark, it's moody and it's full of intense symbolism. They combine really strong physical theatre with accurately delivered lines. The emotion punches you in the face and there isn’t a sound. You can hear the audience holding its breath and then breathing as one.

GILES: They look like they’ve all been kitted out by Dolce and Gabbana, and why the hell not? All wearing black, but it’s the nakedness and explosiveness of the Italian language grabs us. Cassius is enigmatic, Brutas, brooding and Calpurnia (who doesn’t normally get much of an outing) is constantly flitting in and out of her unbalanced mind and never receiving the attention she desires. Props are used sparingly, cleverly and symbolically and some of the physical work that is undertaken by Brutus leaves the audience in a state of shock.

DAN: There are dumb shows and at the point that Mark Anthony declares that Caesar has left all he possesses to his people, the heavens finally open. Down it comes and a chill of thanks goes out to “My Caesar”: what a guy, and what a company.

GILES: Everyone gets it in the back of course - that’s tragedy for you - but the means to that end are explored in that beautiful Italian manner which seems to say, “This play is Italian. WE are Italian. Fuck you.”

The chair...

GILES: Oh yeah whoever gets it in the back ends up in the chair.

DAN: A Dolce & Gabana, Victorian, rock and roll, costumed, cautionary tale that silences the entire capacity Globe. Bravo.

GILES: Imagine our surprise when only six actors come on to take a bow at the end. What a great selection for this festival, another BIG TICK.

DAN: Wonder if it will rain for Titus.

GILES: Prophet of doom!

DAN: Nah I just like it… it's visceral.

Any opinions expressed above do not represent the view of Whatsonstage.com nor any of its staff or contributors beyond the bylined author.

Related Content

Booking Tickets & Show Listings
	Globe to Globe 2012 Listing Page

Internal Links
	Opening: Making Noise, Globe to Globe, South Downs & WE Eurovision - 23rd Apr 2012 News
	Globe to Globe blog: Week two - Richard !!! - 2nd May 2012 Blog
	Dromgoole Launches International Globe to Globe Season - 26th Sep 2011 News
	Globe to Globe blog: Week one - Merry Wives of Kenya - 30th Apr 2012 Blog
	Year of the Producer Blog: Scouring the world for Shakespeare - 5th Apr 2012 Features
	Year of the Producer Blog: Scouring the world for Shakespeare - 5th Apr 2012 features
	Jo Caird: A Good Week for Elizabethan Dramatists - 28th Sep 2011 blog
External Links
	http://www.museoffirefilm.co.uk
	http://globetoglobe.shakespearesglobe.com/