A bit more theatre.

The second day of Seattle Outdoor Theatre Festival now over, for me at least. Unfortunately the weather has taken a turn for the worst, rain and thunderstorms predicted, and yes, we have had both. Lovely timing, dear Seattle weather, this is the first it's rained in three weeks. I saw Twelfth Night this morning, and happily they decided to move the whole business off the stage and under some trees, to keep everybody a little bit dryer. The trees unfortunately blocked sightlines a little bit, but it wasn't too much of a problem and it was certainly fair pay for being out of the rain.

Twelfth Night is my best-known Shakespeare play. I have seen it four times, plus the film, and been part of one production of it. If you give me a couple of lines, I can probably tell you what the next one is. It's certainly not my favourite play (I'm betting that's Hamlet), but I know it pretty much back to front, and as such I definitely have a certain fondness for it.

I liked this production of Twelfth Night (put on by Young Shakespeare Workshop) better than the two professional productions I've seen, which is a bit funny. Nearly all the actors were fabulous (Feste, I'm sad to say, was a bit boring, and I thought Maria could have had more fun with it). I especially liked Viola and Sebastian, who were both played by girls and who, I'm told, switch off twins between shows. I also particularly liked Malvolio, and I'm biased about Olivia, who is a good friend of mine (and isn't it funny how this play always in some way mirrors life but gets it a little bit wrong--Olivia and Malvolio in real life are a couple). The costumes were all absolutely gorgeous (I've never yet, in four viewings, seen this play in Elizabethan costume), rather Victorian.

I didn't manage to see the other two plays I meant to see today, it was too cold to sit on the ground for large amounts of time, and I missed the beginning of King John and I hate seeing only bits of things. That's all right. I'll see Comedy of Errors and King John next weekend, and Taming of the Shrew the weekend after that.