Go see Hamlet at the Mark Taper Forum! It’s a unique and creative adaption with lots of surprises. Patrick Ball’s Hamlet is kind of a bisexual fuckboi. Memorable performances all around and lots of humor, surprisingly. Loved the stage and lighting design. I don’t want to spoil it anymore than that. 🤐
We had the easiest stage door experience. We walked over right after the show. Patrick came out in under 5 minutes, which kind of caught us by surprise. There were only few other people there so it was chill. Patrick was very nice and chatted with us for a bit. He said there were some people from the Pitt at the show tonight. We told him we said hi to Katherine LaNasa. He signed our programs and took a photo with us. We also said hello to Gina Torres (who was gorgeous and great in the show). Lovely evening at the theatre! 💀🗡️
Get you a bestie who'll buy a bootleg production of a random LA Hamlet performance for your birthday because you think the main actor is hot.
Love you @robinsontheroof and also again so sorry for this because we thought the play was Quite Bad. Not through any fault of the actors, they were all excellent especially Patrick Ball who's on stage basically non-stop for 3/4ths of the play. I have noted the name of the director and will be Avoiding him from now on.
The concept was so good and I just don't think it was delivered on.
Below my thoughts one week after watching. Spoilers of course. Also if it wasn't obvious, my thoughts will skew fairly negative, so if you liked it maybe don't read. I don't want to yuck anyone's yum, this is just my personal opinion.
The idea behind it was good. Like in the first half we're only seeing the scenes with Hamlet so we're fully getting his POV and then in the second half we're seeing the "truth". It just didn't really hit
First of all, so many character assassinations:
Osric? You can't tell who Osric is, he's never introduced. Also he's supposed to be young to show that everyone's dropping like flies and they only have like a random ass young page left, but was played by an old man. Whatever I guess, I could live with it if this was the only thing.
Fortinbras, the cast list said Detective Fortinbras. Wasn't even a detective, he was a lawyer covering up the bullshit, also wasn't introduced at any point. I did think it was funny that he was basically a Columbo spoof.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern escape fairly unscathed because they have absolutely nothing to do. Also the only reason @robinsontheroof could tell them apart is because they are her blorbos and she knows their lines by heart, to me they were utterly indistinguishable from each other. The TikTok dance bit in the second half was kinda funny, I'll give them that.
Polonius does coke now?? and is having an affair with the queen?? Huhhhh???
Horatio. Everyone's fucking Horatio apparently, dixit Ophelia. In what world? Horation x Hamlet, yes of course, there's precedent, there's subtext. Horatio x everyone??? You could've had the same effect if you said Hamlet's fucking everyone and it wouldn't be so textually dissonant, like where did this come from. Also Horatio had a line that was something like "Hamlet's the love of my life. Why should I be if he's not to be." And I audibly scoffed when I heard that, this pissed me off more than anything. It just felt so unearned. And I'm not even a Hamlet girlie, like I don't care overmuch about Horatio, but what in the everloving fuck was that line??
Ophelia escaped, life intact and then she.. came..back?? reason unclear? why would you do this girl, you got out?
Gertrude had like a faux girlboss moment where she was telling Claudius that she was the one in charge. And like okay, but then why did you marry him and install him at the head of the company? Like we're not middle ages Denmark, it was contemporary?. Someone at the head with the correct last name could've been you girl. This is just a straight up plot hole they didn't bother to examine, I think??
Also I've seen tumblr posts saying that hamlet (Patrick Ball) is sexing it up with Ophelia in the first few minutes and it's so hot. And people, you lied to me! That was the tamest shit i've seen in my life. She takes her panties off and he crawls on his knees and they're 5 metres apart, like?? Maybe I'm too European for this but they would've been buck ass naked here. I saw a production of Titus Andronicus where the performers were wearing tunics the Roman way aka no undies. And when they died they were just spread eagle dick and balls towards the audience. I was 17. My school sent me to that play!! So it could've been so much more imo. It was incredibly tame pretending to be edgy.
In the end, we concluded that the play was incredibly LA and we're too European to appreciate it. Sorry to people who loved this play, like damn i wish i enjoyed it too, like i was very excited to see it but it just didn't deliver for me.
Ok, rant over. I needed to get this out because this has been living rent free in my brain.
Back in June I went to the Mark Taper Forum’s Performance of “A Transparent Musical”(in downtown LA). I’ve been a huge fan of Steven Universe/Spinel and Sarah Stiles since Feb 2020, and I remember watching the SUF finale when it aired, listening to Sarah’s album the day it dropped, watching “The Crew” the day it released on Netflix, etc. Previously in May I had seen Sarah’s post on Instagram about her role in A Transparent Musical, and since I only live about less than 2 hours away from LA, once my junior year of high school wrapped up my mom and I decided to go see it.
Anyways, getting to the point, one of the actors (MAJOR shout-out to Murphy Taylor Smith; she’s the reason why all of this happened🫶🏻) was doing a pre-show performance/talking to audience members when she noticed my Spinel pin (from San Diego Comic-Con), and a pride pin I had also been wearing (a rainbow heart that said “Love is love on it; since the show was about LGBTQ+ themes). She complemented both of my pins and asked me if I was a fan of Sarah (which ofc I said yes). She then asked if I’d like to meet her backstage after the show concluded, to which I ofc agreed!
To say that the moment I got to meet Sarah Stiles was the best moment of my life is a MASSIVE understatement, oh my god. My dreams came true in front of my eyes in the matter of a few minutes.
NOT only that, but later the next day, Sarah posted both the drawing I had made a couple days prior (in case I was able to give it to either her or a theatre employee), and the picture she and I had taken the previous night, and posted it onto her story😭
She honestly was such an incredibly nice person; probably the nicest person I’ve ever met, and I wish I could truly articulate how truly impactful this moment was. Thank you Sarah and Murphy <33
