Has anyone seen or read Tom Stoppard’s play/movie Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead...

[WCGreen]

It was the first "adult" play I saw without the urgings of an Adult.

My step brother, who played one of the Players in the 1971 production at Chagrin Valley Little Theater, talked me into coming for the run of the show.

The actors were so old, about 20-30, and they treated us like kings, explaining stuff and just getting a kick out of two 13 year olds hanging around.

Brad didn't have any speaking parts but he was ordered to "Alfred, stop picking your nose..."

After that, I fell in love with the drama of drama...

I only tried out for one play in High School and didn’t make the cut, but I did get to play Old Man Warner in the other allegorical play, The Lottery in the Drama class I chose as an elective my senior year in High School.

Looking back I wish I would have taken the time to learn how to act, to jump into the theater just for “The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd...”

It’s funny how we make choices, why we do the things we do.

I still act completely on impulse on occasion, see my highly regrettable and misguided thread from yesterday, even though I am at the half point of my sixth decade on earth.

I did embrace the political theater and perhaps that was my chance for the stage. I loved giving speeches, meeting people, interacting with voters.

It’s tough, real tough to reach out your hand to a stranger and try to convince someone to vote for you, to trust you with the public good. Going door to door is fraught with drama, especially if you are in an area with republicans who register democrat so they can vote in primary
I recommend that people from the OWS movement and from DU to run for office. It’s the most frustrating thing you will ever do, but when it is all said and done, you will have an experience that will last a lifetime.’

It’s the best way to change things, to be engaged. The people who are out there representing all of us on the front lines of this political upheaval deserve all the credit for reawakening the spirit of engagement that is so dangerous to the status quo.

I wish I was younger, healthier. I did participate in several anti-war demonstrations during that frightening jingoism stirred up by Cheney and his partners in mayhem. But even though millions took to the street, the media completely ignored the tens of millions who opposed that adventure.

Anyway, the absurd nature of R&G reminds me of the drama of politics. Especially now as the GOP continue an absurdist and mostly pointless exercise in politic theater.

I just thought I would share that with you all…

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Thank you for sharing this with us...

I know I appreciate your telling us these anecdotes from your life...

I suspect many here do.

Maybe politics is the closest most of us can get to theater, the closest we can get to being a part of something dramatic...

It's a chance to put ourselves out there, and to also make a difference.

[Edweird]

2. 'Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead' is awesome.

[geckosfeet]

3. Oh yes. Saw the movie several times. Have always tried to figure out all the

points where it intersects with Hamlet. They are such vague and shadowy characters in Hamlet, but in their play it is just the opposite.

[WCGreen]

4. It's split into 12 parts on You Tube....

I've seen Hamlet twice live and read it in College.

Well, when everyone but the players interact with R&G, that is where they intersect.

I love the word play. Some people compare it to Waiting for Godot.

[geckosfeet]

6. Well as I recall, we see a lot of their life (R&G) apart and aside from Hamlet

in R&G. I forget how, but they are recruited by Hamlet to carry a message to the king (of France?) which has been switched on the boat to France (by Hamlet?) which basically says kill the bearer of this message, as the message was intended to cause the murder of Hamlet. He read it and ditched it as soon as possible.

R&G popped into Hamlet and got involved in the plot out of nowhere, and were the unfortunate bearers of message that caused their deaths. I think that the R&G play/movie was intended to show that these are real people who simply unwittingly wandered into a plot that they had absolutely nothing to do with.

They are a pair of Shakespeare's oddest and existential characters.

[WCGreen]

7. They went to university together....

The king and queen sent for them because they were outside the scope of the Something that was Rotten in Denmark...

Pretty good memory for not seeing the play for a very long time.

[ChazII]

5. Saw the play in 1972 when I was in

the 8th grade. It was awesome. Hard to follow though since I saw it before knowing anything about Hamlet.

[Hissyspit]

8. I've been trying to see that movie ever since it came out!

It is languishing in my Netflix queue.

[Hissyspit]

9. 1st play I ever saw was "Anne Frank." 2nd was "Equus!"

[pinboy3niner]

10. I'd had a year of experimental Shakespeare studies in HS

So it was funny just to hear that there was a new play with that title.

When I finally had a chance to see it, 6 or 7 years after its first staging, it reminded me very much of 'Waiting for Godot'--and it has some terrific wordplay that echoes Shakespeare's own fondness for wordplay.

That your interest in theater was inspired by the line, "Alfred, stop picking your nose..." is a hoot! (I got turned on to reading by a kids' sci-fi book about a mushroom planet.)

I was lucky to have some great schoolteachers. We went to plays with our Shakespeare teacher (and we also studied 'West Side Story'), but my teacher for English and Journalism classes also did a lot of 'unofficial' field trips. I still remember the jaunts we did to the Shakespeare Festival in San Diego and to see a film based on Ray Bradbury's stories with Bradbury giving a talk and doing a Q&A.

I didn't consider 'R&G are Dead' as political when I saw it. And I have no desire to campaign for public office. In fact, I think I'd be less effective there than working in the background. :)