The Merchant of Venice

Hello everyone!

Ok, so last night we saw The Merchant of Venice at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre here in Stratford-Upon-Avon. I have to say that I was VERY impressed by it! Professor Collins saw it last week and said that we would probably think it was quite interesting. For one thing, they relocated from Venice to Las Vegas for the setting. It worked quite well because the characters in the play are all forced to be something that they are not-much like Las Vegas. There were quite a few changes that are worthy of note. Portia was transformed into a Southern Belle stuck in Las Vegas to do a reality TV show. This was her way of eventually selecting Basantio, who is not entirely into her. In fact, I quite thought that he was reluctant in choosing her as his wife. This is partly due to the fact that the director suggested that there was some type of sexual relationship going on between Antonio and Basantio. For one thing, if Basantio chooses Portia, he will have the money to help Antonio pay his debt to Shylock and if he doesn't, then he doesn't get married.

Patrick Stewart played Shylock in a magnificent performance. He was frightful when need be, yet gained sympathy as a Jew. The anti-Semitism in this play is astounding, but there were other stereotypes that were played up as well. The Prince of Morocco was portrayed as a black boxer and had bananas thrown at him. Additionally, the Prince of Aragon, was portrayed first as a janitor, which was quite offensive. However, none are persecuted more than Shylock who is eventually forced to convert to Christianity. In short, the play is much nastier than it is when it is read. However, that was what the director was hoping for. I quite thought it worked well.

This morning, we spoke with Scott Handy, who played Antonio. He gave us a lot of insights from the director , who really was going for a shock factor. He did tell us that he thinks that Basantio and Antonio do have some type of sexual feelings for one another. All that is up for interpretation, but he does think that Basantio's sexuality affects Portia's opinion of him as a husband. It was all quite interesting. This post is a bit all over the place, but I must run to class now! We are having a class on stage combat in about twenty minutes!!

AL