King Lear Production at Bondi!!!!! (1 Viewer)

[SimpaticO]

Hey all!!!

I'm going with my class to what we're told is a new production of King Lear being held at Bondi Pavillion this coming tuesday. I'm just wondering if anyone else has been to see this same productions and what their thoughts are on it. Is it any good? Are there parts or angles that you thought were done well and what parts, if any, would you criticise?

I'd appreciate any feedback on this particular production.

Thanks in advance for your help and comments!!!!

 

[untamedanimal]

I saw it on the wednesday just passed. It was not too bad, they did it in a sort of oriental style, lots of jumping around in fight scenes. They had live music which was very good. The major criticism would be the lack of props, and due to this, actors who doubled or tripled up on characters were sometimes hard to distinguish, particularly in the minor characters

 

[Teoh]

Isn't there like a 531531 message thread on this topic already???

 

[skypryn]

yeah im seeing it on tuesday as well!

 

[80percent]

yehh im goin tuesday too

 

[santaslayer]

I went to the Pavillion last year (MCK).
It was a more contempoary version of Lear. One good bit I particularly remember is how Edmond engages the audience as fellow conspirators of his evil plot against his father. That was done pretty good IMO.

 

[skotgb]

i saw the bondi production last wednesday,
it was better than all the reviews on here had said, but at times i drifted off into daydreaming cos some characters got boring,
the actress who plays cordelia, fool and oswald was excellent... the fool was comical and light-hearted, oswald was portreyed with a lisp, and at times the lisp was hillarious, aswell as this she really got into character with her body language.
also, the actor who played edmund was very good, he had scheming nature, shown through his asides, he would act genuine and sincere to edgar then be laughing at his foolishness as soon aas he was offstage.. his characterisation was a smartass.

edgar was also good.. he really lost the plot, he had ticks, foamed at the mouth and shouted crazy stuff.

i was totally confused when the monkey scene happened... two of them almost got-it-on... that was protreying the wildness of the 100 knights.

we sat on the right side of the stage, which was infront of the sound guy, he was quite interesting... although when they plucked out gloucester's eye's, the sound guy distracted me cos he was reaching up for an instrument that had this piercing sound..

one pitfall was that gloucester didnt have a beard, but there were two references to it in the text... "goneril with a beard.." and "i will pluck a hair from my beard"

one of the characters had two dogs and it was interesting to note that they were played by goneril and regan... they were crazy; barking and such, they scared the front row.

the heath scene was great.. (once again) the sound guy.. had a wobble board that he would bang for the lightning.. everyone jumped.. the sounds had winds which were choreographed well

we had a show within the show... two ppl from the back row jumped over their seats and were gone for about half an hour.... our teacher was quite interested in that

 

[Persephone87]

Originally posted by skotgb
i saw the bondi production last wednesday,
it was better than all the reviews on here had said, but at times i drifted off into daydreaming cos some characters got boring,
the actress who plays cordelia, fool and oswald was excellent... the fool was comical and light-hearted, oswald was portreyed with a lisp, and at times the lisp was hillarious, aswell as this she really got into character with her body language.

I thought she really carried the play! Yeth Thir!

 

[chardie2]

I went and saw King lear last night (tuesday) at bondi with my friend!

What did everyone who saw it last night think?

I thought it was fantastic and realy helped me to understand the play though I was about to fall asleep in the second half. hehe.

It seemed like alot of people went last night the place was filled with school students.

Charde.

 

[untamedanimal]

Originally posted by Persephone87
I thought she really carried the play! Yeth Thir!

She was the only one where i could distinguish between the characters she played

 

[bbutlerau]

it was bloody wierd when they acted as animals. the whole multi character thing was confusing too cause i hadnt read it yet

 

[untamedanimal]

I havnt read it yet

And on the topic about the ape scene picture this:

I get in and start watching it, same old beginning, starts to get boring, i start sleeping. Guess the scene i wake up to, a bunch of people running around like apes and screaming. I thought i might have slept too long and they started a different play

 

[Piddlepot]

The production would have been great if certain people would actually shut up in there.

I thought the woman playing Cordelia carried the show but it was sort of confusing - the switch between Kent & Edmund towards the end was it for me.

 

[janey18]

Hey, don't wanna be a loser and repeat myself, but anyways, this is what i posted in another forum thingy bout the tempest production in bondi:

"yeah, this production was pretty good

you can apply to a modern/comtemporary, feminist reading -theres a few others brought up during in-class discussions, but um, im not actually using it cos its not really relevant to my readings (aristotelian and existentialist)

and there's a Q&A session after the play, where the director chick basicaly said its primary aimed at high school students -so i mean, its gotta be pretty relevant (but im not using it)

everyone were drooling over Edmund -he's alright, but after being stuck in that room for a few hours, and hes got these tight leather pants on -fair enough, pretty damn hot!

also, i had a chat with the old dude that plays Lear at the end,
what a champ!

Ian Roberts -his pants were way too tight !! stick to footy
mate!"

 

[Persephone87]

Originally posted by bbutlerau
it was bloody wierd when they acted as animals. the whole multi character thing was confusing too cause i hadnt read it yet

Ithought that was really effective in demonstrating the degenerativeness of the new kingdom!

Originally posted by untamedanimal
I havnt read it yet


I get in and start watching it, same old beginning, starts to get boring, i start sleeping. Guess the scene i wake up to, a bunch of people running around like apes and screaming. I thought i might have slept too long and they started a different play

I too fell asleep a bit, towards the end...I felt that the energy of the play instead of climaxing kinda dropped off...

 

[Munchy]

lear at bondi

I saw the King lear production last night at Bondi. it was pretty good eh? It was kinda confusing with some people doubling/tripling characters, but I got who was who. The scene where they were acting like animals (apes?) was interesting... I had no idea what was going on then, but then I realised it must've been portraying the wildness of the soldiers. It was hilarious....

Remember the clapping at the beginning, whenever Lear said something, the rest of the ppl would clap simultaneously... is that to show the strict social order?? Becaues near the beginning, there was hardly any bodily contact, as the play progressed, there was more contact which symbolises the degradation of order? I dunno.... Anyone else have any ideas?

BTW, the fool was excellent, though Cordelia wasn't sweet, gentle etc enough. She didn't work for me.

It was also interesting to see that after they plucked out Gloucestor's eyes, when Cornwall asks Regan for her hand (cos he got wounded) she just left him... *lol*

Anyone else notice that when Gonerill was on stage speaking, she didn't blink?

 

[chardie2]

Can anyone remember specifics from the eye gauging scene in the bondi production??

I have to refer to it in an english assesment this week and I need some details cause I got scared in this part and blocked my eyes hehe.

Please help.

 

[bbutlerau]

they just threw him to the floor and cornwall made his index finger a hook and went to work. Nothing special

 

[Tenille]

i went too.

it was alright. my fav part: the dodgey french accents

and what was with the wanking and monkey screwing? hmmm. but our school was the only one that was laughing, and gasped at the end, and told Edmond to take both. the end.

 

[KarmaKitten]

i tried hard not to fall asleep
i thought the whole japanese influence was strange,

i did like oswald, who was played by cordelia, who also played the fool.