New Thing #49 - The Merry Wives of Windsor

Tonight I went to my first Shakespeare Festival in the park. Forest Park hosts one Shakespeare play a year, starting in mid-May and running through mid-June. They perform the same play every night at 8pm and wrap up the series before it gets outrageously hot. It's also free, which was a big plus. I wouldn't say I'm a huge fan of Shakespeare, but I was looking forward to the experience. I was also looking forward to seeing a play that I hadn't read in high school. According the website, The Merry Wives of Windsor was supposed to be a comedy. That boded well for the night. At least it wasn't Hamlet or Macbeth. I probably would have wanted to jab my eye out with a stick before the end of it.

I went with my friend Betsy and her aunt Mary. Just a girl's night out at the park. When I first read about the play, I didn't think it would be that big, or really all that popular, so I figured we could get there shortly before it started and be okay. But, the more I researched it, the more I realized that this was kind of a big deal. And there would probably be hundreds of people there. So, we changed our plans a little bit and decided to get there a bit earlier than we originally intended.

Betsy and I had hit the gym for a quick workout beforehand and while showering away our sweat, Mary had been nice enough to pick us up a pizza. I know, kind of defeated the purpose of working out, right? Oh well. She had also picked up some Chex Mix and brought a bottle of wine. She was like a Boy Scout, always prepared! And, fortunately, she did remember glasses and an opener. Can you imagine what we would have looked like if we had to pass the bottle around? Awesome.

Once we were all packed up with our food and our blankets, we headed out. We also grabbed a few sweatshirts and jackets, since it had started to cool off a bit. Those jackets would end up coming in very handy later in the night. Once we got to Forest Park, parking was absolutely ridiculous. I think it finally set in that there would be a ton of people at this thing. I'm sure that the nice weather had something to do with it as well. Finally, we found a spot and grabbed all of our crap and set out to find the theater.

It's nestled in a small valley close to the Art Museum and the Zoo. The stage is at the bottom of the hill with chairs directly in front, and places for blankets and camping chairs along the sides. You can rent some of the chairs in the middle to sit, or you can bring your own blankets and find an empty spot somewhere. We attempted to do this when we got there, but it was of course already quite full. Many people had gotten there early to enjoy some of the other random acts walking around and performing. There was a juggler, a sword swallower, some singers, and I'm not sure what else.

The set.

We eventually found a small spot somewhat close to the stage where we plopped our blanket down. We ended up sitting directly behind the hearing impaired section. Every Thursday night is designated for the hearing impaired because they provide two people to sign the play. This didn't bother us. What did bother us was that they were also in the blanket only section but they were all in camping chairs. Apparently someone had given them permission to sit in them. So, for most of the night, we would be bobbing and weaving to see the stage. Why didn't we move? I have no idea. We probably would have had the same problem somewhere else, or we would have ended up really far away. We made the best of the situation though. After intermission, some of the people left, so it made it a bit easier to see the stage.

Once we were finally seated, we pulled out our pizza, our wine and had a nice time people watching. The grounds were filling up quite rapidly, and I couldn't believe the amount of people who showed up. I guess Shakespeare is more popular than I thought. Shortly before 8, two guys took the stage to do a bit of comedy themselves. One guy, dressed in a flowered muumuu with some crazy wig and who called himself Alice Cupcake, and some other guy who's name I can't remember, did a quick sketch of "Previously on Shakespeare in the Park". They recounted the last 8 seasons of performances. It's hard to describe what they did, but it was actually pretty funny. Guess you had to be there.

This is only one small shot of the huge crowd.

This would be the Alice Cupcake guy, who was also a sword swallower and also in the play itself. A man of many talents!

Then, it was time for the show to begin. And the ladies were wearing flapper dresses. Hmm....I don't think Shakespeare knew about flapper dresses in his day. According to the program, the director had taken a few creative liberties and set the play in 1920s St. Louis. Hey, it actually worked just fine. One of the reasons I never really "got" Shakespeare, was of course the way he wrote and his characters spoke. For crying out loud, just say what you mean, instead of saying "forsooth" a thousand times! So, in the beginning, I think the three of us were a bit lost as to what was going on. We had tried reading the description in the program, but got bored by it and gave up. There was some large man in uniform with a "missing" arm not very cleverly disguised by the wardrobe department, some old dude with a bright yellow cane, a skinny weakling of a man whose name incidentally was "Slender" and a few other less memorable characters. 

After the first scene I had absolutely no idea what was going on. I figured out there was some kind of party going on. The big guy with no arm was kind of egotistical and the guy with a cane wanted his nephew Slender to marry one of the other guest's daughter. Follow me? Slowly as the play progressed, we caught on to more and more. I didn't always understand what the heck they were saying, but I figured out the gist of the plotline and the direction the play was taking. Apparently Falstaff, the one-armed man, thought he could seduce two married women, the so-called "Merry Wives" and sent letters to each proclaiming his love. Well, both women were on to his schemes and decided to play a joke on him instead. What they didn't count on was their husbands finding out what they were up to. Of course, the men had no idea their wives were playing a joke on Falstaff, and one husband was incredibly jealous. He ended up dressing up as someone else, with a very unconvincing bald cap, and tried to pry info out of Falstaff. The entire play went on like this...the wives playing a joke on Falstaff and the husbands trying to figure out what was going on. And the number of sexual references was astounding. I feel bad for the parents who had to try to explain some things to their kids! In the end, the husbands figured out their wives' schemes and they all decided to play a joke on Falstaff. Apparently, this included making his dress up as a deer complete with antlers and everything. This Shakespeare guy was messed up.

Oh yeah, and there was this random subplot going on as well. One of the "Wives'" daughter, Mistress Ann, was being set up for marriage between Slender, who her father approved of, and some random French doctor her mother approved of. But, Ann had other ideas. She was in love with some poor guy who nobody approved of. Somewhere through the play the two of them broke out into random song. Seriously random. There was really no other singing throughout the play and here the two of them were just singing along. Weird. It was rather abrupt and I couldn't really figure out why it was in the play. At the end of the subplot, Ann was supposed to be spirited away by each of her two suitors, but she sent out decoys....boys dressed in dresses to allude her prey. She instead married her true love and all lived happily ever after. I'm not really sure the subplot was needed. I mean, the characters all interwove themselves between the main plot and the subplot, but the subplot was kind of unnecessary. At least in my mind. But, I'm no Shakespeare scholar, so what do I know.

It actually ended up being a rather long play. About two and a half hours including a short 5-10 minute intermission. I was pretty surprised. I didn't think it would be much over an hour. The time wouldn't have bothered me if it wasn't freezing cold outside. Yes, it's June, and yes it was in the low 50s, if not the upper 40s. About 20 minutes after the play started and the sun started dipping down, we pulled out our sweatshirts. It still wasn't too bad, but the later it got, the colder it got. We eventually were wrapped up in the extra blanket we brought, and I had the hood of my sweatshirt up. This is not something you expect after Memorial Day!

Despite not always knowing what was going on, the play was actually pretty funny. The actors were great and kept us entertained. We had a great time, and it's kind of a bummer that they only put on one play a year there. But, I guess for the sake of the set and the wardrobe, etc. it makes the most sense. Unfortunately, due to union contracts, I wasn't able to get any pictures of the actual performance. If you're in St. Louis before the 14th, you should check it out!

Thanks to Betsy and Mary for going with me and enjoying a nice night out in Forest Park!