Britain's Got Talent

ok, imagine American Idol.  I know, I know, you've never watched it, right?  sure, whateve, but just try...  now, get rid of most of the singing, decrease the size of your talent pool by a factor of... I don't know, 100, and then keep Simon Cowell.  Oh yes, keep Simon.

what you get is a British TV sensation called "Britain's Got Talent," which is honest-to-god a talent show competition to see who gets to perform in front of royalty.  there is a large cash prize, so this isn't just about traditional loyalist underpinnings of the British society, and yet it's not absent either.

Here's the best part:  after 2 weeks of auditions, we're now into 1 full week of live broadcasts each night, with the winner decided by mobile call-in votes.  Want to see a half-decent Michael Jackson tribute?  How about drag queen singing?  Don't forget a dash of novelty children acts.  check.  If anything, Britain's Got Talent just helps to show how little novelty talent resides in the amateur english league.

But it does serve as a good intro.

Over the last few days I've continued journeying around London, with stops at the Tate Modern, Windsor Castle, and Shakespeare's (reconstructed) Globe Theatre.  the Tate was by far the most honest, showing a great selection of modern (and perhaps even too modern) art and performance pieces.  Honestly, I like the adventure of modern art, but 100 "musicians" standing in line and alternatively playing kazoos, eating their score sheets, and wearing the faux-tux t-shirts... well, it was mildly entertaining, but not especially enlightening - for me.

The Windsor is awesome in the true sense of the word.  It's large, imposing, opulent, and seriously ornate.  It inspires awe that it was ever built, that it wasn't razed during the civil war, and that it remains not only a regular weekend home for the royal family, but a cherished emblem of British patriotism.  What's tough is that they treat the site as both a historical location as well as living space and pep rally simultaneously.  Some rooms have been restored to their closest approximation from the 17th century (ignoring the rich history from before and after), while also (discreetly) accomodating modern comforts.  it's a compromise, and that's fair, but when each room alternates in order to represent only the periods in time in which the Crown was popular, it's easy to leave impressed, but hard to leave sans skepticism.

And that's just it.  Everyone's history has terrible bits that we're not proud of, from Japanese internment camps and the KKK to more modern problems with corruption and graft.  We don't like talking about these things, and I must admit that the British do a better job than most of mentioning, however brief, their negatives.  But the passion with which they pursue the positives, as if the good years equalize the bad, is a bit disturbing in its frenzied, almost manic, expression in every element.

So yes, after 5 days in London, I've surmised that the British love their royalty.  Shocking.

Hard to follow that revelation with anything equally ground-shaking, but let me add briefly that I did find Shakespeare's Globe to be even more entertaining that I thought I would.  It's just a building, and one that isn't even in the original location, but putting it all in context was great.  The structure (pictured above from a Gentleman's box stage left) was built in 1997 using Elizabethan technology, and the craftsmanship shows. 

I'm holding off on watching a show there until Shelley comes to London in August, but I'm getting very excited about that eventual plan.  the tour guides (who were very relaxed and knowledgeable) said something that I know I've heard many times before, but sunk in for the first time.  "In Shakespeare's day, people didn't talk about going to see a show, they talked about going to hear one."

When most companies, especially American theatre companies, put on Shakespeare, one of the first questions they tackle is setting.  Where, when, and what theme will be used.  If Romeo and Juliet, then pick a historical or fictional setting in which two families feuded, then just make the play fit through elaborate sets, props, and costumes.  Whether it's the Hatfields and McCoys spouting iambic pentameter over a Kentucky hilltop, or the epic Shakespeare in Space, these American portrayals all have their ups and downs, but ultimately they miss the whole point.  Modern reinterpertations of Shakespeare (or any theatre) do have merit, don't mark me wrong, but when most companies stage Shakespeare they focus on everything but the language, and then do whatever spectacle they can to distract the audience from this one crucial shortcoming.

but not English companies (that I've seen).  On several occasions (to be fair - usually touring), I've seen phenomenal Shakespeare performed with no pretense by a group of players on a bare stage, and I must say it's always been more rewarding.  How odd, given our national obsession with creativity and individualism, that when it comes to Shakespeare (a reference we as Americans embrace as a shared cultural treasure of english-speakers)  we cannot seem to trust our audience to imagine anything - except why Captain Oberon from the 24th century is using Cockney slang.  Yeah, that doesn't bother our suspension of disbelief one bit, so long as he's wearing some kind of metalic cape and has a green-skinned nymph nearby.

Well, enough rants.  I'm on vacation, and promise from here out to more about the continent more rapidly and spend time on this blog more judicisouly reporting what I'm doing, not just what I'm blathering about.

Thanks to the brave few who made it this far.

Weber (on the lamb)