Last weekend, my parents and I drove into the city to see Shakespeare's Othello performed on the Boston Common. It was a lovely summer, Sunday evening - perfect weather for an outdoor play. Before the show began, we plopped our lawn chairs on an open patch of grass where we could see the stage and dined (actually, "supped" sounds more Shakespearean), on ham sandwiches and cantaloupe.
The show was entertaining, though I wasn't quite in the mood for such a gruesome production (unlike his comedies, I find Shakespeare's tragedies sometimes easier to read than to see) The Boston common is a nonetheless a prime people-watching venue, and I found the sights and situations going on around me to be just as amusing, if not more amusing than the plot that was unfolding on stage!
Members of the play's audience varied greatly in race, gender and age. In front of me sat a group of asian adolescents, sprawled out on a blanket, playing cards. Near them were two European couples, apparently on a double date. On my left was a party of twenty-something twenty somethings, all of whom were females. They sat circled around a chocolate cake, nibbling and chatting cheerfully as they passed around endless tupper-ware containers of snacks to accompany their desert. A dark-skinned woman and a light-skinned man sat together on my right. How interesting, I thought, that they were witnessing another racially - mixed relationship on the stage.
It seems to me that live theatre truly is a "slice of life" experience; both the actors on the stage and the members of the audience can be involved in presenting a picture of everyday reality.
http://www.commshakes.org/shows/current_show/Othello/shows_current.html
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