A Midsummer Afternoon's Feverish Catnap

I just saw A Midsummer Night's Dream, and wow that was just #@*&'ing crazy. It took me a while to get into the spirit of it, but once I did that was absolutely hilarious. There's glam rock faeries swooping in and doing musical numbers in a variety of styles, the Mechanicals are actually funny, there's hot young people in their underwear and glam rock faeries swooping around in next to nothing, but what really drew me in was when I realized they were going to be able to add in their own flourishes and still actually respect Shakespeare's text and tell the story without the irreverant eyeroll that says "we're too zany sexy cool for this dried out Elizabethan prose... jazz hands on three!" that accompanies an adaptation as unrestrained as this one. And there are crazy painted glam rock faeries with feathers everywhere and glittery codpieces dropping down from the ceiling, it's crazy.

I don't often get to laugh as hard as I did at the Mechanicals' play at the end, and to just enjoy the whole energy coursing off of that bunch. And this is one thing I love about the new Guthrie, that you can have three completely different styles of art going at the same time and everyone just spills back out into the bars at intermission. Lou Bellamy and Penumbra are digging deep into American history and the human soul in Gem of the Ocean on one side, Joe Dowling and the Guthrie are blowing up a confetti factory on the other, and above it all there are French dancers stomping out their cigarettes in 3/4 time upstairs in the Studio. I love this place, I really do.

And now I'm off to the Twins-Red Sox game at the HumptyDome to take in a completely different style of performing art at what I'm now starting to think of as the fourth theater. And Midsummer put me in such a good mood that not even that stupid umpire from the Black Sox series finale who waited so long to call a strike on a 3-1 count that the batter headed to first and both runners moved up as everyone in the building thought it was a ball. Okay, let's be honest... that guy could still ruin my good mood. But if he's the home plate ump tonight I'm totally getting Oberon to come swooping out of the stands to verily smite his ass. Forsooth.