The Tempest reading at Baruch was interesting and enjoyable. The live reading was different than what I expected but it is also better than expected. I thought it would be the actors reading the play while walking around, but there was actually a lot of acting and humor. It was more like a comedy and different than the original play. The most enjoyable part of the live reading was the singing of the actress of Ariel. She has a very nice voice and sings very well. I really liked how the background music was played and sang by the character on stage because it made the listening experience very nice. Also, the actors used prompts to make up for the fact that the stage set was very simple and empty. Their use of prompt and acting helped me get a slight vision of how the setting of the play could have been. The least enjoyable part of the live reading was that seeing them read the script in front of me kind of pulled me out of the scene at some points. Seeing the characters portrayed on stage enhances my perception of them compared to me reading their lines on pages because watching them act on stage gives me a better picture of how it should be. When reading the script, I can’t really think about what that scene could look like because I am reading all the characters’ lines, and it confuses me. Watching the actors act as the characters gave me a better understanding of what was going on. I can see the emotions of the characters and know how they are feeling or what they are thinking. Looking at them also helps me empathize with some of the characters but if I were to read it on my own, I wouldn’t think that much.
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