Even though the weather wasn’t great it was still a lot of fun going on this scavenger hunt. One thing that surprised me doing this assignment was that even though I’ve taken a few classes that have do with theatre, I tend to think of theatre as pretty much only happening in times square proper. At most like up or down a street or two from 42nd Street, but reading the clues and running around (more than just 2 streets up)  to try and find not only theaters but other kinds of places like shops, restaurants and statues really showed me that theatre history is bigger and deeper in New York than I thought before this class or this scavenger hunt.

My favorite find from the scavenger hunt was seeing Sardi’s Restaurant and Grill. Before this class I had never seen it in person even though I live in New York and am in the city often. It was my favorite because it felt really special to be there with all the caricatures  that kind of serve as an unofficial hall of fame. Also you always hear stories about how people catch sightings of celebrities in there just a table over, and even though we didn’t go inside just being outside just held a kind of magic. Plus on a more personal note, it’s mentioned in The Producers which is one of my favorite musicals and how many times will I get to actually go to a place that is referenced in a work that I enjoy. Unlike a statue which is in memory of something, a representation. it was like looking back at little piece of history and tradition. Though I tend to be shy and didn’t want to have to ask strangers for directions and didn’t really know my classmates very well, I liked the whole experience of working with a team to get the right answers quickly and taking pictures with theatre landmarks was fun too, rainy or not, it beat just talking about all these places in the classroom for sure. I did wish we had a little more time to submit just because running down the blocks through tourists and umbrella’s took more time than I thought it would have. I wouldn’t have minded doing more than one scavenger hunt this semester but I’m glad we got to do this one.

At the end of A Doll’s house when after 8 years of marriage Nora leaves her husband and says that they do not understand each other. But the man that was trying to blackmail her seems to get a more traditional happy ending. Do you think she made the right choice? And how does it make you feel that even though we watch Nora struggle emotionally and work hard throughout the play she ends up leaving to be alone but the guy who uses blackmail and threats gets to have a wife to take care of his children?

the circus today is much more accepted in society but still many people hold reservations about it and acrobatic troupes like Circ de Sole are held to be a higher form of entertainment than a regular circus, do you think the circus was better off changing its ways into being more family friendly or should it have just stayed unchanged and tried to hold out unchanged.

Like in today’s age we have lives and other kinds of shows that are geared towards kids so maybe a more adult circus could actually make it now.

The reading spoke about the move from theatre being about moral wrongs of individuals to showing the follies of just not being part of a certain nation or cultural group. The case study at the end mentioned that in Germany they couldn’t have known that this sense of pride would in turn be twisted into serving the Nazi’s. My question is do you think the world would have been better off if people had tried to use theatre at this time to show unity between people of all kinds opposed to showing you why your country was the best and everyone else was less? Do you think it would have worked or would it have just been ignored?

I have always been taught that the most effective acting comes from being able to put yourself in your characters shoes, try to make that characters reality as real to you as possible embody that and then show that. I found it very interesting that Diderot seemed to think the opposite.

I wonder though what kind of effect his philosophy of how to act would have had on the acting we see today? What if more people tried to act based off of trying to just create the “illusion” of that character rather than become the character?

I had a really enjoyable time at the museum. Knowing nothing really about Yiddish Theatre except that Fanny Brice was a real person that Barbra Streisand portrayed, Fiddler on the roof was a wonderful show and The Jazz Singer existed I didn’t think it would have as much there as it did. To me the most interesting things I saw were the puppets and the mini puppet heads. The work required to do each of those faces and construct the puppets had to be a lot and seeing the Hitler puppet really surprised me because I wouldn’t have thought that after everything he caused and did that he could be portrayed less seriously in the yiddish community. Or maybe it was easier to puppet him then have someone have to actually pretend fully to be such a terrible person.

I had a lot of fun on our visit/tour of the New York Public Library For the Performing Arts. The research tools he gave us were really helpful for me especially because I’ve never had to go through archives before and probably wouldn’t know where to start on my own. The room where you can watch old performances of shows was really cool and a useful fact to keep in mind not only for the project but in general, however I think my personal favorite thing that I saw in the building were the old set drawings that weren’t a full exhibit yet. It did make me think that i might want to find a way to talk about set design in my project but I don’t really know how I could make some form of argument including that, either way I was really interested in the different styles and scenery in each of them.

these were certainly some of the most colorful and fully expressive performances we’ve seen thus far.

The first video had very thick severe make-up, costume and chair and even though I really had no idea what was really going on and there was no movement in the dancers feet I got a general feeling of sadness or struggle from the performer who really had amazing control of their facial muscles. In the second video with the backstory and subtitles I had an easier time following along which made watching more enjoyable and it didn’t seem as long as it had been.

I do wonder how much of the regular target audience watching this is familiar with all the hand signs though, it was like more elaborate performative sign-language. It was really enchanting to watch though.

This story pegs the god Dionysus as the god of fun, wine, and madness while an underlying theme also seemed to be following tradition and just blindly performing rituals to respect the gods. Dionysus punishes Pentheus gravely for questioning and refusing to just blindly carry on in a manner that he thought was improper. Even the characters at the end mention that the punishment was really disproportionate to the crime, especially in my opinion since even though he was a god they were his relatives on his mothers side. He had his cousin murdered on a matter of pride, which even though a good portion of the dialogue stated over and over that he was a god that eased men’s suffering for those that believed he caused Cadmus so much pain and then banished him. I feel like this story is meant to inspire a great amount of fear about disrespecting even the gods that one might have considered minor, but in the case of Dionysus in particular if you’re supposed tone about having fun and loving and living i’m not sure how much of that can be genuine if you are essentially feeling a grave pressure to enjoy yourself and party.

All these different religions throughout time seemed to come eventually to the same thought of practicing certain dramatic rituals or representations of what they believe to be the past. My question is why did these religions come to the decision that during festival times or certain specific days they should be performing certain things?

I know the readings mention that it was to give the public a chance to be involved but I think if you are of a certain religion you have the ability to worship and be a part of your religion either at a place of worship or in your home so what other reasons could have been behind the decision?