Hi Walter

The logic of both your questions is flawed a little. It's not the play, but the audience that becomes 'overdone'.

If the play attracts an audience (and our schools performances have booked out) then it is obviously not overdone. It would only be overdone for you if you thought you had seen too many productions. That's up to you to decide, individually. But you can't impose that judgement upon others.

If the people who come to see our production have not seen R&J performed, or have only seen it once or twice before, then it is most probably worth their while to see someone else's take on it.

I'm not sure how supportable your assertion is that 'at least half a dozen productions happen every year in Perth', but I'll take your word for it. Maybe they happen at private parties? Even so, that would indicate to me that enough people seem to think it's a story worth telling.

The other error you make is to assume that a play needs to contribute an interpretation that "hasn't been seen before' to be any good. Really?

I am pretty convinced that the vast majority of Shakespeares I've seen that try too hard to show me 'something I've never seen before' actually lose sight of the point and forget to show me what I WANT to see - a good play.

In fact, maybe that should convince you to come and see something YOU might not have seen before - a production that's not trying to do anything clever other than to tell a good story well. It sounds to me like you may have been 'overdone' (or done over?) by previous productions that were trying too hard.

And I'm not sure why anyone should be 'especially' concerned by it being 'his weakest tragedy' (if that is, indeed, the case?)
The strength of the tragedy doesn't necessarily correlate to the strength or appeal of the story.
Would you rather we performed a much more tragic piece less well??

I think you'd be hard pressed to convince anyone that R&J is not regarded as a pretty good story. Whether or not there are other stories that may be 'stronger' is outside the realms of this case in point and so logically a bit irrelevant.

Other things I think the production has going in its favour:

I've edited the text. It only contains the bits I think are interesting. The two acts both run an hour (quite shorter than some productions can be!)
I've edited the cast. It only contains 8 actors, and I think what they do to tell the full story is interesting.
I've edited the set. It only contains what I think is necessary to make the play interesting.
I've added a song, which I edited from the complete works of Shakespeare in a way that some ought to find interesting.
I've edited the music. (Composed it all from scratch, actually). That was interesting to me personally. I hope others like it.

You'd know I am a regular critical eye on this website. I've put my acting skills under the microscope of scrutiny here many a time...but for most of you I imagine it is the first time you will have seen any of my directing. Some of you, I am sure, will find that interesting, and I welcome any comments that you may care to give.

But who knows, maybe I am secretly about to deliver an overdone, stale, uninteresting, weakly directed piece of theatre, just so I can please Walter and show him something no one has seen from me before?

Cheers,
Craig

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Thanks Garreth, that really supports my point above.

This is art that is trying SO VERY HARD to be interesting that it kind of misses the point.

In fact, as the person taking the video realised, the most interesting thing about it was not the piece itself, but to watch the audience wondering how to react to it. Their response was less because they enjoyed it, and more because as a group they wanted to be impressed by the concept of what 'art' is, and didn't want to be exposed in the crowd for not understanding what the hell was going on or why they were watching it...!

This was 'fresh' in the sense that it was something I've never seen before. That doesn't mean I really liked it, or that I didn't find it rather tedious.

Form won over content, but neither was particularly engaging.

Cheers,
Craig

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