Mid Summer Night with the Bard, um, er, well Elvis

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Geo: 52.1919, -1.70713

We arrived in Stratford Upon Avon, tired and a little travel worn, but ready to hit the ground running. We both fell asleep on the ride and when the man asked us for our tickets, I'm sure he had to ask rather loudly and I jumped as I replied, "oh, my goodness, I'm sorry!" he had to go collect others until we could dig around for ours.

Upon arriving we walked about 1/4 mile to our B&B, the Ambleside. An adorable place where we were greeted by Peter, the owner. We were given a breakfast menu to fill out and shown to our room. Cozy and quaint (see! There's that word again) Peter also showed us how to work the toilet (2 buttons, one for a short flush, the other for a long flush) and the shower.

As we had tickets for the theatre, Peter suggested we freshen up and get dinner so we wouldn't be late. It's a good thing we followed his advice to the letter because we literally walked into the theatre as they called 3 minutes to curtain! But I'm getting ahead a bit....dinner was at a restaurant in a centuries old building, about 12 tables, and lucky for us they had a "pre-theatre" menu. You could choose between an appetizer and èntree OR èntree and dessert. Yes, I know, no one needs to guess what we chose! Dinner was delicious complete with a nice Shiraz for me and, ready for this....? A fermented lemonade fizzy drink for Mom! There's hope for her and my Cotswold pub crawl yet!

Needless, to say, they took forever to get us our desserts and, as I mentioned, got to the theatre with enough time to hit the ladies room and get to our seats! Here's where the night takes an odd turn....I was so ready for The Merchant of Venice in period dress since it was being performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company. Mom knew she was in for a long evening but I'm forever grateful that she went out of love for me! As we walked to our seats, there was some sort of floor show with Vegas style gambling tables, an Elvis impersonator was singing Viva Las Vegas and there were show girls and glitz! It was at that moment, I realized, "oh, shit, this is someones modern day flippin' interpretation of my favorite playwrite! The entire play was performed as a Vegas, gangster, girls with bad southern accent/Valley girl talk reality show! (SIGH) Well, at least I saw the Royal Shakespeare Company perform, right?

This morning Peter asked me if we enjoyed it....honestly, not really. But an evening with my mother at the theatre, any theatre is a great evening that I'm sure we'll laugh about it someday (after I have her watch the BBC version)

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Photos

Details of a "choir seat"
Each seat was carved with different figures.

Comments

[Jenni]

Laughing hysterically! Oh the Theater! Can be surprising at times! So glad you are having fun! Thanks for sharing! PS: any Royal sitings yet...Wills and Katherine Are having fun here in California!

[KoAnn Rutter]

You would probably have to go to Vegas to see the British version of The Merchant of Venice. Keep the laughter coming...it doesn't make us "Staycationers" feel so envious.