For Tim's birthday I bought him and Ali a ticket for MoV and a pair for us - and they were literally two pairs as when I looked for 4 together I got rubbish seats and when I looked for two pairs I got four seats next to each other but the pairs were different prices because they were on the end of the row so slightly different views!! They turned out to be good seats too which I was not expecting!
I love this play, it intrigues me. Is Shakespeare merely reflecting the prejudices of his time or asking us to question them? Of course, some of our answer is based on the performance and hence interpretation we see but I am not sure I can ever answer the question definitively and I'm not sure I want to. I think I prefer it open to question so I am not disappointed! Either way, I don't think it really matters as it is what message we take away from it that is the most powerful and, arguably, the most important.
I do have to admit, though, that I think Antonio is a slime bag and even his friendship with Bassiano doesn't redeem that for me. Interestingly, this performance showed him very frightened by Shylock in the courtroom which I have never seen before and it worked for me. Shylock was the belligerent character at this point which, again, is unusual I think but they carried it off.
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