In the evening of Thursday, 18 March 2010 a group of pupils from Gymnasium Grafing went to the Amerika Haus in Munich to watch William Shakespeare's Romeo an Juliet performed by the American Drama Group and TNT Britain.
Before they had worked on some of Shakespeare's sonetts and the drama Macbeth and now they got the chance to get a more practical insight into Shakespeare's work and time.
The scenery used by the group was quite plain, they only had a few items but they built all the coulisses with them. They used e.g. simple wooden cases to sit and stand on and to build important locations like the balcony and the tomb.
This is like it actually was in Shakespeare's time, too.
Everybody knew what was shown immediately, but had to imagine the complete setting and design by himself.
Furthermore the group really tried to abduct the modern audience into the time of Elizabethan staging by using stylistic devices which were also typical for this time, like singing for several voices and a little choreography.
The actors all did their jobs really well. Romeo was the dreamy but honest lover, whereas Mercutio and Benvolio where the funny and not so honest counterparts. On the one hand the nurse's lively and communicative mind became really clear but on the other hand she also stayed unpredictable.
But the most unbelievable thing is that all actors played not just one character and excelled in changing roles rapidly - at the end everybody was surprised to see only 5 actors on stage.
Although the production was really geared to the original composure, there was one important difference at the end. Romeo did not kill Julia's official future husband Paris, who she actually doesn't want to marry. This stresses the scene in which Romeo is kneeling in front of his seemingly dead love, because he doesnt give a false impression of himself by commiting a second murder.
All in all the visit of the play gave a good idea of what Shakespeare's dramas are really like and it was a succesfull ending to the work on this famous part of literature.
Markus Eck O11