Word: playing
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Chinese city of Soochow a book entitled Stories Old and New. They were collected by a literary vacuum cleaner named Feng Meng-lung, who dashed off dozens of books himself, but showed more talent in tidying up the writing of others. On one occasion, he read the play of a friend but refused to express an opinion. When the worried playwright returned later that night, Feng put him at ease: "Your play is excellent, but it is one act short. This act I have now added...
...best quarterback in the Ivy League. The 160-pound speedster led the varsity to an expected 38-12 victory in an unofficial scrimmage with Williams College Saturday, first outside encounter for the Crimson. From the six-minute mark of the first period, the varsity dominated play and completely outclassed the Williams eleven...
...choosing the first show, the C.D.F. naturally wanted a festive work of acknowledged merit. It settled on Twelfth Night and engaged the imaginative Herbert Berghof as director. Berghof, in keeping with the festive occasion, decided to turn the play into a "music and dance extravaganza." He employed as much music as possible, composed or arranged in neo-Elizabethan style by Andre Singer. He interpreted Malvolio's phrase, "the fool's zanies," as "the Fool's zanies," and created two new characters--a singing zany and a dancing zany--to accompany Feste the Fool. He also did some textual pruning...
Even those who decried Berghof's liberties had to admit that the resulting show was exuberantly entertaining and contained several brilliantly staged elaborations. Siobhan McKenna's Viola was a gem. As the play's one honest, sincere, and normal person, who must spend most of the time abnormally disguised as a young boy, Miss McKenna conveyed a zestful boyishness without ever losing her innate womanliness; and she paid more attention than anyone else to the poetic qualities of the text...
...final offering of the C.D.F. was Much Ado About Nothing, with Sir John Gielgud as both Benedick and director. Gielgud gave us a clean, crisp, meticulous production, beautifully and symmetrically staged in keeping with the symmetrical, Renaissance style of the play. Having played Benedick off and on for 28 years, he gave a performance that was marvelously nuanced. Still, as he himself has admitted, he is not an ideal Benedick. The part demands more brio than he has inside him to give. He plays the clarinet when he should be blowing a trumpet. Yet he was careful to choose...