FRESH SHEET: Korean-Style

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May 7, 2020

Is Kim Junsu’s Dracula the sexiest vampire ever?

1. KOREAN-STYLE

How about this for a jaw-dropper: despite controversy, a handful of theatres in South Korea have stayed open throughout the pandemic and have been selling at over 90% capacity.

In The Stage, producer Richard Jordan reports that South Korean theatres “were given the choice, rather than demanded, to close. A 15-day quarantine restriction has been applied to any theatre that remained open if a member of the audience or company develops Covid-19 symptoms.”

Although many theatres shut down, two hit Korean musicals, Rebecca and Dracula, kept running and are reporting impressive attendance figures. (This Forbes article focuses on the debate about those decisions.)

Largely, the success of these two musicals seems to be about star power. Both Rebecca and Dracula feature K-pop icons. Koreaboo.com asks if Kim Junsu, who leads the company of Dracula, is the hottest vampire ever.

But it must also be about the audience’s sense of safety.

When a couple of Canadian and American cast members from the international production of The Phantom of the Opera returned to Korea after trips home, they fell ill and the production was forced into a period of quarantine that started March 31.

According to The Stage, “The entire 126-member cast and company were then all immediately tested, and, impressively, so were the 8,578 audience members who had attended the production between March 15 and 31.

“To date, everyone has tested negative. After 15 days in quarantine, the company was then retested and confirmation given that on April 23 performances could resume.”

The current wisdom is that North American and European audiences will be reluctant to return to the theatre once restrictions are lifted. Many citizens are pinning their hopes on the quick development of a vaccine, which is probably optimistic, especially since the virus may be significantly mutating, which would make it harder to target.

Should we start focusing on massively improved testing and contact tracing? As we await a vaccine, we’ll probably have time. And we need to find a way to honestly reassure our audiences — and ourselves.

As Jordan argues in The Stage, “These three shows demonstrate that if people want to see something, they will go despite the associated risks – so long as they feel safe. That should afford producers and theatre owners elsewhere some hope.”

+ The Globe and Mail reports that this Monday, rather than announcing a new season for Toronto’s Tarragon Theatre, artistic director Richard Rose e-mailed patrons a questionnaire, which included the queries, “Would you come to the theatre without the assurance of a vaccine?” and “Would you come to the theatre if we practice social distancing with good sanitation?”
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Having been insulted early in her career, Judi Dench is famously insecure about her looks, but her daughter reports that she returned from this Vogue photoshoot “thinking she was Beyoncé.” (Photo by Nick Knight)

2. STRIKE A POSE

At 85, Judi Dench is the oldest person to have appeared on the cover of Vogue. She’s is currently gracing the June issue of British Vogue wearing Dolce & Gabbana.

The accompanying interview by Giles Hattersley is casual and complex.

Dench’s eyesight has deteriorated to the extent that she can no longer work on-stage or drive.

Hattersley asks her to name one thing she likes about being 85. “’Nothing,’ she barks, deadly serious. Nothing? ‘I don’t like it at all. I don’t think about it. I don’t want to think about it. They say age is an attitude…’ she trails off, then snaps, ‘it’s horrible.’”

But she won’t brook talk of retirement: ““No, no, no, no. Don’t use that word, Giles. Not in this house. Not here. Wash your mouth out!”

Dench is still working steadily in film: we’ll see her as Madame Arcati in Blithe Spirit, when it’s released later this year, as well as in the $125 million Disney spectacular Artemis Fowl. And she's lining up future projects.

The interview comes ripe with theatre stories: “There is an accepted myth that Dench has never had a bad review, though it is worth noting that the London critics, who were even more hierarchical than the theatre crew, did not instantly warm to her. Even that heaven-sent voice didn’t always land with audiences. In the mid-1960s at Nottingham Playhouse she made front of house put up a sign that read, ‘Judi Dench is not ill, she just talks like this.’”

And there’s at least one quote that’s going to go down in history: “Inevitably, conversation drifts to Cats, the widely panned film adaptation of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that, for its sheer madness, has gained cult status as a wonderfully distracting comedy-watch in the current crisis. Dench visibly prickles at its mention. ‘The cloak I was made to wear!’ she cries. ‘Like five foxes f**king on my back.’”

For its sheer beauty, I love most this short section from near the beginning of the conversation. “As she is a legendary champagne enthusiast,” Hattersley writes, “I brought her a bottle of Dom Pérignon Blanc Vintage 2008, the presentation of which provokes a first, delicious crack of the trademark voice: ‘Absolute heaven!’ she beams. Her skills as an actor are so intense that for a second you believe no one has ever given her a gift before.”
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Jamal Gerald’s Idol was part of the Gateshead International Festival of Theatre

3. IT’S A GIFT

Okay, let’s all take a close look at — and learn a lot from — the Gateshead International Festival of Theatre (GIFT), which just wrapped its three-day run in northeast England.

Rather than cancelling the experimental whoop-up when COVID-19 hit, festival director Kate Craddock invited participating artists to adapt their works so that they could be performed online. Every artist accepted the challenge.

Theatre is particularly good at physicality and intimacy, dimensions that are often lost in digital adaptations — but were captured by at least some performances in GIFT.

A preview article in The Stage explained: “Icelandic artist Gudrun Soley Sigurdardottir will be broadcasting Elision live from her living room with every member of the audience watching from their own homes with a melting ice cube in their hands.

“Live artist Tania El Khoury and musician and street artist Basel Zaraa have reinvented their moving piece about a refugee in detention, As Far as Isolation Goes, for one online audience member at a time with detailed email instructions sent in advance.”

Yes! Pass me an ice cube. Whisper in my ear.

And then there’s the experience of assembly, which is often absent in digital adaptations. In The Stage, Craddock said, “I am well aware of the saturation of online offerings … Uppermost in my mind was how the festival could still be a genuinely shared experience.”

GIFT made most of its events ticketed and time-limited to keep the shared temporal buzz happening and to protect the artists’ ability to present their works live in the future. And there was a cocktail lounge where you could hang out and chat — presumably having made your own martini.

And that's not all! In the context of the climate emergency and a necessary change in attitudes to international touring, GIFT provides a model for future festivals and other forms of international sharing.

So the artistic director of a three-day event in England’s North East has done us all a whole lot of favours.

Kate Craddock established the Gateshead International Festival of Theatre in 2011, having recently completed her PhD — which was about using domestic technologies to enable international theatrical collaboration.
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Harriet Walter is a shocked Brutus in the Donmar Warehouse production of Julius Caesar. (Photo by Helen Maybanks for The Guardian)

4. SEEING THINGS

From here on in, I’m only going to recommend work I’ve seen — probably.

Because a lot of digital productions stream for brief periods, I’ve been recommending work that sounds promising. I’m not pleased with my batting average.

I tagged the National Theatre’s Jane Eyre and Frankenstein — both of which I found lacking despite significant strengths. And I regret promoting John Leguizamo’s Latin History for Morons, which deals shamelessly in stereotypes, including a homophobic spin on Montezuma. (Of course the coward is effeminate! Screw you, Leguizamo!)

So I’m charting a new course. I’ve seen both of the shows I’m encouraging you to take in this week. I’ve made both recommendations before, so they’re not fresh, but they do have my well-polished seal of approval.

If you haven’t taken part in Rumble Theatre’s Good Things To Do yet, act fast; they’ve added another weekend. There’s a handful of tickets left for Saturday, May 9 and a few more for Sunday, May 10. It’s an innovative and humble show, quiet and healing.

And check out director Phyllida Lloyd’s all-female production of Julius Caesar, which is presented as if it’s being performed by incarcerated women. It’s available on Marquee. You can get a 14-day free trial.

Lloyd’s Julius Caesar is the most successful filmed play I’ve watched during the lockdown. The director’s interpretation is crystal clear and her staging always illuminates the text — often in startling ways.
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