Weee...

[neotoma]

Another busy weekend. Saturday, ellen_fremedon and I met up with mrshamill and her family to see Othello downtown at the Shakespeare Theater. Avery Brooks was playing lead, and as good as he was, the actor playing Iago -- Patrick Page -- was amazing. He played Iago as a man who used sex as a weapon, and only a weapon. He rejected his wife Emilia in disgust when she made advances to him, but touched both Roderigo and Claudio in intimidating and sexually suggestive ways. It was quite a mesmering performance.

Sunday, I went down to the Mall to demonstrate spinning on handspindles at the Knit-Out with other members of my guild. They brought their spinning wheels, I brought many handspindles and loose wool so that people could try their hands at spinning. It was quite fun, though I never did get a chance to sit down.

One woman brought her mother forward -- an older immigrant woman from someplace in the Middle East by her dress -- who had spun from childhood. She took one of my top-whorls and was spinning fine in seconds. I think she was amused by the lime green wool I handed her; I have a bunch of Perendale wool I dyed with Kool-Aid and Easter Egg dyes that I bring along because the colors attract kids.

I also had at least *three* troops of Girl Scouts come up and ask for demonstrations. That was fun, and hopefully the guild's education/outreach program can hook up with the troops later and help out with their craft badges. I also got several kids and moms spinning, and gave away all of my brochures and flyers about how to make spindles at home. I even got a man spinning -- usually men wind up making spindles or spinning wheels if their wives have gotten into spinning (so many retired engineers get a second career as wheelwrights this way) -- admittedly it was because his girlfriend pushed him into it, but he made a respectable length of pretty even yarn.

tricksterquinn and our friend A came by about midway through the afternoon. I was surprised to see A, as I hadn't told him about the Knit-Out, there being no fly-fishing to interest him, but tricksterquinn apparently had. They gave me the carrots out of their lunches, and Quinn let me eat half her sandwich; evidently I looked starved. Which was sad, because I had gotten down there a half hour early and had breakfast at Teaism.

Anyway, it was a fun, busy weekend, and I'm probably going to sleep for the rest of the day.

Comments

[neotoma.livejournal.com]

That was the second time Avery Brooks played Othello for the DC Shakespeare Theater. In 1991, he played it with Andre Braugher (http://imdb.com/name/nm0105672/) as Iago, which would have been AMAZING to see, plus rather full of mind-fuckery. And just a few years ago, Patrick Stewart played Othello in a production that was 'photo-negative', ie the rest of the cast was black.

But damn, I would love to see James Earl Jones on stage in just about ANY Shakespeare, even Titus Andronicus.

[micehell]

Guh, I would have loved to see Andre Braugher play Iago, especially combined with Avery Brooks as Othello. *sobs* But the James Earl Jones one was nice (if a long time ago). Christopher Plummer played Iago, which he was eerily good at, all sly and silky to Jones' sonorous tone.