In 2000 we were approaching the end of our quest, that is,
our goal to see all 37 of Shakespeare’s plays performed live. We had just returned from the Stratford
Festival in Ontario
where we had seen Titus Andronicus (#36),
and all that stood between us and completing our task now was to see Coriolanus. Upon our return it occurred to me that I
could “surf the net” and perhaps someone, somewhere, would be performing the
play. (Surfing the net was still a relatively new phenomenon.) To our great delight, we discovered that a
theater company from England,
the Almeida Theatre Company, had performed the play there and was bringing
their production to the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) in New York.
The star of the show was Ralph Fiennes, who was known to us only as one
of the characters in the film Schindler’s
List and as the star of The English
Patient.
Getting to New
York from our home in the Chicago area was not the most difficult
obstacle. First, our two young children (4 and
1 at the time) had to be placed somewhere.
Accomplishing that (thanks, Grandma), I then had to convince the BAM to
sell me tickets to the show (and to Richard
II, the other play that the Almeida Theatre Company was doing there in
repertory). The person in the box office
was not too interested in selling me tickets to the two shows, let alone
helping us finish our quest. She was quite
willing to sell me only the whole season series, which would have included the
two shows and several others that I could not see traveling to New York for. I begged, pleaded and cajoled for quite some
time, but the only progress I made was obtaining the contact information for
the Artistic Director. I appealed by
email to him and he, recognizing the uniqueness of our plight, relented, and we
were able to secure two tickets for each show.
Our trip to New
York was an adventure in and of itself. As a native of the Chicago area, I didn’t think traveling to,
through and in New York City
would be all that different. I was
wrong. Shortly after arriving at our
hotel in mid-town Manhattan, we discovered that our vehicle had been
towed. We barely made it to the first
show, Richard II, after rescuing the
vehicle from the clutches of the New York police. We were pleasantly surprised to see that
David Burke, known to us as Dr Watson from the BBC Sherlock Holmes series, was also in the theater company. The day between the two shows was taken up with
getting to the club known as The Players, which is worthy of a blog post of its
own. But we kept an eye on the car,
enjoyed our day, and made it back to the BAM in plenty of time to finish our
quest.
Much has happened in the dozen years since we saw our first
Coriolanus. The landscape of New York City looks much
different. Heroes and villains have come
and gone, and Ralph Fiennes has become an international star. But apparently his mind never got very far
away from Coriolanus, as he is back with a film version of the play, his
directorial debut.
The film is a modern take on the play. Although the play is set in Rome, the film
was shot mostly in Belgrade which provides a lot of the bombed out urban look
of the set. To summarize the story, Rome has two
problems. On the one hand the common
people are revolting. On the other hand
the city is at war with the Volskis, led by Eurifedes, played in the movie by
Gerard Butler. Caius Martius is a
general who almost single-handedly defeats the Volski army at the city of Coriolus, for which act
he is given great honors, including the new name of Coriolanus. This pleases his mother, played in the movie
by Vanessa Redgrave, to no end as she has raised her son with great intention
that he should be successful. Newly
named Coriolanus is urged to run for Counsel, a political position of some
import in Rome. However, to do so he must appeal to the
common people and gain their approval.
This is quite a problem as Coriolanus despises the common people. He almost accomplishes the task, but through
political manipulations the recent hero is ultimately banished. In retaliation he joins the Volskis and is on
the verge of defeating Rome
when his mother appeals to him and he relents.
This is a great film of a pretty good play. I don’t think anyone sneers quite as well as
Ralph Fiennes or shows such complete disdain.
For the character of Corialanus he is wonderful. There are times when you see the leopard
trying to change his spots, but he just can’t do it. The film environment allows a much closer
view of the inner torment that can be seen on his face. Many of the side conversations that you would
see between actors on the stage are set as newscasts on TV screens, a very
clever way of moving the story along.
The movie has a quasi-documentary feel to it, especially with some of the
battle sequences, which are rather graphic.
Gerard Butler does a good job as the enemy turned friend turned back to
enemy, Eufidides.
Volumina is an interesting character, one of the more
interesting of Shakespeare’s female roles.
She has some odd beliefs about what glory and honor and children are
for. At one point she says something to
the effect that she would rather have 11 children die in battle than to have
one live in comfort, not having served his country. I suppose all countries have women who are
that patriotic, but in this day and age it seems rather extreme. Regardless, she, and only she, is able to
make Coriolanus back down from what appears to be a certain victory over his
former comrades, a decision which has tragic consequences for him and for her
as well.
This is one of those plays that if anyone else’s name but
Shakespeare’s were on it, it would be unlikely that it would ever be
performed. I am sure there are some that
feel it is a great work of art, but I don’t.
It’s a good play, a great film, but it’s not Hamlet, or Henry V or
even Julius Caesar. I wonder what Ralph Fiennes could do with Hamlet . . .
