Moving the finish line

The homestretch just got shorter. Today we found out that, contrary to previous terms in which we made our final presentations on the last day, this term we'll do them a week earlier. Ouch. And last Friday we found out that our Acro presentations will also be in Week 7 rather than Week 8. And on Wednesday to boot. That's a mere 9 days away. Double ouch. As if that weren't enough to mark the nearness of the end of term, a classmate bid us all adieu today. He's leaving Thursday and won't be back. Several classmates are thinking they won't return next year. I don't think it's a disenchantment with the school on any of their parts--more financial concerns, or life intervening--but we've already lost 3 or 4 people since the beginning of the year. We're all supposed to let the school know by the end of the week if we're planning on doing the second year. I don't think anyone will be told not to come back, but as it is we'll be significantly smaller, which is a loss.

¶ Last weekend I saw Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Simon Callow in Waiting for Godot. Yes, it's a truly odd play, but the actors played it with such humor that it was a treat to watch. I read an article a month or two ago in which comedians spoke of the influence that Beckett has had on them (the illustration was a famous photo of Beckett with a clown's nose added). I'd never known that so many people see his plays as comical, but it worked really well with Godot. Maybe that's the way it's always done, I don't know, but clownish or vaudevillian treatment really made the play move along, at times in a touchingly endearing way. There's a lot of cruelty in it, too, but that works well pushing hard against the comedic elements. It was also reassuring to see actors of that caliber stepping on each other's lines occasionally (once, anyway) and dropping their accents from time to time.

And yes, Robin, to answer your question, they pronounced it GAH-doh. Who knew?

¶ I've seen a few plays lately: another odd one (this by Wallace Shawn) called Aunt Dan and Lemon. A one-woman show called Kafka's Monkey, starring Kathryn Hunter. I'm too ignorant to know how famous or well regarded she is but it was an amazing performance. The character is a chimpanzee who's learned to pass as a human, who thinks and feels like a human, more or less, but who still moves and acts like a chimp. Then there was an experimental theatre piece that a few classmates were in and one devised, with all the aspects (for better and for worse) that "experimental theatre" implies. Overall recently, quite a range.

¶ Last night I went to a two-hour African dance class. What a workout, and what fun! Led by a Ghanaian god of a man with incredible stamina, and charisma, and what a body. Oh my Lord...

¶ And today, the 29th of June 2009, some eight months later than most of my classmates (the whippersnappers), I was able to consistently accomplish the headstand.

(He takes a long slow bow.)

Thank you. Thank you very much.