Another Summary of a Few Days

Once again, I am trying to post every night but I can only do so much as a human being lol. Anyway, on Monday we had a tour of the Royal Opera House and saw a production of a Ballet of Romeo and Juliet. First off the Opera House is very beautiful, and I would have loved to have shown you some pictures, but unfortunately they didn't let us take any. I only have a pic of the entrance. Our tour guide showed us through the entire facility, and it was interesting to see the combination of old and new architecture. The opera house itself remains close to what it looked like when it was build in the 1850's. The house holds over 2,000 people, and it is preserved this way because the house was built with perfect acoustics. In the late 1990's, they added on to the building, and built a larger backstage, more rehearsal spaces, and well as cafes, restaurants, and lobbies for the multiple floors next to the seating areas. The building was quite impressive, and the Romeo and Juliet ballet was really good. It was interesting to see the story adapted to a dance. It was fairly long (around 3 hours) with two intermissions! The dancers who played Romeo and Juliet were incredibly talented, and had good chemistry together on stage. The only parts I didn't like of the show was that it was difficult to figure out the different supporting roles (like Benvolio and Mercutio). Also, the section where Juliet takes the poison I thought was a bit too long, as six maids came in and did what felt like a 10 minute dance before they saw Juliet "dead." The fighting was pretty decent. It wasn't realistic looking in any fashion, but it was done to the beat of the orchestra. Lastly, the orchestra was quite wonderful to listen to.
After Romeo and Juliet, we went back to Schiller for dinner, and then I left to see yet another show: Spamalot. I went with Preston, Jessica, Rachel, and Carrie, and the show was pretty funny. My only complaints are that are seats were very high up in the theatre and there were guard rails on the edge that limited our view of the stage. I also thought that the actor who played King Arthur was a bit bland and lackluster, but aside from that, the show was hilarious. There are several musical theatre parodies in it which were cleverly written, such as a parody of the bottle dance in Fiddler on the Roof (in this one the knights dance while balancing Holy Grails on their heads lol).
Tuesday we started classes, which were actually not too bad. We had Shakespeare from 12:00 to 5:30 with many breaks in between (our teacher rocks and is a very understanding person when it comes to eating lunch and the like). We started reading Troilus and Cressida, and finished it today. I thought it was pretty good. Its about a love affair set during the Trojan war. The only thing about the play is that it emphasizes the political part of the war more than the romance between Troilus and Cressida. The play also kind of just ends with no real resolution, only the knowledge that the war is going to continue.
After classes we went to the Hard Rock Cafe, and had our first edible meal here lol. The food at Schiller isn't very good, so we jump at opportunities like free food. We had a choice of several meals, and I ate a grilled chicken and mashed potatoes meal, which was great. We were also treated to a free wine or beer with our meal. After Hard Rock, we went to the Wellington at Waterloo and met up with Dr. Sharon as a final goodbye. She leaves tomorrow to go back to the U.S.A., and we were all sad to say goodbye for now to her. She is very much like a mother to us all, and I think it will be hard for us for awhile to not have her here.
Well, today we had Shakespeare and Acting (in which we read part of Midsummer Night's Dream). We get to either do the final scene of the play, or pick scenes to perform, which I am very excited for, since I love the play.
After classes, I went on a date with Emily (don't worry Kelly, it wasn't a romantic date) to find a show to see on the West End. We tried to find cheap tickets for Gone With the Wind the musical (yes, its a musical here lol), but alas they were fairly expensive, so no dice for that. We ended up seeing a play called God of Carnage, which features Ralph Fiennes (the actor in The English Patient and he plays Voldemort in the Harry Potter films), and it was hysterical. It dealt with two parents dealing with one child hitting a child from the other family. The son of Ralph Fiennes's character hit the other families boy with a stick and knocked some of his teeth out, because that boy was making fun of him. The play shows the two parents meeting together for the first time, and talking about liability issues, hospital payments, etc. Eventually the parents end up arguing with their spouses and each other, and start acting like children themselves. It was a very funny play that was cleverly written. Ralph Fiennes actually had the least amount of lines, but his presence and expression were very impressive. The father of the other kid (who was a strong Irish accent), provided more of the comedy, with being more talkative, loud, and sometimes just plain rude. I also thought the two wives did a great job. They both had power in their own way, and at times had more authority than their husbands. Toward the end of the show, Ralph Fiennes's wife takes his cell phone and puts its into a flower vase filled with water, and the audience was instantly dying with laughter. To mend the situation, the father of the other kid takes out a hair dryer and tries drying out the water in the cell phone, which was also hysterical. Overall, I thought it was a very good play. The only part I didn't like was the ending (it kind of just ends with each character spotlighted and exhausted from their fighting and arguing).
Well, I have class from 9:00 to 5:30 tomorrow and its going to be a very long day, so I'm going to sleep. Friday morning I leave for Berlin for a weekend stay there!