{"id":14810,"date":"2014-01-28T17:56:16","date_gmt":"2014-01-28T22:56:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kith.org\/journals\/vardibidian\/2014\/01\/28\/14810.html"},"modified":"2018-03-13T19:06:25","modified_gmt":"2018-03-14T00:06:25","slug":"on-the-noises-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/2014\/01\/28\/on-the-noises-off\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Noises Off"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>So. One of the things about <cite>Noises Off<\/cite> is that while it&#8217;s the funniest play ever written, and a lot of fun to perform in, it is in many ways not a very interesting play to produce. There are very few big choices to make&#8212;the set, for instance, must be almost exactly as described by the playwright or the action won&#8217;t work. That action is set out in detail, and very few particular bits can be significantly changed without tearing apart the fabric of the farce. Even the character choices are constrained more in this play than in most plays I have been involved with a production of, largely because of the play of stereotypes, but also because of the thickness (if you know what I mean) of the gags. This isn&#8217;t a drawback of the play, but it is a drawback to writing about the production of the play. \n<p>Not that one production can&#8217;t be better than another, mind you. Some productions will be funnier simply because the timing is better, the physical gags smoother, the voices and walks and facial expressions more or less risible. I have seen a group of high schoolers put on the show without understanding the dirty jokes&#8212;or possibly, it now occurs to me, whilst pretending not to understand the dirty jokes, possibly under orders from the director. At any rate, it was still funny, although not as funny. But my point is that while one production will be better and funnier than another, all the productions will for the most part look and feel the same.\n<p>The one big directorial choice, it seems to me, is whether this is a group of talented and professional <i>farceurs<\/i> who, under better circumstances, would be doing a fine job with, or whether this is a crew of pathetic incompetents reaching their level. Essentially, the choice of incompetence allows for extra gags on a moment-to-moment level, while the choice of competence allows for a greater sympathy for the cast in their disaster, and presumably a farther fall to the third act. I don&#8217;t think one is better than the other necessarily, being rather a decision of balance that lies within directorial discretion. Although that discretion might properly depend on the actors and their abilities.\n<p>Our director has chosen the competence route. I like it, myself, if only because the last time we went the other way. I like to think that some of the audience will leave feeling at least mildly disappointed that they didn&#8217;t get to see an actual production of <cite>Nothing On<\/cite> with our cast.\n<p><I>Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus<\/I>,<br>-Vardibidian.\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Which Your Humble Blogger is not terribly interesting, either, but that&#8217;s all right, isn&#8217;t it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[209],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-theeyater"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14810"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16630,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14810\/revisions\/16630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/vardibidian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}