On Tuesday I took the evening out, to go off to London and see a play at Shakespeare's Globe. This year for English Lit we're studying The Tempest, conveniently this was showing! So me and my class went down to go and be groundlings for an evening.
I'm going to try and leave out all of my textual analysis and context and just general school stuff...because I know you're all really here for the pictures of London! Unfortunately, because I live in England and we're not known for our good weather...right on cue, it rained the entire evening (which is probably partially to blame for why I'm sitting in bed right now with my camomile tea!)
I originally wanted an OOTD in front of the Globe or somewhere good...but due to weather problems...that couldn't happen really!
But anyway, I got home about 2:50pm, needed to leave the house again at 3:10pm. So had the quickest hair, clothes and bag change in the history of the world there I think! I managed to get a photo of the top half of my outfit... but still let's do a quick outfit rundown!
For my top I wore the Choies one from my OOTD (here), this is great evening wear and really lightweight and comfortable. Normally I wouldn't wear a sparkly top like this and the sequins still scare me a little, but it's great. Over the top of that I wore a chocolate jacket from my great all-time friend Boden. I love these guys and although it may not seem like it...if you went through my wardrobes, probably around 70% of the items are from Boden! I've been buying from them for years and they're just great. For bottoms I wore the jeggings from UNIQLO that I featured in my Hallyu Takeover Haul (here) and for shoes I just wore some brown boots from Primark!
Rather than just sit here talking about the entire evening, I'm going to now just let the photos guide you through and just share some moments with you all!
Welcome to London I guess everyone! So we arrived at Kings Cross and then had to go to Blackfriars station... we had a little ticket problem...so had to sort that out before we could move onto Blackfriars!
Yeah, we'll leave that there!
Once we made it to the station, got off the tube and walked across the bridge, we arrived at the theatre! Half an hour early... To waste some time - and finally get some food and drink - I took Stacey and Sophie for their first ever Starbucks! Not sure they'll be going back anytime soon, but I got my regular panini like usual and Sophie was at least slightly amused by the fact she managed to get Byron on her cup...even if the woman serving her had to ask her how to spell Byron...
Doors opened at 7pm, The Tempest started at 7:30pm and this is a quick view from the steps into the theatre, this is the other side of the river...it looks so plain and normal...and then the globe is just in and amongst everything. I personally think that's really cool! It's like a tiny piece of British history inside modern London...that's really exciting!
So this was my second visit to the Globe, first time I went to see Midsummer Nights Dream and I also had a tour of the place, so that was pretty useful for this time! I actually knew what was going on once I was there and...yeah it was just helpful I guess!
Even though the pictures don't really show it, it was really raining pretty hard...just constantly and although this was really irritating , it actually helped with the atmosphere. In case you didn't know, The Tempest is a storm...so it was pretty fun watching it in the rain!
I managed to get some pictures of the stage whilst it was still light as well! Obviously with the play starting at 7:30 and ending around 10:30... it was hard to get pictures of the stage when the play had finished...I tried not to get too many of these though because honestly...you can just type in the Globe Theatre into google and millions will come up!
What's really exciting about the Globe is the history behind it though! The Tempest was first performed around 1610-1611 and now in 2013 I'm watching the same play...in an identical theatre! Isn't that exciting?
The show itself was great. I don't really have much more to add without going into full on fan girl mode... basically... I now ship every character with Ariel - played by Colin Morgan who you probably recognise from the TV show Merlin! ... - and yep. Everyone is with Ariel now!
I think my tweets from the evening sum up the excitement a little better than this probably does considering I saw it on Tuesday and it's now Saturday (stupid me for getting ill and all)
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| Credit: Marc Brenner // Source: Globe Theatre FB Page |
My favourite though other than Colin Morgan of course had to be Roger Allam, which although I loved him as Falstaff...he was great as Prospero as well! He did portray Prospero very differently to how I pictured him and in the first half it was starting to annoy me. I don't like Prospero much...and Allam's acting did challenge this view! But in the end not only did I finally appreciate Prospero, my love for Allam grew as well.
Of course, being a beauty (and fashion) blogger...I did spend as much time - okay more - on the outfits and makeup as the acting. So I feel like Gonzalo's ruff, Sebastian and Antonio's outfits and Ariel as a harpy all deserve mentions! It's a shame I wasn't able to take pictures of these outfits but they were really great! The costume designer has done an awesome job there and I feel like sometimes the costumes can get overlooked...but I definitely acknowledged the effort made!
On subject of Ariel again, Colin Morgan's makeup was really well done as well...I didn't notice the details at first, but although it was natural... it really emphasised the airy and ethereal quality of his character!
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| Credit: Marc Brenner // Source: Globe Theatre FB Page |
There's so much more I could say, and I didn't want to do a full on review of the performance because I'm a literature student not a drama student so my knowledge of acting itself is pretty limited! But I hope you all enjoyed this post almost as much as I enjoyed going and if you're ever in London, please drop by the Globe! It's only £5 for a standing ticket which is almost the price of a Starbucks. So please go for it!
Thanks everyone and have an amazing day!
"Be not afeared; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not."
