Driving down the interstate, I missed the exit that I wanted to take into Richmond, but it turned out to be a good thing, because driving down Monument Avenue I stumbled across this statue of Arthur Ashe, one of the city's famous sons. The statue shows the late tennis champion holding books slightly higher than his racquet and surrounded by children. A nice testament to a great man.
I arrived at Agecroft Hall about an hour before the show. The house itself, an expansive Tudor style edifice, was originally built in England in the 15th century, disassembled, shipped across the Atlantic, and rebuilt here in Richmond. The grounds are beautiful, with lovely gardens that are perfect for tailgating before the evening performance.
The performance of Henry V put on by the Richmond Shakespeare Festival was an enjoyable production, with action, humor, romance, and some of the Bard's most beautiful language. I was worried that this outdoor show might fall victim to the thunderstorms that were forecast, but it turned out to be a lovely--if slightly humid--evening. The play was well cast, with a strong actor in the title role (pretty much essential given how this role dominates the piece) and some wonderful work in the bit parts, especially Fluellen, Katherine of France, and the "Three Stooges" characters of Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol. This was worth the (long) trip!
I saw the rarely-performed Edward III tonight presented as a staged reading by the actors of the Richmond Shakespeare Company. This work is one that has been commonly accepted in the Shakespeare canon only in the last couple of decades. Lots of echoes of Henry V in the second half of the play, what with the fighting in France and the heroics of Edward the Black Prince ("Ned"). There were about 15 actors performing in front of an audience maybe twice that size. I guess this one-night-only take on Edward III brought out just the die-hard crowd!
I now have seen 38 of the 39 Shakespeare plays on my list. All that's left is Timon Of Athens, which I am scheduled to see in Boston in early June. (And I'll see both halves of Henry IV in London on August 1, which technically will be the true end of my quest, since I've seen Henry IV, Part Two only in the conflated version in Lincoln Center some years back.)
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