A Pinoy @ The Theater: Benedict Cumberbatch as HAMLET

              (From across the street, 
          Benedict Cumberbatch and 
             Tom Hiddleston's posters)

When I was in Grade 6, Miss Maroma, our English teacher, introduced my classmates and me to the works of William Shakespeare, including Merchant of Venice, where Portia successfully defended Antonio from being butchered by Shylock. 

         (Cumberbatch fans ascending 
       the steps of the National Theater)

But during the other weekend, I was no longer in a classroom; I was at the National Theater of Korea. And it wasn't Merchant of Venice; I was watching NTLive's Hamlet! With Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role, no less!

Just like Coriolanus, the National Theater Live was also featuring Hamlet. NTLive is a live performance filmed and then later shown to audiences around the world. And this time, the lucky audiences were in the National Theater of Korea in Seoul!

Although it was chilly that day, the audience braved freezing temperatures. Why? Everyone didn't want to miss Benedict Cumberbatch's performance!

I watched him on TV as Sherlock Holmes, and a couple of years back, he was impressive as Alan Turing in Imitation Game. Definitely, nobody wanted to miss this award-winning actor's performance as Hamlet!

                  (My Hamlet ticket)

Even though it was freezing and snowing outside, the intensity of the cast's performance was sizzling inside the theater, especially with Benedict's signature deep voice that resonated across the hall and his emotions that were commanding from all angles. Since most audience members were non-English speaking, there were subtitles at the bottom of the screen. 

Benedict Cumberbatch was the voice of Smaug in The Hobbit, and he was emotionless and superhuman as Khan in Star Trek Into Darkness. Here was an actor with a special kind of presence, and that day, I was a witness to his amazing gift of acting: voice, emotions and all!

Although the play lasted three hours, there was nary a dull moment. After all, instead of flying to London to watch Shakespeare, we were all lucky that NTLive brought Shakespeare and Benedict over to Seoul! And even though it was all a videoed performance, the local audience still showed their appreciation and applauded like the whole cast was just right there within hearing distance.

           (Huge posters at the lobby of 
                 the National Theater)

After the performance, everyone headed home to a snowed Seoul with paths a little bit slippery, but nobody complained. We were treated, not just to this unique NTLive's staging of William Shakespeare's longest play, but also to Benedict Cumberbatch's sublime performance.

A Pinoy @ The Theater: Tom Hiddleston in Shakespeare's CORIOLANUS

      (Giant Benedict Cumberbatch and 
        Tom Hiddleston's posters at the 
     National Theater of Korea entrance)


Last month, as my bus was passing by the National Theater of Korea in Seoul, a huge poster caught my eye. The two men in the poster looked familiar! 

It was Benedict Cumberbatch and Tom Hiddleston! Benedict Cumberbatch was Sherlock Holmes on TV's Sherlock and was brilliant as Alan Turing on Imitation Game, while Tom Hiddleston was, well, bossy as Loki of Asgard in The Avengers. From my bus window, I took a photo of the poster to see what it was all about. Because with two big names and recognizable faces on the huge posters, who wouldn't want to pass up the chance to see them?

The poster was for the performances of Coriolanus and Hamlet for the National Theater Live, or NTLive, which is a filmed live performance at a London stage and shown at other theaters around the world. And this time, in Seoul, NTLive was showing Shakespeare's Coriolanus and Hamlet!

When I got home that day, I immediately logged on to the website of the National Theater of Korea and just got lucky that, over the play dates, there were a few seats left for Coriolanus and one, yes, one-unexplainable-mysteriously-available-seat for Hamlet! Whew! Of course, I bought the available seats immediately! It's Shakespeare!

And on the play date for Coriolanus, the main theater was packed! 

Coriolanus is a tragedy, and I didn't expect Tom to show up as a god from Asgard complete with horns and cape. Here, Tom Hiddleston was a successful Roman general and was spilling out Shakespeare's words like they were meant to be his. Since NTLive had close-ups, Tom's intensity was magnified all over the big screen. His words and emotions jumped out of the screen and reached even those sitting at the farthest corner of the theater (perhaps they also bought their tickets late!). Tom, as an angry Coriolanus, still pierced them on their seats with his emotions as if they were sitting up front. I even told myself, I liked this NTLive! I didn't have to fly to London to watch Shakespeare! Ha-ha-ha! 

A familiar face in the cast caught my attention: Alfred Enoch, who played a student at Viola Davis's How To Get Away With Murder drama series. I didn't know he was English. I thought he was an African-American who happened to attend Viola Davis's law class at a Philadelphia university and later got involved in a murder plot in that drama. Here, in Coriolanus, Alfred plays Titus Lartius, another Roman general.

  (Brochures for Hamlet and Coriolanus)

Although Tom Hiddleston plays the main character, his mom, Volumnia, played by Deborah Findlay matched his performance word-for-word. Miss Findlay stole the scene from Tom a few times, and for a very good reason: she was very good! And in each of her scene, she made sure the audience knew who she was: an ambitious mother to Coriolanus and a very good stage actress.

After the play, I realized I was lucky to have looked out the window that day and spotted the poster, or I wouldn't have had the opportunity to experience and enjoy NTLive's Coriolanus.

     (My tickets for NTLive performances)

I started reading Shakespeare at 12 during my grade school years. Our English teacher, Miss Maroma, would read with us the plays during class and made us understand those centuries-old Shakespearian words. But that night, among the audience made up of Koreans and a few foreigners, I watched and enjoyed not just another Shakespeare work, but performances and a production of the highest quality even William Shakespeare would have been proud of.

                         * * * * *

Next play, Benedict Cumberbatch as Hamlet!

International Folk Music & Dance Concert @ National Museum of Korea's Yong Theater

As expected,  tickets were all gone in a jiffy! Being a free concert featuring dances and songs from different cultures, the International Folk Music & Dance Concert, organized by the Senior Public Diplomacy Group, was very popular among the Korean and international audiences.

The Senior Public Diplomacy Group is an organization of former diplomats of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of South Korea, whose main objective is to help promote and strengthen South Korea's friendships and relations with other countries. And I think tonight, they succeeded!

Dances and music from Korea, Mongolia, Brazil, USA, China, Indonesia, Cambodia and other countries were all applauded and enjoyed by the crowd.

Three of the hundreds of audience members, Insook from Seoul, Veronika from Germany, and Terri from Namibia were especially impressed with the kind of show that featured dances and music from different countries. They said they were lucky in the first place to have been able to get tickets, and even luckier to have been able to watch this kind of concert in Seoul.

Thanks to Mr. Ha-Kyung Choi, the president of the Senior Public Diplomacy Group, and to Mr. Tae-Hoon Lee of the Korea Observer, those who sat and filled the 862-seater Yong Theater of the National Museum of Korea in the Yongsan District of Seoul were treated to a Sunday night of international performances that surely helped understand each other's culture.

Looking forward to the next international concert!

A Day @ The Uijeongbu Music Theater Festival

It was my first time to Uijeongbu, a city in Gyeonggi Province, which is just east of Seoul. Over the years, whenever my friends and I enjoyed a large, shallow pot of buddae-jiggae, they tell me that this dish originated from Uijeongbu, where an old U.S. army base was located.

            (The outdoor stage of the Festival)

But on this trip to neighboring city wouldn't be about buddae-jiggae. It was about the city's premiere cultural event: the Uijeongbu Music and Theater Festival.

As it's quite far if you travel by subway, we were lucky that we had chartered buses to ferry us to the Uijeongbu Arts Center, where all performances and events were held.

          (An outdoor theatrical performance)

            (Inside the Uijeongbu Arts Center, 
                     which has piano stairs)

In and around the Arts Center, outdoor theatrical and musical performances were enjoyed by the locals, and arts and crafts activities enjoyed by kids and adults wanting to find out if they still have their creative talents in watercolor painting.

             (The piano stairs of the arts center. It lights up and plays a note when you step on it. )

There were giant puppets and fairy tale characters around the festival for kids, and food stalls for everyone who needs something to eat.

A showcase feature, Mahlermania, staged by Nico and The Navigators, a theater group based in Berlin, was supposed to be the highlight of our trip. The libretto was in German with a mix of English, but since my basic Deustche classes were a long time ago, I hardly understood the whole thing. And even if this was based on the life of Gustav Mahler, the Austrian-Hungarian composer, my only knowledge about him was limited to the piano exercise books named after him. The staging of the opera was very good, but it was the connection with the audience that was lost.

(Dinner at Verdi's restaurant in the arts center)

             (Performers hanging on the side of 
                       the arts center building)

Thanks to the K-Performance Supporters team of the Korea Tourism Organization, I was able to set foot on Uijeongbu City for the first time. And although I would have wanted to enjoy buddae-jiggae in the place where it originated, the buffet dinner for all the bloggers at Verdi's was good enough.

Until the next festival!

            (Fireworks to end the second night 
                             of the festival)