Two contrasting styles:
William Poel's 1881 Ofelia (Maud Holt) carried a lute (as in Q1 stage
directions).
Holt - now Mrs Beerbohm Tree - later recalled the care taken in choosing
the flowers for the mad scene for her husband's 1892 production. She
wrote: 'nothing but real flowers would content me, and the more
beautiful they were, the more it pleased me to toss them and tear them.'
In Poel's (all male)1900 production, at 'Here's rue for you', his
Ophelia picked up a feather from the stage to hand to Gertrude - which
commentators found unbearably poignant.
Best,
Jean Chothia
Burt,Richard wrote:
> Hi lal,
>
> just wondering about what is done with Ophelia's flowers in her mad scene. I see three kinds of stagings of the flowers as prop and with no prop:
>
> 1. No prop: flowers (or anything else) at all (Zeffirelli)
> 2. Something in place of flowers (polaroid photos in Almereyda)
> 3. Flowers (Olivier).
>
> Can anyone thinking of any other way the flowers have been used (o rnot) as a prop?
> Any compelling film adaptations that come to mind?
>
>
>
>
>
> Professor Richard Burt
> Department of English and Film and Media Studies Program
> 4314 Turlington Hall
> P.O. Box 117310
> University of Florida
> Gainesville, FL
> 32611-7310
> Phone: 352 373-3560
> http://www.clas.ufl.edu/~burt/burtindex.html
> http://www.clas.ufl.edu/~burt/Citations.html
|