A View From the Bridge, Kew Gardens and Running Wild (May 12th -13th)

--- Thursday May 12th ---

We went and saw a play called A View From the Bridge (1956), written by Arthur Miller. The play was broadcast to the Ritzy Picturehouse, a movie theater, where we watched it. That was a first for me. Going to a movie theater to watch a live recording of a performance.

I really don't have a lot to say about the play as a story. As a play it was well executed. It was a very simple setup. The stage was small and square with seating going around it. There was a just a white wall with a step leading to an opening in the center and a long bench the closed the stage on the remaining 3 sides. Besides that, there was only a single chair. No setups of stages, walls, or decorations. Just a white wall, a bench, and a chair. The genius part of the play is that it changed location a number of times but you were never lost or left wondering where the characters were. It was quite amazing really. I really want to try doing that with a film. Just have it be in a single room and try to have it all shot in a single plain room that represents all of the locations in the film. That would be an interesting challenge.

--- Friday May 13th ---

This was a full day. We first went to the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew (aka Kew Gardens). This is a beautiful place. If you go to London, this place needs to be on the itinerary. The way my professor Tom put it "This is a place where you can just be." It's not a place that you rush through or worried about getting to the next amusement. It's a place to walk through and experience. Around each corner you wonder what new beauty you'll see next. Here are some of the pictures I took of it an you'll get a little glimpse into what you can see.

Behold the tree from which the Whomping Willow was made! The design team for the movie took moulds of this tree to make the famous tree of Hogwarts.

A photo posted by Travis Clark (@travdc_edits) on May 21, 2016 at 3:32pm PDT

Japanese inspired tower in the middle of a Royal Botanical Garden in England. Not sure why it's there but it's cool all the same

A photo posted by Travis Clark (@travdc_edits) on May 21, 2016 at 3:59pm PDT

Japanese Gateway. It was made as part the Japan-English Exposition in 1910. This was probably my favorite part of the garden.

A photo posted by Travis Clark (@travdc_edits) on May 22, 2016 at 9:34am PDT

Such vibrant colors everywhere.

A photo posted by Travis Clark (@travdc_edits) on May 22, 2016 at 9:38am PDT

My camera died while I was here so I wasn't able to get pictures of everything that I wanted.

That evening we went to play at an open air theater called Running Wild!. It was so cold! The play was great. It was a play that was made for kids and it had a bit of an agenda. It wanted to let you know poachers and why wildlife is being endangered. The thing that made the play so great was the puppetry. I didn't take any pictures but I managed to find a couple of good one online.

Running Wild - Main Character and Elephant Puppet
(Photo by Alastair Muir)

Running Wild - Main Character and Puppets
(Photo by Alastair Muir)

This show really made me want to make my own puppets. Maybe I should take that puppetry class at BYU. That could be really fun.