Kiss Me, Kate

Friday night I ventured off into Northeast DC to watch a play rambunctiously titled, "Kiss me, Kate!" It's a play within a play, about a production company putting on the show of The Taming of the Shrew. The lead roles were to be played by a man and a woman who were once married but have since divorced. Onscreen, the man plays the suitor who must "tame" the woman, Kate. Offscreen, the man and woman fight like cats and dogs, often going for the jugular. Still, it is obvious they still have strong attachments to each other. How the offscreen romance is resolved directly affects how the onscreen romance crystallizes in the final act. The breaking point for the man is perhaps the famous "spanking" scene where, onscreen, the man, as Petruchio, gets so fed up with his ex-wife's verbal and physical abuse that he grabs her, flips her over his knees and gives her a thrashing. It is unclear to me whether or not the thrashing was supposed to take place in the actual "Taming of the Shrew" although it fit in with the theme rather well.

Now I have a question for my dear readers to ponder. Are shrews typically portrayed by skinny, hot-tempered women? For reasons I can not comprehend, but somehow the image of a corpulent, fully resonating woman doesn't quite mesh with the image of a shrew. This shrew was no different. She was skinny, angular, flat-chested and very plucky. She sang a number called, "I hate men" to rousing applause. However, there was something in the way she carried herself that was very crone-like and off-putting, not in the least feminine and graceful. Still overall, I enjoyed the show. I especially enjoyed the number where three suitors dance around the gorgeous Bianca (the shrewish Kate's younger sister) asking for her hand in marriage and she blithely sings,"I'll marry any Tom, Dick and Harry." They proceeded to do the train, with her at the forefront, wiggling her head side to side and chanting, "Ah Dickety Dick ah dickety dick!" That was funny. Of the plays I've watched in the last year or so, the common thread that runs through them is how bawdy and naughty they can be.