When the tickets to this play went on sale, I jumped on them and got center stage front row for the first viewing.

Of course we all know that date was canceled. We got tickets to Nov 4th. I was a bit disheartened since I already had a ticket for the 7th of November.  After a phone call to the box office and a wonderful conversation with a rep, I hung up owning a VIP ticket.

I arrived at the theater and was roaming around trying to find someone who could help me find out where I belong, the individual who helped me was non-other than the Managing Director Michael Stotts. Wonderful man whom I had a lively discussion on the renovations, the play itself, and the tour of the stage after the play.  He said they were thrilled to have Kate back gracing their stage. She is wonderful to work with. He then pointed me to the room that was exhibiting Alec Egan's artwork. As I was in there looking at it all, he was in there with some friends checking on the lighting and the paintings. I must say this artwork is nothing like his earlier work. I found these pieces to be fascinating.

I quickly found my seat, 4th row and an aisle seat. Met the other VIP's and was thrilled to find that they all were Kate fans. Another lively discussion ensued about her career and what we all love about it and her.  The lights went down and the journey began.

The seating is a horse shoe around the stage. The entrance ways and aisles are all used by the actors running up and down.  We were all fortunate to be in the aisle that Kate runs up and down the most times. It opens up with her running around the stage with a sword in her hand mock fighting/playing with her attendants and Anthony. The energy is simply vibrating off of all the actors and does not wane until the end of the play.

Kate's portrayal of Cleopatra is palpable. She has the most difficult part of this play. She is the only one with costume changes. I lost count after five. She does the entire play barefoot, running up and down aisles, stairs.  And this is just the physicality of her character. The emotional aspect of the part... unlike Kate (Hepburn) who 'ran the gamut of emotion from A to B in the play 'The Lake', Kate (Mulgrew) runs the gamut of emotions from A to Z and then works her way through the Egyptian alphabet in 'Anthony and Cleopatra'.

The river down the center of the stage was a very cunning idea on Tina Landau's part. It truly showed the division between Cleopatra and Caesar. Cleopatra's area was to the left of the river and Caesar was to the right. There were times when Cleopatra used the left side, but Caesar didn't cross over until into the second act.  Off to the far left of the stage, just behind the last seats was a mini 'stage' It was set up to be like a 'party room' for Cleopatra. Whenever Anthony was chatting with Caesar or someone else about wars or treaties, You would find Cleopatra lounging on her throne with her attendants and eunuch and other servants all enjoying food, wine, opium and each other. This she did quite often.  So I made it a point to keep glimpsing over there.

At the end of the play we all jumped to our feet and gave a resounding ovation. Once again, when they pointed to Kate she got the loudest applause.  As the cast clapped to us, she looked to Alec and clapped and blew him a kiss. He gave a big smile back to her.

Needless to say us VIPers were eager to enjoy the extra's. There were five of us. We did get a nice tour of the stage, we were even brought downstairs under it and saw just how the stage can be created either high up like it is now, or dropped down which it will be for 'A Christmas Carol' next month.  We were then brought back behind the curtains and shown just how they 'hoist' up Anthony in the death scene and how they raise and lower the glass panels on the box. Which is a free floating stage held up by wiring and cables and the stairs that are attached to it.

Now the best part, while we are back behind the curtain, Michael comes back and says Kate and John are waiting for us. I think we stampeded out of there, rounded the corner and Kate and John were sitting in the front row waiting. .A table was set up on stage with champagne bottles and glasses on it. We were given a beautiful 8x10 of John and Kate on stage which they both signed for us. Then we got our photo taken with them. We all got to chat with them both.   While Kate was signing my photo, I told her 'They really should have added seat belts to the seats when they renovated this theater, because boy did you take us for a ride tonight.” She laughed and said it was one of the nicest compliments she has heard in awhile.  One thing I have noticed often with her is if she remembers you, she shakes your hand and says things like nice to see you again. But if she hasn't, she introduces herself with 'Hi, I'm Kate Mulgrew' Which proves just how unpretentious she is.

I was talking with John about how this play is just shy of 3 hours long and is it the longest play he has ever done. He was saying yes and out of the corner of my eye I caught Kate nodding emphatically. He did say it was actually around 4 hours but Tina knew she had to cut it down, but every time she cut something out she would add something else. So it was a fine line what to drop that did not compromise her vision. I feel it worked out well. A woman had brought her own photo for Kate to sign as well and she graciously did so. She then slid it across the table towards John and goes, “Here John, when I didn't have an asp at my breast”.  I looked down at it and it was a photo of her as Janeway and an enemy had a phaser to her neck. I mumbled to myself  “you went from phasers at your neck to snakes at your breast, wow” Apparently they heard me cause they both chuckled.

Alec was there with his two friends, so I got a nice chance to chat with him about his artwork. I did tell him if I had $4200 'The Barn' would be going home with me.  He smiled and said that was his favorite also.  Turned out it was one of the other VIPers birthday the next day and she had treated herself to this as a gift. Kate immediately said 'well, this deserves a toast' and we started to pass around the champagne. A toast was said and drunk in her honor. Then we toasted Kate and John. 

I have to say, we really got a lot of time to chat with them all. The photos were taken on stage. Unfortunately none of us have gotten ours yet, otherwise I would have included it with this review.Even though Kate and John were exhausted they spent a lot of time with us, and then they went out in the lobby with the rest of the cast to mingle with any fans who were still around. Apparently this always takes place after a Friday performance. 

All of us VIPers stood in the lobby chatting for over an hour about our time with Kate and John, the play and all the other work we have seen Kate in. Emails were exchanged and I made 3 new good friends out of this experience.  To sum up Kate's performance, Michael asked us right before we took our tour of the stage, something about what was our favorite parts of the play, and someone answered whenever Kate was on stage. He smiled and we all agreed.

I did go and see the play again during a Wednesday matinee with a friend of mine. Michael was running around and recognized me. I mentioned I heard a rumor they are looking into extending the run of the play. They want to, but the inventory for the last week is still under. I looked at him blankly and he explained sales of seating.  We had a nice discussion about how the economy is taking a toll on all theaters from Broadway to off Broadway.  If the sales pick up, he would love to see this play extended.  Alec wasn't there but his artwork was.  I still don't have $4200 so 'The Barn' is still there to enjoy.

This time around, I understood a lot more of the verbiage. Which helped me to understand more of what was going on.  Not sure if it was because this was an afternoon play, or whatever, but I found (if it at all possible) that the intensity, tension, and hunger the actors brought to the stage was more tangible. I was most fortunate to have the same seat but on the other side of the aisle. So I was sitting where Kate does most of her entering and exiting again. This time around she got three separate ovations for her performance during the play.  The first one was during the scene where the messenger comes in to tell her that Anthony is bond onto Octavia. Here she gets a laugh (like the other night) when the messenger goes “But yet..'”and she replies, “I do not like, but yet”  We all laughed at her facial expression and her delivery. Then she rails on the poor messenger and wails about Anthony being with Octavia. At the end of this scene we all clapped.  The second time was during the scene where Anthony catches Caesar's messenger kissing Cleopatra's hand. He rails about this and has the servant whipped. Cleopatra proclaims her love/following to Anthony.  Her speech is not as long as Anthonys, but she gave such a great performance we all clapped after it. Then at the end of the scene Anthony asks for one more gaudy night before the battle, and she leans in and whispers in Anthony's ear, then looks over to her attendants and repeats the line... “It's my birthday”  We all laughed and clapped again.  The last one is the scene where Anthony is dying and she laments about her love for him and her offense of letting him think she had killed herself. Like last time a standing ovation and she drew the loudest applause. 

Once again, I did not go to the stage door. Immediately after the play they had a post show discussion.  On stage was Scott Parkinson who plays Caesar, Jake Green who plays the Messenger to Cleopatra, Kindra Underwood who plays Octavia. I believe one of the production stage managers. I did not catch her name.  They all spoke about Tina Landau's way of directing the play. They pretty much reiterated what Kate has said about her style. They did go into detail about how they chose the way they saluted each other in Caesars army. One thing that stood out was when Jake  said “All I have to do basically is run around and be scared of Kate, which is very easy to do” the rest of the cast nodded as we all did when he finished by stating, “Because she is that good”. The woman picking people to ask their question said one more because they had to go and eat and get ready for the night's performance, to which I threw my hand up as did a bunch of us. She picked a gentleman in the back who asked a question about Tina and her style of directing which was basically answered earlier. So after Scott answered it, we all threw our hand up again hoping to get a 'new' question to end it with. But to no avail. All in all I am very glad I was there to be a part of this discussion. 

Three hours of running around a stage, delivering Shakespeare dialog, missing not a step nor a word, my appreciation of her as an actress increased ten-fold after seeing this play. She carries this play. She carries it with passion, style and grace. She has incredible acting range, timing and delivery. 
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I find when I glance at the clock and if it's just before 8pm, I smile knowing there's a few hundred people who will be taken for the ride of their lives without ever leaving the Hartford Stage.

Tina Landau may have taken us to Egypt, but Kate gave us Cleopatra.