I see. I’m not sure it would really trip my trigger to see extant plays performed by the original troupe. I took your question more along the lines of “what new plays would you commission from the Bard if you could go back and do so?” One must admit that it would be fascinating to see how Shakespeare would handle material unfamiliar to his era.
It would be interesting to see *Hamlet *at the Globe, but more to see how an Elizabethan-Jacobean audience reacted to the various elements than to see how Shakespeare staged them. Not so much as Steken implies with the various cruderies, but to see what meanings that may be lost on 2012 audiences were crystal clear to the Bard’s contemporaries.
OK, I know this is a tangent but I’m really curious - what makes it your favourite?
I have to admit I loathe it - I want to kick just about every single character, I think anyone who says ‘More than our brother is our chastity’ should be fired out of a catapult for the royal we alone, and I think it has only a fraction of the beauty of language of most of the other plays. But I know a lot of people are really passionate about it - look how often it shows up in this thread - and I’ve always felt like I must be missing something. What is it?
Most of them, but I’d really like to see how Comedy of Errors was directed. The “twins” thing has been done again and again (mostly badly) I would love to see how Shakespeare handled it. I would also like to see how he handled the physical aspects of the humor in that play. It has so much potential for physical (read slapstick) comedy.
That’s not a tangent. The premise is just an excuse to talk about Renaissance plays, though I’m sure at some point I’ll say something racist about the Welsh.