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We\u2019re just back from a matinee performance of Michael Frayn\u2019s Noises Off<\/em> at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. \u00a0To the best of my recollection, I\u2019ve seen only two plays by Michael Frayn, and they are about as different as could possibly be conceived. \u00a0I\u2019ve seen Noises Off<\/em> twice before, I think, and it\u2019s about the most slapstick farce imaginable. \u00a0Lots of action. \u00a0Hilarious. \u00a0By contrast, Copenhagen<\/em>, which we saw here in London years ago, is a very serious play that is focused very serious ideas. \u00a0Almost no \u201caction.\u201d \u00a0Just conversation. \u00a0I would love to see it again, but only if it featured a superb cast. \u00a0(It has only three characters \u2014 Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, and, coming onto the stage only from time to time, Margrethe N\u00f8rlund Bohr, the wife of Niels Bohr.) \u00a0I regard Copenhagen<\/em> as one of the greatest and most memorable theatrical experiences of my life.<\/p>\n We toyed with the idea of going to see Sir Kenneth Branagh\u2019s production of King Lear<\/em>, in which he stars and which he directed. \u00a0My wife once performed as Cordelia in a BYU production of Lear<\/em>, and she has a special love for the play. \u00a0But the reviews of it that we read were pretty uniformly negative, tickets to it were quite expensive, and, anyway, we need to be up quite early tomorrow for our return flight home to Salt Lake City. \u00a0So we opted for the Noises Off<\/em> matinee, instead.<\/p>\n And, as it turns out, the Theatre Royal Haymarket, which dates back to 1720, making it the third oldest still-functioning theater in London, was the very first theater to do<\/em> matinees.<\/p>\n Prior to walking to the theater, we strolled a little bit around the area of Trafalgar Square. \u00a0We had actually planned to spend some time in the National Gallery, but we decided, first, to dip into the Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields \u2014 and we were hooked. \u00a0(I had heard of the church long before visiting it for the first time, many years ago: \u00a0I was and am very fond of the chamber orchestra recordings created by the late Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. \u00a0Today, Joshua Bell is the Academy\u2019s Music Director.) \u00a0An a cappella<\/em> mixed quartet drawn from St. Martin\u2019s Voices<\/a> were practicing. \u00a0A bit of Renaissance polyphony, I think, that I did not recognize. \u00a0It was exquisitely beautiful. \u00a0And so we stayed for the 1 PM eucharistic service, at which the group were also singing. \u00a0Today, by the way, is All Saints\u2019 Day.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n My admiration for Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye is deep. \u00a0That\u2019s one of the reasons why I invited her to write a personal essay in Interpreter for Easter 2020. \u00a0(See \u201cChrist and the Work of Suffering.\u201d<\/a>). Now I look forward to reading her new book, Sacred Struggle<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I posted the item below on Monday and again on Tuesday. \u00a0I\u2019m posting it yet again just to ensure that Everybody\u2019s WC has had full opportunity to see it. \u00a0When I first encountered his explanation that he hates me because of my supposedly vicious campaign to harm an anonymous friend of his, I thought that he might, for once, be expressing a sincere (if mistaken and misguided) sentiment. \u00a0That\u2019s still a theoretical possibility, I suppose. \u00a0Given his long track record, though, I\u2019m much more inclined to believe that he\u2019s either been played by somebody or \u2014 by far the more likely explanation \u2014 that it\u2019s just another of his malignant fictions about me:<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been mildly puzzled for years now about the hostile personal fixation that some pseudonymous folks over at the Peterson Obsession Board seem to have on me. \u00a0Well, I finally have a clue with regard to one of them \u2014 the one that I\u2019ve identified here as Everybody\u2019s WC<\/em> \u2014 who claims that he hates me because of a multiyear crusade of defamation and slander and ceaseless personal attacks that I conducted against his best friend in an attempt to get that friend fired. \u00a0Having seen the stress, the hurt, and the frustration that his friend and his friend\u2019s family suffered over those years, Everybody\u2019s WC has concluded that I am, in his words, \u201cpure evil.\u201d<\/p>\n That would be a somewhat understandable reaction, I suppose, if a bit overwrought. \u00a0But\u00a0I have literally no idea what he\u2019s talking about. \u00a0I can think of no such case. \u00a0Even after searching through all of the dim recesses of my mind, I can\u2019t think of any instance in which I\u2019ve ever sought to have anybody fired. \u00a0Moreover, I can\u2019t even imagine myself doing such a thing. \u00a0What on earth does he have in mind?<\/p>\n I really would like to know. \u00a0Seriously. \u00a0So I invite him, or some surrogate for him, either to contact me privately or to post something here in the comments section so that I can understand his accusation. \u00a0As it is, I haven\u2019t the foggiest idea.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n And here are three bloodcurdling horrors from the inexhaustible Christopher Hitchens \u201cHow Religion Poisons Everything\u201d File<\/em>\u2122:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Posted from Bankside, London, England<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 \u00a0 We\u2019re just back from a matinee performance of Michael Frayn\u2019s Noises Off at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. \u00a0To the best of my recollection, I\u2019ve seen only two plays by Michael Frayn, and they are about as different as could possibly be conceived. \u00a0I\u2019ve seen Noises Off twice before, I think, and it\u2019s about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":41821,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[10429,9688,36842,36839,36845,36848],"class_list":["post-102503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-copenhagen","tag-london","tag-michael-frayn","tag-noises-off","tag-theatre-royal-haymarket","tag-west-end"],"yoast_head":"\n<\/a><\/a><\/a>
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