The Kings:
We've Got Magic to do just for you...
we've got miracle plays to play.
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The King of Siam
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The King of Hearts
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The King of the Holy Roman Empire
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The King of Edessa
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The King of Camelot
We've got parts to perform,
hearts to warm,
Kings and things to take by storm
as we go along our way.
Life has, from time-to-time, provided occasion to study the lives of some of history's most influential kings. This is a tale of the kings, therefore; some who existed literally and some who existed in literature. I've always been interested in the study of their power. At this point, I think it's a foregone conclusion that we all probably derive from Kings, to be honest. My genes certainly do. Pretty much everybody can claim descent from Charlemagne, we're told, but the elite think that's something super-duper special. They covet that bloodline and the Jesus bloodline. It's all about blood and power on this planet to them and they are obsessed with it. And so we should be obsessed with why they are obsessed with it. The theatre forced me into encounters with a few of these kingly figures: I played "Pippin", the princely son of King Charlemagne the Great, who dethroned his father and himself became king; and I played a sort of mentor to a metaphorical spiritual king in "King of Hearts". But the first of these theatrical intersections occurred when I was cast as lowly palace guard to the King of Siam in "The King and I".
"The King and I"
Palace Guard to the King of Siam
But wait. I'm getting way ahead of myself. I should back up. It began for me in a palace with dutiful servants and acolytes and fanatics to the form of make-believe. The palace of Thespus called Telfair B. Peet Theatre. In the far-away southern end of the land known as Alabama, in a village called Auburn.
Cool links for the theatre.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/150881199@N03/32036261791/in/photostream/
https://www.baileyharris.com/portfolio-archive/telfair-b-peet-theatre-auburn-university/
https://calendar.auburn.edu/telfair_b_peet_theater_619
University theatre is idyllic. A well-funded machine to make theatre magic happen. The theatre department was its own kingdom. I was an incoming serf and I really was Johnny Hayseed who just one day surprised everyone when he said he'd be majoring in theatre. And I was overwhelmed by the world I stepped into. It was like everyone had a secret I didn't have. I was utterly clueless. That first year started with a touring show of "On Golden Pond" in from the Alliance Theatre, and then we did "Last of the Red Hot Lovers" and Brinsley Sheridan's "The Rivals" on mainstage — which kind of blew my mind that the goofballs I saw in the hallways were THIS talented. It left me in awe. And then there was the big build-up to the winter musical which deployed all the departments' substantial resources. "The King and I" was the big splashy show that everyone was waiting for. And it did not disappoint. It was an eye-popping spectacle. I've seen more intimate productions of "The King and I" and it just doesn't quite work. You have to have the scale of that large proscenium stage for the oversized lavishness of the Siamese court. And that big old proscenium stage we had was incredible.
Nothing at college made sense to me until I did a play. Classes didn't even make sense to me because I didn't know what we were doing, even though we'd already produced several mainstage productions and even though classes occurred IN the theatre complex. I still couldn't put it together. What I lacked was an understanding of the machine of producing a play, and the backstage culture involved with its performance is when it all makes sense. Suddenly you know. I was in no way ready for a lead role on mainstage, so I was cast as spear carrier #5. Or whatever. I was thrilled. I just wanted to see how it all worked. So I invented a life for him and made him as real as I could. And I watched it all come together. Ashley was our Mrs. Anna and she was fabulous. The entire production was A+. The music majors handled the ingenue singing roles of Tuptim and Lun Tha, and there was the fantastic Simon of Legree ballet for the dance depatment. "The King and I" brought together the drama department, the music department, the dance department — and there were children. LOTS of children. Once I saw all the pieces spinning from the vantage point of the performer, from within, then I understood. But to say that I was clueless is an insult to clueless. I was actually traumatized by the scale of everything I saw, and the flurry of activity I couldn't find my rhythm in.
Debbie and I were rehearsing "The Owl and the Pussycat" at the same time she was rehearsing with Todd in the Theatre Upstairs (our smaller black box theatre) for "When Ya Comin' Back, Red Ryder?" Todd was Eduardo's roommate. Having allies makes things more understandable.
Things shifted once Debbie came along.
Eduardo was the third member in our intense little trio. This was the gang:
REDs:
Ron, Ed, Debbie.
Debbie and my roommate, Steve.
"The King and I"? What's it about?
"Well, there's this guard..."
"The King and I" is based on a real Siamese king, Mongkut, and I played his palace guard. The play is really all about power and a clash of wills between the King and Anna (new governess and teacher to his wives and children) that undergirds this play's unique love story. Upon immediate arrival Anna finds herself at war with the brusque patriarchy of court life, and outraged by the King's treatment of her as his servant (which, of course, she was ).
"Your servant, your servant, indeed I’m not your servant…"
This wonderful Rodgers and Hammerstein masterpiece is a 1950s feminist's tale recast in 1862 as a love story in the Siamese royal court. The musical is unabashedly about human rights and wages a frontal assault against oppressors of equality. Rodgers and Hammerstein very often employed the social issues of their time as themes for their musicals (i.e., racism in "South Pacific", Nazism in "The Sound of Music", etc.) to great effect.
"Shall We Dance?" is a great theatre moment and I can tell you from watching it every night, it always moved the audiences to rousing applause. Every time. When these two bull-headed personalities caught up in a power struggle with each other finally touch in this number, it is pure electricity. And audiences always lose their minds. Without fail. It also has to do with the motion of that ginormous dress flung all around a gigantic stage (the dress is a thing in the show; the children wonder if Mrs. Anna is shaped like that under her dress). The King's minimalist, nearly naked attire, is emblematic of his rawness while her voluminous dresses are emblematic of her over-stuffed mid-1800s Victorian morality, and what we're really seeing in "Shall We Dance?", of course, is an epically musicalized roll in the royal hay. I remember watching this for the first time from the wings with an audience and I was amazed at the reaction. It's a marvelously crafted theatre moment that makes this play great — and it works every time. I had not seen that one coming. You have to do a really lousy production of "King and I" for that number not to work (and it doesn't work as well in intimate venues; part of the mathematics of the reaction has to do with the scale and grandiosity).
ANNA AND THE KING OF SIAM (1946)
[Two Oscars.]
https://ok.ru/video/295419710115
https://fmovies.cafe/movie/anna-and-the-king-of-siam-v5oz2/1-1
https://www.bitchute.com/video/r1ntO4DXLGT6/
FURTHER EXPLORATIONS
Anna and The King (Thai Residence of Anna’s son, Louis)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSxYkCALLMY
Anna and the King: Who Was The Real Anna Leonowens?
... but because I totally made that badass dress Mrs. Anna is wearing...
So the story starts at the docks in Bangkok, Siam. 1862.
Mrs. Anna Leonowens is arriving with her son Louis to teach the wives, concubines, and many royal children of the King of Siam.
This play was significant not only because it was my first stage appearance (Palace Guard to the King of Siam)...
sitting at that sewing machine right there:
Moi. The King's guard...
For me, a good Baptist boy, having to say the words "Praise to Buddha" was the first time I remember understanding how to separate my beliefs from the beliefs of a character. And it was a peek down the corridors of time to when kings snapped their fingers and commanded their subjects to bow and genuflect and worship upon their orders. I knew all of this in history books, of course, but to be among humans acting this story out together on a stage, powered by the magic of illusion and amplified by the audience who happily fed us their rapt attention — well, it was indescribably intoxicating. It was more like a spiritual event to me, to be honest. I had no idea what I was doing, but I determined that I absolutely would learn.
"THE KING AND I" (1956)
[Five Oscars, including Yul Brynner for Lead Actor]
https://moviesjoy.to/movie/the-king-and-i-13603/
https://ok.ru/video/215184837138
