Ours for the Taking

I think often about how it's literally never been easier to educate yourself. Or cheaper. To want, to have the time to dedicate your life to enriching your knowledge all day every day, and you would still only begin scratching the surface of the wealth of wisdom that's free for the taking.

Over the past couple of weeks, I've been savoring my most recent discovery, the National Theatre at Home subscription service. In retrospect, it's absurd that it took me so long to hear about it, but there we are. How it happened was I'd been looking for a recording of last year's Vanya for many months, had asked about it at the Theatre itself twice while there, but only knew about their DVD collection, National Theatre Live, of which I'd seen several. But no luck. Then one day, quite by accident, I discovered it was available online, along with an extensive catalog of some of NT's greatest recent hits, and all for just 10 GBP a month.
That's less than a ticket costs here, let alone in London.

Needless to say I was thrilled and got myself a month-long subscription immediately. I've been busy watching as many plays as my days physically allow. Falling in love with one production after another.

Vanya alone, a take on the Chekhov classic, where Andrew Scott plays every single character (mind-blowingly) was alone worth the subscription price. What a lesson, what an exercise in acting mastery, I've never seen anything like this man. It's certainly not an easy thing jumping around between 8 or so different characters, and yet at no point in the play is the audience confused about what's going on. You turn off the thing with a vivid memory of everything that you've seen, where everyone was, even though it was only one man. What a delight. Truth is, I'd built it up so much in my mind, I thought it wouldn't live up, but it not only did that, it actually surpassed it.

Then I discovered Zeldin's The Other Place, which is an Antygone adaptation with Tobias Menzies and Emma D'Arcy. Saw it twice, and am bound to see it a few more times before my subscription runs out. I can get very obsessive, I know, when I discover something or someone I like.

I won't take you through them all, but it's just been one extraordinary production after another. There's such an abundance of fantastic actors (it is, after all, the National), and even for someone like me, who's a bit of a theatre buff, there's so much to discover, so many new plays and playwrights to adore. A winding web of history and who inspired who, and iconic performances and themes that in turn inspire me.

It's easily one of the best ways to spend ten pounds.

It's an interesting new experience, being able to view theatre at home, to pause and turn the captions on and most of all to watch again, to pick apart what the writer does and why. It feels like being back in school. Well, so much of my life now is about studying and being in school, various schools, and I suppose this just fits into the theme of my life.

Feels a little like an endless feast, where everything I do or watch or listen is nourishing in some way. Right now, I'm drawing on podcasts, theatre, books I'm reading, classes at PA, conversations, everything that surrounds me is serving as creative fodder (and replenishing my inner well). It feels like any moment now, I'm about to burst. By rights, I should burst with this abundance of knowledge that's being thrust my way.

And yet, I don't. I feel like I've uncovered this beautiful, secret trove. Like I have no right to taste so much art and so many exciting novel ideas.

I'm getting a sense of my life that the more I accept, the more the Universe gives, and I wonder whether it could really all be so easy.

You know, whenever I go to London, I read the theatre websites, looking for things to see. Am frankly astounded at the prices. Personally, I think it's a little ridiculous paying 500 pounds to see some Hollywood star on the stage. Some are definitely worth it, though I do think a lot of them are over-hyped. And while I always end up loving my time there, there's a part of me that regrets a bit, that thinks of all these plays with (some) great people, or directed by some fantastically talented folks, and not being able to see them.

Well, you might not get to see all of them, but you get to see a lot. For all the bad things technology has done, it's brought such a staggering amount of knowledge and wisdom to our doorstep. And here's us, still not taking it.

If you're someone who's into theatre, I do recommend trying the NT subscription. It's fantastic.

But even if you're not, what's one seemingly little way by which you're broadening your own horizons lately? :)