Two years ago tonight — life changing theater with Richard Armitage
I was looking at my copy of The Crucible today. This is a night I will never forget.
Richard Armitage’s entry into the scene as John Proctor in Act One of The Crucible, June 2014. Photo by Geraint Lewis.
Me + Richard Armitage 
I was blown away when I had read all your posts re The Crucible. I’ve watched the performance via DT this year. The live performance and the recorded one can’t be compared. But the impression was still very strong. When I put my impression and description of your experience together – well, it’s like I’ve been there myself that everning. I wish I could go to NYC this Fall deep, deep sigh but all I can affrod is to read a play (ordered it t on Amazon) and wait for the fans’ reviews.
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I wish you could come as well!
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So nice to read all this again (including Guylty’s version). Can’t believe that it is already 2 years ago. Time flies….
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indeed. I was thinking something this morning about two years being sort of the time frame of my current career discomfort … but it doesn’t seem that long at all.
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It was great to re-read your account again. It brought everything back in a flash – the excitement, the wonder, the energy – and it makes me wonder why I can never remember these anniversaries. Maybe it is because the memory is still so vivid that I don’t feel it is two years ago… more like a couple of months. On the danger of sounding really sentimental, but I feel very lucky that I was allowed to see that play three times – and to share your first night of seeing it.
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August is a crazy heavy month for me — two family members with birthdays, mom’s death, this, and until recently always the beginning of the academic term as occasion for reflection. I’m always thinking hard in August about what has happened in the past. However, I still think about this particular occasion at least once a week anyway — for months I looked at the signed copy of my Crucible book every single day. I, too, still remember us rushing outside the theater and me being so excited that I only wanted to speak German in case someone was listening. That was an amazing night! I’m really glad that could be our first meeting as well, too.
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Goooldig!…Da seid ihr also bei all der Aufregung ins Deutsche verfallen (sicher ist sicher, obwohl… ich weiß aus sicherer Quelle, dass noch so mach andere deutschsprachige Fanin dieses Stück gesehen hat). Es gibt eben Momente, da wäre man einfach gerne privat und nur unter Freunden. (Ich verfalle bei solchen Gelegenheiten manchmal in möglichst schweren Dialekt. Das versteht dann hoffentlich auch nicht jeder, den es nichts angeht.)
Herzlichen Dank für all eure eindrucksvollen Beschreibungen. Ich habe mittlerweile so viel über dieses Stück gelesen, dass ich fast das Gefühl habe, dabei gewesen zu sein. Hoffentlich wird das im Herbst auch so sein. Ich bin schon sehr gespannt.
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For various reasons too stupid to go into now, I was trying really hard not to be recognized — no one expects Serv to be standing front of a theater, gesticulating wildly and spouting German. I thought at most a German might think it was silly for an American to be speaking German. I think it worked, though 🙂
Thanks for the kind words about the description. I really wanted people to feel like they were there, not least because I thought I wouldn’t be able to go and then went — I wanted there to be extensive documentation available, even if inevitably influenced by my perspective.
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Es ist dir – und vielen anderen auch – richtig gut gelungen, eure Emotionen zu vermitteln. Die unterschiedlichen Sichtweisen und Wahrnehmungen sind sehr interessant. Was euch allen gemeinsam war, ist die Begeisterung. Das Stück muss unglaublich intensiv gewesen sein. Die Aufzeichnung vermittelt das natürlich nur teilweise, deshalb bin ich so dankbar für deine/eure Mühe. (Außerdem ist es einfach goldig (mir fällt gerade wirklich kein besseres Wort ein), wenn sich patente, kluge und mitten im Leben stehende Frauen kurzzeitig mal wieder so jung fühlen können… ) 😉
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It was really intensive. One thing I like about the recording is that everyone can see some of the things that only the first few rows in the theater probably saw during the live performances. It’s not as intense as the live experience was — but it does a good job of capturing the play.
re: feeling young again — you’ve said it. I never expected that was possible; as an actor, Armitage has given me that feeling of renewal over and over again.
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I don’t know what it was like to be in the theater. However, I was completely mesmerized, and on the edge of my seat the times I watched it on my laptop. That was so gut wrenching, intense, and exhausting that I can’t imagine how emotional it was in the theater. Note of caution to everyone, when my laptop died, I replaced it with an Amazon fire 10″ tablet. I can’t download The Crucible on it. It is an android, and Digital Theatre doesn’t have an android app yet. They are in development supposedly, but who knows. This is certainly not an issue that ever would have occurred to me, so hopefully this info will help someone else. Anyway, how sweet was Richard to meet with the fans when the show was cancelled? Not many people would’ve done that. 💝
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Yeah — it was incredibly nice. And definitely was a signal that he has an idea what’s at stake for so many fans in a trip like that.
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Yet you don’t want to do the stage door at LLL?
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I’m pretty ambivalent about the stage door thing, although I definitely enjoy observing. I’ve been thinking about blogging about it because I know at least one person who feels similarly to me and it might be interesting to some. Maybe as the day gets closer.
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Now you have me reading and reading….this will take awhile…….Memories emerging of all that excitement and all the unforgettable moments….have I read all this before??…. Unglaublich….I’m endlessly grateful and joyous to have been able to see the play several times, and it’s marvellous to find (and re-read) all this incredibly wonderful written accounts of your visits and your impressions of the play and all the things that were going on around the performances. Sigh……We’ve been there!!!
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Thanks. I really hope we can have comparable experiences this fall in NYC and document and share them as much as possible. Part of why I wanted to see LLL was my memory of how exhilarating The Crucible was.
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Yeah, I hope so too, even it is somehow hard for me to imagine. Everything seems so different, and I don’t have the slightest idea of the area where the theatre is. The cast all in all is so much younger, though Richie isn’t the oldest!! 😉 The ‘outward’ atmosphere (room,smell,sound) of the The Crucible/Old Vic is probably not easy to surpass! Not that it is anyhow fair or possible to compare both plays with each other.
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This theater is so much smaller and I hope more intimate (although it will be hard to beat that experienced of sitting on the stage with thea ctors), but I can’t imagine they’ll go for the full bore sensory experience.
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It crosses my mind: On that very day you describe I wasn’t in London but in York, because on my longish holidays in England that summer 2014 I went inbetween times for a few days to Yorkshire. Wanted to go there in so long. Brilliant trip to Howard Castle and Riveaulx Abbey that day. Still I have to admit that there were some moments of regret where I missed the opportunities to hang out at the Cut/The Old Vic during that week. It was an unaccustomed feeling of being somehow bereft of Richard Armitage (and yes, you have a much better way with putting something like that into words, Serv!)after an intense week of attending various performances of TC.
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I can imagine — by the time I left I had seen the play seven times, but I would definitely have gone again to see him — the feeling of energy that he (and the cast) created was definitely addictive and left me with Entzugserscheinungen, too.
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Man. Hard to believe that was really two years ago.
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Time has been racing by lately. But this is still so present for me, too.
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Oh what a night! I never remember these kinds of anniversaries. I knew I’d met him roughly 2 years ago but had forgotten the date.
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That was an AMAZING night (hugs).
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