The Globe Is (Not Just) A Stage

London’s Globe Theatre Is Where the Bard Once Entertained Nobility and Everyday Folk Alike. The Verve of the Shakespearean Era Is Still Captured Well Here

- Shreya Sen-Handley

Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon ‘em,” Twelfth Night’s Malvolio proclaims as he struts across the stage, cross-gartered in canary yellow-tights, to the laughter of a packed theatre, basking in the mellow, English midday sun. An ebony giant in a gold lamé dress and a towering Diana Ross wig strikes up a full-throated song in the deepest baritone from the balcony overhead. Our attention skitters upwards. Up over the strong timber pillars holding up the sweep of this Jacobean theatre’s embellished galleries. Up past the pagoda-like peaked roof arching over the stage to the open azure skies, where a helicopter hovers watchfully. As if waiting its turn, with a flock of pigeons, to swoop down on stage to join in the horseplay of Maria and Sir Toby.

“Why, this is very midsummer madness!” Olivia declares then, and we in the audience wholeheartedly agree. Yet, it is the best kind of madness; full of sunshine, song and the confluence of communities—Londoners, tourists, lovers, friends and families—and art of the highest order, bridging time and culture. But not place. No links are required to bring the original stage for Shakespeare’s plays together with the floorboards the performers are treading on now. Because we are at the Globe Theatre, besides the Thames in London, where the only bridges required are to cross the shimmering river. Everything else—the bustle, ballyhoo and bonhomie—are eternal and universal, needing no translation.