The Playgoer: Poster of the Day

Custom Search

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Poster of the Day


I know I posed this earlier, but I'm bumping it up again just to encourage more submissions. Thanks to those who have emailed already!

How's this for a new Playgoer feature: show us your favorite theatre posters! Email me--at playgoer_[at]_gmail_[dot]_com--a jpg of a poster for a theatrical production--a real-life production--that you just think is really, really cool, whether or not the production itself was, or whether or not you even saw it. I'll post the highlights as they come in. Tell me just what the show was, where, and when. (If you have the poster design credits, too, great.)




I'll go first. Here is an image I've never forgotten from the BAM lobby in 1992 when I saw Richard Eyre's original stage version of Ian McKellan's "fascist" Richard III on tour. It was, of course, later adapted to a successful film. But, as much as I enjoyed both incarnations, nothing in either captured the concept as eloquently and elegantly (and chillingly) as this almost minimalist collage of black, white and smoke. It's all there--the time period, the royalty, the menacing cynicism. McKellen's blank averted gaze and implied crouching posture help, too, of course.

I've actually sought this poster from one end of civilization to the other ever since. (I even shelled out on eBay for a poster from the movie--similar pose but in color and too cluttered.) But a happy ending to the quest came when I stumbled upon this site--the near-complete inventory of Royal National Theatre posters for sale! So it's mine now. Not cheap, given the exchange rate and the shipping. But mine.

Royal National Theatre, Richard III, 1991. Poster designed by Michael Mayhew, photograph by John Haynes.

1 comment:

Jaime said...

Jesus Christ that's a sexy poster.