Vinci's Notebooks Are Notebooks example essay topic
346 words
Da Vinci's Notebooks Are Notebooks, Not a Play The Play "Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci", was a very artistic rendition of the five-thousand-odd pages of Leonardo"s handwritten notebooks. Although the consummate renaissance man, Leonardo had not planned for his notebooks to be acted out, although he did seem to want them to be read, as his voice was that of an author, and not a journal writer. Wanted to be read or not, they were not meant to be performed. When the brilliant words of this great thinker are mingled with excellent actors performing marvelously choreographed stage direction, it should be an excellent production, but this turned out to be much less. The words were hard to follow, and merited more of my attention than I was able to give them, due to the sensory overload given to me by the playwright. I found the monologous structure to be infuriating, and more over the dancers moving all independently of one another and of the cadence of the recitals, were rather uninspiring, and distracting from some of the more interesting and difficult concepts. I might have been better off had I closed my eyes. The set design on the other hand was more than amazing; I have heard someone liken it to their thoughts of Da Vinci's mind.
The drawers all filled with different things, and at the end of the play, many of the drawers were gone, carried or rolled off stage. the various surprises removed from the drawers, were to me the high points of the play, there was everything from living birds, to a stratified model of the earth, to a recessed stairway into the wall. The dual purposes the things in the set served were quite cool, the bars overhead looked like pipes, and fit into the brain-like imagery well, but were also bars for gymnastics, and for stringing a display on perspective up. The lighting was cool, both from the normal places, and from the odd, and unexpected positions behind the stage.
