Yes, we are still here.

Today was a rather uneventful day. Sorry. I went to class early this morning (yes we take classes here) and we performed our scene from All My Sons. It went well, especially for being the first group to go. Then I came home and worked on a paper that was due at five.

Tonight we went and saw a show at the Hampstead Theatre called Andersen's English. Now when I first of this show, I didn't care to see it at all. It sounded boring and awful. My opinion has changed fully.

The premise of the story is that Hans Christian Andersen (interestingly enough played by a black actor in this show) shows up unannounced at the home of Charles Dickens. However, Andersen, a Dane, has extremely poor English skills. And so there is a fair amount of humor that comes from his innocent attempts to understand both the language and the customs of the household.

The rest of the story is not so happy as it examines the decaying world of Charles Dickens, who is forcing a son to go to war in India, forcing his wife to separate from him, kicking out the Irish maidservant who is pregnant with his son's child out of wedlock, and so on. It's hard to watch in the way that drama should be. It was incredibly well written and very quotable (I just don't remember many of them...).

Mostly it came down to the wonderful script and some very strong performances by some key actors. Dickens was incredibly engaging to the point of becoming annoying, which helps the audience to connect with his wife and son who have become fed up with his emotional abuse of sorts. Andersen worked very well. This was one of those roles that challenges actors by not allowing them to really use their voice, which is one of their main tools.

Anyhow, the show was one of the better ones that I have seen so far. Also it was one of the cheapest and we had seats in row 2. So the experience was great as well.

I plan on posting more tomorrow (look at me keeping my little resolution thing). Tomorrow we are heading to Primark, which is a chain of second-hand/cheap clothing shops. Then we are seeing Twelfth Night at the Tricycle Theatre as a matinee. There also has been some talk of going to the National Theatre tomorrow night to see if we can find another show.

I know it seems like I'm going to see a lot of shows, but for me that's the whole point of being here. I love it. I'm so happy that there's so much to see.