We spent the remainder of the afternoon hanging out at the hotel...not necessarily a bad thing toward the end of a long week of sight-seeing. For dinner, we found that the hotel joined up with an underground mall (that connected to the Seabus station). So, we wandered through there and stopped at McDonald's for dinner. Then, we caught a taxi to take us to our last planned event in Vancouver - a play.
We went to see the "Merchant of Venice" by William Shakespeare, as performed by the Bard on the Beach theater group. Here's the history of the group, as described in the program we received at the play.
"Bard of the Beach Shakespeare Festival was established in 1990 with a mandate to provide Vancouver residents and tourists with affordable, accessible Shakespearean productions of the finest quality. The Festival began as an Equity Co-op, funded primarily by a Canada Council Explorations grant awarded to founding artistic Director Christopher Gaze. Bard of the Beach is now a fully professional theatre company, engaging more than 40 actors as well as exceptional directors, designers, and technicians.We enjoyed the play, though it did spark a philosophical debate on the way home about the treatment of certain characters. We also found a neat Shakespeare tie for my Dad's funky tie collection.The Festival presents three Shakespeare plays in Vanier park from June through September in two open-ended tents - the 525-seat Mainstage and the 420-seat Studio Stage. Attendance has grown from 6,000 patrons in 1990 to more than 66,000 patrons in 2002."
Picture of the stage setup, from the Bard on the Beach program:
Ticket Stub:
