What do Shakespeare and Harry Potter both have in common?

Inside the Globe

Well for one thing they are the reason's I have traveled to London, and the other is that today's events revolved around both of them as well. So on Thursday we began our day with a very detailed tour (3 hrs) of Shakespeare and visited some area's that would have been in his everyday life. We were able to see where the 2nd Globe stood and exactly how close The Rose theater was from it since remains of both sites have been found. We continued on and saw a very touching memorial to the "women of the night" who were buried in a lot by a brothel because they were not allowed to be buried on Sacred grounds. A while back when they were digging to make the underground, they found lots of Women's bodies (some of them with child) who had been put here. To this day people still visit the site to remember those women. What's really sad is that it's tucked away in an unseen part of London and many of the Londoners probably don't even realize it's there. After visiting the memorial we continued down numerous streets named after what they were known to have carried during that time, people in Shakespeare's time were so inventive. For example, Bread lane is where the bread makers were stationed as well as milk street where obviously the milk man would be. Eventually we ended up on Bear Gardens which was known for its' bear bating rings (a popular entertainment during Shakespeare's time where they would tie up a bear and let dogs attack him).  On the end of the street was an actual Ferryman's bench that had been preserved, an exact date of when it was first built is not known. After that we walked a bit further to the Current location of the Globe Theater. We took a small tour of the Globe which really consisted of sitting/standing in the different areas within the theater. After the tour finished we headed to another part of the Glove where they had an exhibition that consisted of the Globe history, past design ideas, and even some demonstrations. A group of us soon headed back to the dorms since we had spent so much time on our feet earlier in the morning, that we just wanted to relax for a bit. On the way back some of us stopped at an Italian restaurant and picked up some food to go. When we got back to the dorm I ate my food and then took a small nap before we had to head back for a new type of theater experience. We finally headed out in search of the Almedia Theatre for a brand new experience called The Theatre Brothel. The idea behind it is that we go in and speak with some assistance who ask us a variety of questions before finally suggesting what plays for us to watch. Out of 6 possible show we are then given colored poker chips to two of the shows, not knowing which one we'll be watching. The first show that I watched (Blue chip) was about Judas. It was very interactive and basically told the story of what happened the week of Jesus' execution and what events lead up to his betrayal. This show was very enjoyable and combined a great about of audience participation, comedy, and dramatic effect. The second show I watched (Orange chip) was about two older men who invest their time and some money into a Russian mail order bride site. I personally thought the show was OK, thinking that it was bland and lack personality and quite frankly I zoned out within the first 5 minutes of the show. The blocking choices could have been a little better since a lot of the play took place on the ground and since there was no raked stage it was very hard for anyone other than the first two rows to see what was going on.

Memorial to the Women of the night

By the time both shows were over it was a little after 10:30. Thinking that we were late, Sara and I hurried back to the tube station so that we could hurry back to the dorms and change before heading to the Cinema for the last Harry Potter film. We made it back to our rooms by 11:15 and were at the theater by 11:20. When we got there we were surprised to see that people were still lining up and that the doors were still closed, so we decided to grab some food from the snack bar. When it was my turn I asked for the popcorn combo which was just a regular popcorn and a large drink. The lady asked me if I wanted salted popcorn or the sweet kind. I replied salted and then asked if they had butter. She giggled and replied no as if only "an American" would ask that. Anyways I changed my mind and told her that I wanted the sweet kind, and boy am I glad I did. It tasted just like kettle corn and was super tasty. Finally around 11:45 they let us into the theater and we took our seats. The screen was much smaller than that of a typical American movie theater. At around 11:55 the lights went down and I got super giddy, but turns out there was no reason too because here in the UK they show commercials before they show the movie, and even before the previews. The commercials last about 25 minutes and some of them were rather ridiculous. For those of us Americans who didn't know of these commercials we were quite upset since the ticket said the movie started at 12:05 and not 12:30 when it finally began. Needless to say once the actual movie started it was greeted with cheer and whoops from its' dedicated fans.

Our group at the Midnight Premiere

I really loved the movie and thought that it was a great way to end the series. I saw it in 3D and honestly I couldn't really tell except for a couple of parts, but then again I could have just been distracted with it being the last movie and not really have paid that much attention to the 3D effects. Anyway, my biggest fear was that I would start crying hysterically during the movie and would be asked to leave because I was disturbing the other viewers. Although I did cry, It was bad enough for them to kick me out and the people next to me said they couldn't tell that I was. I told them that I was trying super hard not to make noise when I was crying, especially when Harry goes to the forest and uses the resurrection stone to see his loved ones. I'm pretty sure that was the one part that sent me over the edge. Being someone who has grown up with these books since I was ten and has watched all the movies religiously, it was really hard to say goodbye since not only was this an end of an era, but also the official end of my childhood. Overall I thought it was a way to end it and was super excited to have been able to watch it before anyone in the US.