All Hail Macbeth!

On Saturday our group went on a Shakespearean tour on the other side of the Thames. We went around some really old parts of the city, saw some of the original sites, as well as places where the plays supposedly took place. When we left the weather looked about like this:

As we lunched in Borough Market (delicious by the way. I chose a wild boar sandwich. The Brits seem to have a special something for sausage. My sandwich was just one cut in half on a bun. But surprisingly wonderful) the weather turned a bit, but nothing to be alarmed by, as it made for excellent pictures:
(Me across the way on London Bridge [the second as the first was shipped to Arizona by the whim of some ridiculously rich person])
We went to the Globe (the reproduction, also not the original) to see Macbeth. Here is one of the bagpipers that opened the Scottish play. I don't think I was technically allowed to take a picture of him, but he played for like 10 minutes, I had to do something.
This is a paper hat that folds out to fit your head, purchased by many of the elder members of the audience, as it is lightweight, space compact, and terribly handy. I thought it made them look like ice cream cones.
Here is a close up in case you were wondering what was going on in the background. It's a kind of nylon tarp with slits for the groundlings' heads. It is supposed to further layer the audience so feel like Dante's different levels of hell. I, for obvious reasons, was further up--though i was slightly jealous as the groundlings could better see Macbeth's abs and amazing back. The man was devilishly attractive. But then the creepy witches would run underneath the membrane and scare everyone who couldn't see them.

The porter had a fabulous seen where he walked around with a bucket of guck and threatened to throw it out over the audience. When he finally threw the bucket's contents all the heads disappeared as people ducked, then slowly popped back up one by one.

The sky continued to darken until the fifth act when the rain finally broke. It wasn't so bad at first, but then just got worse and worse. The biggest raindrops I've ever seen. It was enough to cancel a whole slew of sports games, but the actors kept on going. They and the groundlings were completely soaked through and then it started hailing. Naturally Macduff came up to greet the new king once Macbeth was killed, shouting, "HAIL!! Hail!!! Hail! (and for good measure) Hail hail the king!!"

Naturally I forgot my coat and umbrella on my bed, so I was soaked before too long. We bummed around West End a bit afterwards (since we saw a matinee) and got something to eat. We all were cold and wet and slightly miserable, but I thought it quite a proper London adventure.