Globe Theater

A replica Globe Theater has been built along the Thames.  We were lucky enough to get one of the last few seats for Anthony and Cleopatra for the very last evening of the trip.   We were in the first balcony, looking down on the groundlings who were standing in the middle.  It is almost June, but the evening was quite cool, and I supplemented my layers with a newspaper across my lap to keep warm. 

It was a great complement to our visit to the Cleopatra exhibit at a museum in Paris.  That exhibit started with artifacts from the time of Cleopatra, as well as coins and such that may have had her image on them.  Then it went on to the representation of the Cleopatra story in the various arts over the years.  There were lots and lots of pictures of her being bit by the snake.

And both of these were a great complement to my reading of the award-winning Cleopatra biography a couple of years ago.  In the biography, she is a shrewd leader – not deserving of the label whore given by Shakespeare.