Mystery Plays

I attended the Wakefield Mysteries last night and thought they did a pretty good job with the whole performance. They had a nice description on the back of the program explaining the origins of the plays and their purposes. The modernization and humor added to the play made it quite enjoyable and interesting. I felt like they captured the purpose of informing the general audience of specific Bible stories and had some very creative props and backdrops.

The cast also did an excellent job with their parts. I especially enjoyed the performance by Keith Wyma, who played Lucifer. The creativity of when he was portraying the serpent tempting Eve was excellent; he was “snake-like” in everything he did. Although not dressed like a serpent, the movements he performed left little doubt to the audience on what he was.

I enjoyed “The Garden of Eden,” but my favorite rendition was “The Killing of Abel.” The cast, writing, humor, and modernization of the story made it quite entertaining. The moral lessons were not difficult to figure out and the story was quite simple, but again, the creativity behind the story made it very entertaining.

I have to admit, I was a little disappointed in “The Shepherd’s Play.” From what we read in class, I thought the humor was kind of lacking. Now, do not get me wrong, I thought they did an excellent job and thought the rendition was pretty good; however, I was looking forward to seeing how they portrayed Mak’s character. My favorite part of “The Second Shepherd’s Play” that we read in class was when Mak tried to uphold his lie to the very end, even when he knew it was hopeless. They pretty much cut that whole part out. They did, however, include the blanket scene. Overall, all the renditions were a great performance with quite a bit of creativity in the modernization, the props, and the cast.