Last night I was Hunter's date to Romeo and Juliet at the Delacorte. For those of you who have not seen Shakespeare in the park and you live in NYC - what are you waiting for? It really is one of the top ten greatest things about New York. I suppose you'll pressure me to come up with the other 9, so I'll have to get to work on that.

This is pretty remarkable production of R&J with some top-notch acting. But the most amazing thing about it is that nature is part of the show. The breeze picks up at any random moment. Hunter and I were laughing about how the breeze happened exactly on 3 scene shifts in a row. We were wondering if mother nature was perhaps the Production Stage Mangager. Then during the whole balcony scene with all the refences to the moon - Romeo and Juliet are looking up and refering to the ACTUAL waxing moon just overhead. So amazing. Ya can't do that inside the Minskoff.

Consider this my official proposal for The Public to mount a revival of The Golden Apple in the park. Can you imagine if they got a real hot air balloon to fly over the audience and land on the freakin' stage!? And come on, the "Departure to Rhododendron" act 1 finale could have a real boat that shoves off into the duck pond behind the stage! And in "Doomed, Doomed, Doomed" they could launch an actual rocket! The show practically directs itself! Christopher Gattelli, if you're reading this -- get to work on making this happen!

Let this inspire you:

Stay on for the outtakes at the end.