My Hamlet action figure story is featured in the Shakespeare magazine

[dieastra]

Big honor for me - the new Shakespeare magazine is out, with a lovely post about David Tennant and fans writing about their theatre experience - and four pages of my Torchwood and Doctor Who figures doing the Hamlet play. They can be found on pages 18-21, and on page 46 is a picture of me and a little biography I had to write. Not easy to talk about yourself in only 70 words!

I knew about this for a while but didn't want to say anything before I could show you the picture - now I know what John Barrowman feels like when he has to be quiet about something! It isn't easy when you are excited and want to tell the world ;)

There is a link at the end to my LJ to see the complete story - they asked me to select only 12 pictures but there are 36 altogether. However, the link is in two lines and therefore not clickable, here is the right one: http://dieastra.livejournal.com/28212.html

Have fun! There is another page after the linked one, just turn the page:

http://issuu.com/shakespearemagazine/docs/shakespeare_magazine_02/c/subohxd



Tweeted at 07.06.2014: https://twitter.com/dieastra/status/475152702650187776

Comments

[bloodsong13t.livejournal.com]

COOL!!!

you're SO my idol! lol!

:)

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

I always wanted to be someone's idol ;)
Thank you!

[celeste9]

That's very exciting! Congrats!

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you! "I'm so excited, and I just can't hide it..." *sings*

[spaciireth.livejournal.com]

That's so cool! :D And that really was a lovely article. I love David's Doctor but I really think Shakespeare is his calling. I wish I could see him in more. You Europeans have it so good! :P At least Digital Theatre is a thing these days.

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I knew you would like it ;) In general, real people live on stage will always beat actors on a screen, it is just such a more intense experience. Especially when something unexpected might happen.

Digital Theatre is a really good invention, as well as the National Theatre cinema screenings. Just last week we went to see "The curious incident with the dog at nighttime". I might be closer to the UK, still I can't fly there every time someone or something interests me - my money and time is also limited ;)

BTW, the Richard II DVD is out now, although I have no idea whether you can play UK DVDs? I am looking forward to watch this again with subtitles, it helps me a lot in understanding.

The article and the fan experiences are lovely indeed, and so full of passion and love. If you are interested, this is what I originally wrote:

Hi!

My name is Antje Strauch, I am 40 years old and I do live in Dresden/Germany. And I can honestly say that David Tennant made me a Shakespeare fan. I used to think these plays were boring and complicated English which not even native speakers were able to understand anymore. How wrong I was. Shakespeare is very modern and we still can learn from it.

When he did “Hamlet” I was not yet a David Tennant fan so I only watched it on DVD afterwards but his performance blew me away and touched me deeply. A friend and I were so impressed that we actually set up the complete play, in exact the way it was done in DVD, with our “Torchwood” and “Doctor Who” figures. We put a lot of details into these pictures, if you like to see them, I will be adding them to this mail. I also changed a figure of the Tenth Doctor to the clothes that David wore as Hamlet.

In 2012 I went to London for the first time ever to see David Tennant and Catherine Tate in “Much Ado About Nothing”. I absolutely loved it. We only had tickets for one show but as soon as we came out of the theatre I said “I want to go again” and luckily we were able to see it a second time. I also was very happy about the official Digital Theatre download, so I am able to watch it again whenever I want to. Getting photographs and autographs from everyone at the stage door was the icing on the cake of my first live Shakespeare performance.

In December 2013 we were back to London, this time to see David as “Richard II”. Even though I had read up on the play beforehand, I admit I still had a hard time to follow all those complicated sentences and I can’t wait till it will come out on DVD so I can watch it again, preferably with subtitles. But despite of this, I still loved it as well – all actors were wonderful and the play made me quite emotional. We had very good seats in eight row.

What I love about Shakespeare plays – they are not only either comedy or drama. I was surprised to see so much humor in “Hamlet” and also in “Richard II”, and even though “Much Ado About Nothing” is a comedy, there are still very powerful and touching scenes in there. And David is wonderful in displaying all the range of emotions - from silly to serious in a heartbeat. He is such a great versatile actor.

Whoever said that Shakespeare needs to be seen and not read – is absolutely right. I may not understand every single word or double meaning joke (although reading the script afterwards helps with that as well) but still an actor can display so much by the way of pronouncation and facial expression, so still I am able to follow very well.

And of course I also had to make a figure of David looking wonderful in that white Navy uniform. I even bought a little golf car to go with it. By showing you all those pictures I just want to express how inspired I got by those Shakespeare plays and that I found a way to express my creativity through this. All thanks to a Scottish actor named David Tennant and a play writer named Shakespeare. As a result, I am also going much more often to the theatre here in my hometown than I used to before.

In 2012 I met David Tennant at a convention and I actually told him that he made me a Shakespeare fan.

My next project is making a figure of him in that Superman T-shirt...

Many thanks for listening.

Greetings from Germany,

Antje Strauch

[l-jade.livejournal.com]

That's so cool. congrats !!!

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I am quite excited, and the layout looks wonderful! They really did a great job with it.

[geekslave.livejournal.com]

That's amazing news! Happy for you!

Stacey

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you, Stacey! I am over the moon!

[tardisjournal.livejournal.com]

Oh WOW! What an honor! What a beautiful, posh-looking magazine. Your photographs look very dramatic against the black background they used.

I'm so happy for you!

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Isn't this the best thing ever? I just hope I can buy it as a paper version somewhere, I'd love to have that in my collection.

I was a bit worried at first since they told me the pictures need to be between 1 and 2 MB, and some of mine were smaller, but they all worked out nicely in the end. And I really do love the layout.

I need to read yet what the other fans wrote, it is so nice they asked us to tell stories.

I also had trouble coming up with a good picture of myself for the biography at the end of the magazine. When on holiday, I often wear sunglasses, which you can't use for a portrait.

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

Yay! Congratulations!

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm quite excited, as you can imagine!

If only someone paid me for playing with figures all day long LOL

[sharp2799.livejournal.com]

This is so amazing! You deserve the recognition!

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

Thank you! You can probably tell, I am over the moon!

[tangotabby.livejournal.com]

This is just amazing! And how totally cool that it was featured in the magazine--what an honor :-)

[dieastra.livejournal.com]

It's really exciting! I'm just a little sorry that the link at the end to my LJ entry does not work and so probably nobody is able to see the rest of it. As they asked me to chose only 12 pictures which was really hard!

How did you like our "behind the scenes" shots? ;) We really had so much fun!