Shakespeare's Macbeth, in a colonial setting

Today and tomorrow are the last performances of "Macbeth: A Colonial Tragedy," the latest presentation of the three-year-old Garfield Shakespeare Company. The shows will be at 8 p.m. in the MacAllister Center of Performing Arts amphitheater in Garfield Park, Indianapolis.

These images were taken at the show's opening night, Friday, Sept. 10, 2010. Director Thomas Cardwell's production is set in pre-revolutionary war America, hence the "colonial" reference in the title.

The picture at the top is in the second half of the production, a dramatic scene when Macbeth, played by Eric MacDonald, has a disturbing vision in which he sees a procession of kings from the lineage of his onetime friend Banquo, as prophesied by the three witches.

Best thing about the shows: They're free!

A full gallery of images from my shoot of "Macbeth" is available at my online site at SmugMug.com.

The three witches -- or "weird sisters," as Macbeth refers to them in the play -- during a dance while concocting a brew. Their prophesies are key elements in the play: That Macbeth would become Thane of Cawdor, putting him first in line to succeed King Duncan; that Banquo, Thane of Lochaber, would never sit in the throne, although Banquo's lineage would assume the throne, a prediction that would disturb Macbeth and, along with Lady Macbeth's goading, motivate him to kill Banquo, his onetime friend; that Macbeth would never be harmed by anyone "born of woman"; and that Macbeth should beware of Macduff, Thane of Fife, whose family and servants are put to death at Macbeth's direction. Macduff eventually kills Macbeth after divulging to Macbeth a shocking technicality that enables Macduff to circumvent the witches' pronouncement: Macduff says he was not naturally "born of woman" (through the birth canal), but was "ripped" from his mother's womb (Cesarean section).

King Duncan, played by Stephen Scull, talking to Lady Macbeth. Later in the drama, Duncan is slain by Macbeth.


Lady Macbeth, played by Meagan Matlock, trying to persuade her husband to kill the king so he can take over the throne.

Macbeth, in blood-stained shirt, during a tortuous reflection in the aftermath of his late-night slaying of King Duncan in the king's chambers.

Macbeth and Banquo, played by Charles DiGiovanna, converse in a scene after Macbeth had killed King Duncan. Not longer after, Banquo would be slain at Macbeth's direction, although Banquo's son Fleance -- also an assassination target -- would escape, allowing the fulfillment of the witches' prophecy that a long line of Banquo's lineage would ascend the throne.


Macbeth's onetime friend Banquo (left), returning as a ghost -- seen only by his slayer Macbeth -- at a banquet, a scene befuddling everyone else at the table who cannot understand why Macbeth is raging at an empty chair.


Lady Macduff, played by Melissa Mowat, shortly before she and her child are killed at the direction of Macbeth, who is trying to heed the witches' prediction to beware of the exiled Macduff.

Macduff, played by Nick Henry, announcing the beheading of Macbeth.

The show in the sky

While still working on editing more than a thousand images taken Saturday at the Miracle Mile Parade in Indianapolis, I decided to dedicate a post to some things in the sky that caught my attention during the parade. All of these were taken with a 70-200mm lens equipped with a 1.4x extender at its maximum focal range (so 280mm).

The commercial airplane -- well, I suppose it might not have been that big a deal except for the craft's bright red underbelly. Even when I first spied it (picture below), it was impressive, but then it turned slightly and caught the sunlight in such a way that it lit up the craft's underbelly (top), and that's when I did my audible "oooooo" while the shutter clicked away.





The balloon -- there must have been a dozen balloons -- all yellow -- that I saw released (whether accidentally or on purpose) from the spectator contingent at various points during the parade. I wasn't lucky enough to capture its marking except for the one occasion you see pictured above. Otherwise, the "faces" on all my images of skyward balloons from Saturday are a bright, solid yellow (below).






The party streamers -- well, the festive occasion was open for stuff like this to be thrown about. Some floated skyward unobstructed (above); unfortunately, some did not, and ended up caught in the telehpone poles and wiring (below).




Send in the clouds -- I guess the cloud formation below isn't that spectacular, but it did strike me as interesting ... and besides, I wanted another sky image for this post! I played the "guess what it look like" game when I pulled it up on my screen at home afterward.



An interesting thing about these sky images, at least to me, is that I was able to snag that rich blue color in most of them without benefit of a polarizing filter (which I usually turn to when this is actually an objective). I also did very, very little tweaking of saturation in post-processing.

It was that beautiful of a day.

Native American heritage, revisited

This is a second, and final, post of images from Saturday's shoot at the Native American Heritage Days observance at Garfield Park, Indianapolis.

All but one of these images are from the various dances in the dance circle at the observance. The image at the very bottom came after an all-female dance number, when LeRoy Malaterre of Lebanon, Ind., who served as emcee for the various routines, asked each of the women to come to the microphone and introduce themselves. This woman was the first to be introduced. She said she lives in Indiana, but is from Oklahoma, which will always be home.

Appreciating Native American heritage

These are images from activities and crafts found Saturday at the second annual Native American Heritage Days observance at Garfield Park in Indianapolis. The photographs depict several shots from the dance and circle drum activity just outside the Art Center at the park.

The woman with the uplifted head (two photos below) stood out to me this day; she seemed very devoted to the heritage and wore an elegant, proud expression throughout the day. Her eyes were closed in meditative fashion quite often, so this wasn't an "oops, he caught her blinking" mistake.

In the third photo below, a woman assists a child who's confused (as was I) about the dollar bills someone or some people were tossing her way (you can see one of the greenbacks near the woman's right foot; the girl is looking right at it). I think they meant it as a gesture of gratitude, but I couldn't help but scratch my head wondering how that ever entered the Native American tradition.

The observance runs one more day -- Sunday, Aug. 29 -- from noon to 5 p.m.

A tomato for the ages?

This is a still life of something I picked off the vine of a beefeater tomato plant in my yard the other day. I tried to explain this to someone in an email yesterday, and had trouble doing so. I finally said, "You have to see it to appreciate it!"

Which is what put the idea in my head to capture this as a still life. This is, indeed, one fruit -- a sort of siamese twins (triplets?) thing with two parts smaller than the third, and one part yellow, two parts red.

This fruit measured 15 inches at its maximum girth, in case you're wondering about perspective. I used window light from camera right and the angle was slightly left of center.

I haven't consumed this fruit just yet; it's hard for me to do it!

Elegance in the urban landscape

While walking back to my car after my shoot Saturday at the inaugural Indy Crit cycling competition, I came across this striking, lavender-colored bloom in a couple of the gardens along the north border of University Park in Downtown Indianapolis.

Thanks to the help of a blog visitor, I've been able to identify this flower as a Cleome Rose Queen.

The closeup shot (above) comes with a bonus, tiny insect clinging upside down along one of the thin plant whiskers in the lower left portion. I like the perspective shot (below) almost as much for its elegance: the combination of bloom, its distinctive, sculpted stem and the drooping foliage of its buddy to the right.

A good one to ... well, make you feel good.

Reflecting on ... downtown buildings

Here a few reflection images I grabbed Saturday while strolling Meridian Street during the inaugural Indy Crit cycling competition on a Downtown Indianapolis loop course (see previous post) -- and one I grabbed last November while covering the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon and Half-Marathon.

The one above is a no-trickery-on-my-end distortion. The bellowed panels on the right just happened to bend that way from where I was standing.

The first one below I decided to take because of the juxtaposition of the reflection against the real-time U.S. flag to the right of it.

The third simply is the federal courts building, as it looks when bounced off the all-glass facade of its AT&T neighbor on the west side of Meridian.

Finally, the last one -- the one I grabbed last November -- is the State Capitol, reflecting off a glass sheen on the east side of Illinois Street.