Back at the TOR

The TOR resumed rehearsals a couple of weeks ago.  The first two weeks were only Tuesday, but with the performances approaching we're now rehearsing on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. (Next week will be Thursday instead of Wednesday.)

We're now not just learning the singing but going on the stage and getting our movements straight.  For the tavern scenes at the beginning and end of TALES OF HOFFMAN, we get long pipes and metal mugs for props.  In THE BARBER OF SEVILLE the chorus only sings a few times, so Beatrice has us onstage without singing in a couple more scenes.  For one, the men are pretending to be musicians accompanying the Count's serenade.  I pretend to play a violin, and the half-kneeling is a bit of a challenge for me. (I half-kneeled last year during the Vilja song in THE MERRY WIDOW and the year before during the "Bruderlein und Schwesterlein" number in DIE FLEDERMAUS.) I may need a single kneepad.

When we were rehearsing the HOFFMANN scene with Olympia the dancing doll, she was wearing a fancy wig but Giuseppe decided that she looked like Bette Davis in the Grand Guignol film WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?  Which reminded me of the NEW YORK TIMES capsule description of WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? which said "Plenty."

Back when I occasionally read parts of the TIMES other than the crosswords, I liked some of their movie capsules. (I think some were written by Howard Thompson.) On THE DIRTY DOZEN: "Entertaining as a blow-torch." TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT: "Swell first chapter, the rest not bad." GUNGA DIN: "Plenty of both." STAR WARS: "All aboard." The three-story movie YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW: "The first and third parts are wonderful, it's number two that's the clunker." FLUFFY: "Dweadful." THE GODFATHER: "Minestrone and dynamite." MY FAIR LADY: "Not to be rude, but what was all the shouting about?" MOMMIE DEAREST: "You won't be bored."