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"Vissi d'Arte"
May. 4th, 2008 11:53 amI'm not the world's hugest Italian opera fan - but Tosca! How can you not love a show in which a villainous baritone Baron threatens Our Heroine against a background of giant chorus and clanging bells of a pious Te Deum (and then has her shadowed by Tre sbirri, una carrozza [3 Cops, 1 Carrlage]) . . . . while the wretched object of his loathsome affections objects that she simply lives for Art and Love, and when they fail her leaps to her death from the -- oops, spoiler!
And now (with 4 weeks to our Rome Trip and counting) someone has kindly published an article letting us know the whereabouts (and admission times) for the "Tosca Trail" to see where it all takes place . . . . I shall go. And I shall make a huge fuss. See,
I have been utterly disgusted lately by the TV worship one sees here in NYC: not only are crowds lined up outside the stage door of every Broadway show featuring an actor they've seen on the screen - and only those - I mean, we're talking people actually screaming and flashbulbs popping when Clay Aiken (who?) emerges from Spamalot. Yeah. We saw Boeing Boeing last night, and they were lined up to, I dunno, like kiss the hem of Brad Whitford's jeans (leaving the unbelievably brilliant Mark Rylance to escape scott free - all this will change, of course, when he finally achieves greatness and plays a prosecutor on some show about the brave men & women who track down semen stains on criminal microwaves or something) - but yesterday for the first time in several years I revisited our old haunts at the far end of Bleecker Street, to discover it all utterly transformed: Juicy Couture where the little Japanese fountain store used to be, Ralph Lauren in place of the Indonesian carving place where I bought Delia the little deer while we were writing The Fall of the Kings. . . . and why? Because of the Magnolia Bakery. Which makes perfectly decent cupcakes, I'm sure, but is now a pilgrimage site for Sex in the City fans. I liked that show, but now I may never forgive it for making it literally impossible to walk down the block, the sidewalks were so crammed with tourists waiting to get in (which I assume is what encouraged name brand shops to move in to take advantage of them). And I'm, like, People, look! You're in Greenwich Village! Two blocks further down there are Italian cafes with homemade cannolli!
But, gee, nobody's made a movie or TV show about the old hipster Village, or Edna St Vincent Millay. If they did, I'd probably never get a seat - or a little ricotta pie - at Rocco again.
It's as if only things that are on TV are real. I am filled with hate - No, not hate. Something more 19c. Anomie, perhaps, some kind of spiritual loathing and general sickness that seems to find relief only in making loud rude remarks as I pass the mindless hoards, who probably think I'm some kind of TV stunt or other. Or possibly simply not real, as they've never seen me behind glass.
I must go put on Tosca now, and cry my eyes out.
Vissi d'arte, baby.
And now (with 4 weeks to our Rome Trip and counting) someone has kindly published an article letting us know the whereabouts (and admission times) for the "Tosca Trail" to see where it all takes place . . . . I shall go. And I shall make a huge fuss. See,
I have been utterly disgusted lately by the TV worship one sees here in NYC: not only are crowds lined up outside the stage door of every Broadway show featuring an actor they've seen on the screen - and only those - I mean, we're talking people actually screaming and flashbulbs popping when Clay Aiken (who?) emerges from Spamalot. Yeah. We saw Boeing Boeing last night, and they were lined up to, I dunno, like kiss the hem of Brad Whitford's jeans (leaving the unbelievably brilliant Mark Rylance to escape scott free - all this will change, of course, when he finally achieves greatness and plays a prosecutor on some show about the brave men & women who track down semen stains on criminal microwaves or something) - but yesterday for the first time in several years I revisited our old haunts at the far end of Bleecker Street, to discover it all utterly transformed: Juicy Couture where the little Japanese fountain store used to be, Ralph Lauren in place of the Indonesian carving place where I bought Delia the little deer while we were writing The Fall of the Kings. . . . and why? Because of the Magnolia Bakery. Which makes perfectly decent cupcakes, I'm sure, but is now a pilgrimage site for Sex in the City fans. I liked that show, but now I may never forgive it for making it literally impossible to walk down the block, the sidewalks were so crammed with tourists waiting to get in (which I assume is what encouraged name brand shops to move in to take advantage of them). And I'm, like, People, look! You're in Greenwich Village! Two blocks further down there are Italian cafes with homemade cannolli!
But, gee, nobody's made a movie or TV show about the old hipster Village, or Edna St Vincent Millay. If they did, I'd probably never get a seat - or a little ricotta pie - at Rocco again.
It's as if only things that are on TV are real. I am filled with hate - No, not hate. Something more 19c. Anomie, perhaps, some kind of spiritual loathing and general sickness that seems to find relief only in making loud rude remarks as I pass the mindless hoards, who probably think I'm some kind of TV stunt or other. Or possibly simply not real, as they've never seen me behind glass.
I must go put on Tosca now, and cry my eyes out.
Vissi d'arte, baby.