The movie, Genius, which we saw tonight, refers in its title to the writer Thomas Wolfe, author of Look Homeward, Angel and Of Time and the River. His other two novels, The Web and the Rock, and You Can't Go Home Again, were published posthumously. I haven't read any of them. The movie has made me intent on reading Wolfe, though, although I'm not yet sure which novel it will be.
Wolfe wrote long, very long. The movie is about how a great literary editor, Maxwell Perkins at Scribner's, recognized Wolfe's genius--he had previously discovered Fitzgerald and Hemingway--and in a torturous process taking months and then years, edited Wolfe's more-than-1000-page products to more accommodating 600+ pages each. They got great reviews and the second novel was a best seller.
The movie depicts Wolfe's tumultuous, regrettably short life and focuses mostly on his relationship with Perkins, who had five daughters and was a rather strait-laced Puritan type who commuted to New Canaan, Conn. Much controversy still exists over whether Perkins's editing did Wolfe justice. Wolfe himself did abandon Perkins, apparently resenting the frequent attribution of credit to the editor. The prolific late literary scholar, Matthew Bruccoli, brought out the unedited version of Look Homeward, Angel in 2000, claiming that it better presented Wolfe's true genius.
Whether Perkins was Wolfe's savior or weakened his style, Wolfe doubtless suffered more from his posthumous editor, Edward Aswell of Harper & Brothers, to whom Wolfe delivered his last two novels before dying at Johns Hopkins in 1938. Aswell, it now appears from more recent scholarship, savaged Wolfe's very rough drafts and worse, inserted much of his own text into the novels. Wolfe's work has declined in popularity, it has been noted, although in 1958, Look Homeward, Angel was adapted for Broadway and played 564 performances and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
All this aside, the movie is terrific. Colin Firth captures Perkins's personality as Jude Law does Wolfe's. The actresses Nicole Kidman as Wolfe's lover, Aline Bernstein, and Laura Linney as Perkins's wife, also add to the delight of the picture. Much of it was shot in Britain--in Manchester and at Pinewood and Shepperton, the two huge British movie factories. While the film does show the real train gates at Grand Central, incidentally, when they proceed past them to the platform, they are showing us, it would appear, some British train shed, perhaps Manchester's, but not the real inside of Grand Central's platforms. Just a train buff talking.
Friday, June 24, 2016
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
A Mezzo for All Time
I'm tempted to travel out to Santa Fe this summer, yes, for the opera, and yes, even though we managed to make it out there to the opera for the first time last summer. It was delightful even though none of the operas were perfect. Just watching the sun set over the mountains behind the main stage is enough reason to want to go back soon.
But this summer they are reviving Samuel Barber's Vanessa, the rare modern opera that has been revived quite a few times since its 1958 premiere at the Met. Now one prime reason I'd like to see this opera would not be satisfied by a trip to Santa Fe, but probably not by any place else either. Rosalind Elias, long-time adornment of the Met's mezzo roster, created the role of Erika, which she played to Eleanor Steber's title soprano role. It's of more than mild interest that the title role was written with Callas in mind, only the diva turned it down, saying Elias's mezzo part was better!
Ms. Elias is likely the only principal connected with that premiere almost 60 years ago who is still extant. She was interviewed by Opera magazine in its July issue and the story was a delight. As a very young singer, she lucked out by being offered a major role in a new production--a new opera, no less. And she dared to tell the imperious Rudolf Bing, then the Met's general manager, that she thought she should have an aria written for her part as well.
Bing was known to cater to singers he liked and clearly she was one of them. He called Barber right then and said, "Sam, Rosalind is here and has something to ask you." And lo and behold, the great Samuel Barber wrote one for her, a good one too: "Must the winter come so soon?" which has become a recital hall staple. Elias remains the sole Erika in Met history, having sung the role in each revival. She has also sung the role of the Baroness, originated by the wonderful Regina Resnik.
Elias was always lucky, it seems. In the 60s, she sang Zerlina, the first mezzo to do so at the Met since the 1880s, with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf no less, who was getting on and not in good form, and who almost freaked Elias out, until Geraint Evans took Elias by the hand to get her away from the legend's problems.
It's wonderful to recall that Elias starred in the first Met performance I ever attended--a student performance of Carmen in 1958, when I was in junior high and went on a school excursion to the old house on 39th Street. Just being in the amazing old building was exciting and now I realize what a trouper Elias was and why Bing must have liked her--here she is singing student performances, albeit of the opera with the greatest mezzo role, while in the same season singing the premiere of Vanessa.
Barber's opera, with libretto by Gian-Carlo Menotti, is now revived enough to be more than a curiosity. Should I be unable to make it to Santa Fe this summer, it's being done in the late fall at the Wexford Festival in Ireland.
But this summer they are reviving Samuel Barber's Vanessa, the rare modern opera that has been revived quite a few times since its 1958 premiere at the Met. Now one prime reason I'd like to see this opera would not be satisfied by a trip to Santa Fe, but probably not by any place else either. Rosalind Elias, long-time adornment of the Met's mezzo roster, created the role of Erika, which she played to Eleanor Steber's title soprano role. It's of more than mild interest that the title role was written with Callas in mind, only the diva turned it down, saying Elias's mezzo part was better!
Ms. Elias is likely the only principal connected with that premiere almost 60 years ago who is still extant. She was interviewed by Opera magazine in its July issue and the story was a delight. As a very young singer, she lucked out by being offered a major role in a new production--a new opera, no less. And she dared to tell the imperious Rudolf Bing, then the Met's general manager, that she thought she should have an aria written for her part as well.
Bing was known to cater to singers he liked and clearly she was one of them. He called Barber right then and said, "Sam, Rosalind is here and has something to ask you." And lo and behold, the great Samuel Barber wrote one for her, a good one too: "Must the winter come so soon?" which has become a recital hall staple. Elias remains the sole Erika in Met history, having sung the role in each revival. She has also sung the role of the Baroness, originated by the wonderful Regina Resnik.
Elias was always lucky, it seems. In the 60s, she sang Zerlina, the first mezzo to do so at the Met since the 1880s, with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf no less, who was getting on and not in good form, and who almost freaked Elias out, until Geraint Evans took Elias by the hand to get her away from the legend's problems.
It's wonderful to recall that Elias starred in the first Met performance I ever attended--a student performance of Carmen in 1958, when I was in junior high and went on a school excursion to the old house on 39th Street. Just being in the amazing old building was exciting and now I realize what a trouper Elias was and why Bing must have liked her--here she is singing student performances, albeit of the opera with the greatest mezzo role, while in the same season singing the premiere of Vanessa.
Barber's opera, with libretto by Gian-Carlo Menotti, is now revived enough to be more than a curiosity. Should I be unable to make it to Santa Fe this summer, it's being done in the late fall at the Wexford Festival in Ireland.
Friday, June 17, 2016
12 Innings and a Requiem
Didn't intend to bracket these two events together but so it goes. Wednesday afternoon into the evening (as it turned out) was getaway day against the Cubs for the Nats, each club leading its division and the Wrigleys boasting the best record in baseball. We had taken the opener, dropped the middle encounter, and now needed the 3rd to make up for losing all four back in Chitown last month.
Strange game in that Strasburg gave up a solo homer in the top of the first and then Nats came back in the bottom of that inning with a score from third on a wild pitch. Then no score until the Nats put it together in the bottom of the 8th to lead by a bare 2-1 going into the 9th where the bullpen promptly gave away two to give the visitors the lead.
Key steal in the bottom of the 9th set up a Ramos RBI to tie and off we went into extra innings. Another exchange of runs brought us into the 12th and after Michael A. Taylor got on, 37-year-old Jayson Werth smacked one off the right/center field wall to set off the speedy Taylor around the bases from first to score the walk-off winner.
By the 8th, of course, the starting pitchers were gone and it was effectively a whole new ball game, played by tired players waiting to get out of town--in the case of the Nats, to the Coast for series against the Padres and Dodgers, and then the Brewers, coming home eventually to face the ill-performing Mets, who still present the best pitching staff in the majors.
But Friday night we were at Strathmore, definitely the nicest music hall in town with the best acoustics, to hear Marin Alsop lead the Baltimore Symphony in Verdi's Requiem, which I'd never heard before. It was a marvelous performance, with the Choral Arts Society serving as the massive chorus and our friend Phyllis Kaye's friend Elizabeth Bishop singing beautifully in the mezzo role. Actually, all the singers were terrific and the orchestra overwhelming.
Given that it was Verdi, there was plenty of operatic sturm und drang. All in all, a nice week, proving that that other Baltimorean, Mencken, may not been right in scorning opera in English as being as sensible as baseball in Italian--here we had a requiem in Latin and baseball in the many lingos spoken by today's diverse crew of players. Actually the game wouldn't have been complete without an umpire chucking Rendon out after he protested a called third strike in whatever language such outbursts occur these days.
Strange game in that Strasburg gave up a solo homer in the top of the first and then Nats came back in the bottom of that inning with a score from third on a wild pitch. Then no score until the Nats put it together in the bottom of the 8th to lead by a bare 2-1 going into the 9th where the bullpen promptly gave away two to give the visitors the lead.
Key steal in the bottom of the 9th set up a Ramos RBI to tie and off we went into extra innings. Another exchange of runs brought us into the 12th and after Michael A. Taylor got on, 37-year-old Jayson Werth smacked one off the right/center field wall to set off the speedy Taylor around the bases from first to score the walk-off winner.
By the 8th, of course, the starting pitchers were gone and it was effectively a whole new ball game, played by tired players waiting to get out of town--in the case of the Nats, to the Coast for series against the Padres and Dodgers, and then the Brewers, coming home eventually to face the ill-performing Mets, who still present the best pitching staff in the majors.
But Friday night we were at Strathmore, definitely the nicest music hall in town with the best acoustics, to hear Marin Alsop lead the Baltimore Symphony in Verdi's Requiem, which I'd never heard before. It was a marvelous performance, with the Choral Arts Society serving as the massive chorus and our friend Phyllis Kaye's friend Elizabeth Bishop singing beautifully in the mezzo role. Actually, all the singers were terrific and the orchestra overwhelming.
Given that it was Verdi, there was plenty of operatic sturm und drang. All in all, a nice week, proving that that other Baltimorean, Mencken, may not been right in scorning opera in English as being as sensible as baseball in Italian--here we had a requiem in Latin and baseball in the many lingos spoken by today's diverse crew of players. Actually the game wouldn't have been complete without an umpire chucking Rendon out after he protested a called third strike in whatever language such outbursts occur these days.
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