Good morning, all! I have a lot of writing for Toyland today, so that's my principal occupation. I'm laundering all of the bedding today and I have to leave for the corner laundromat, which is rather expensive, but it's the only place i can wash pllows and comforters.
Last night I finished COLD COMFORT FARM, in its 3-part BBC adaptation from 1970 or so. I still prefer the John Schlesinger flm from the 1990s. I also watched the first act of the Gran Teatre del Liceu production of Massenet's wonderful opera MANON with Natalie Dessay: good cast, great costumes, and some of the most awful. lighting I've ever seen.
Whatever happened to opera direction? The director David McVicar keeps the piece moving with some wonderful staging - his coach arrival was wonderful - and some very stupid ideas, like putting the ensemble in a bleacher-like stadium watching the action when they're not singing onstage. I hate this contemporary custom of staging the Overture. In this production the dancers shouted and stomped through the Prelude to little or no effect, in my book, except to confuse the issue of why and where they were. I think it's all part of the MTV dumbing down of music: if it's not being sung or danced to, why bother to listen?
And so, to the laundry.