Being tortured in the name of art

[TownsendPLocke]

Last night I went to see the LA Opera.s new production of Das Rheingold.

Not only was it torturously bad it was also just under three hours with no breaks

I guess that was nothing new-that is how it is written.The music was glorious and the singing was pretty good-but the new staging by Achim Freyer was so incredibly juvenile(while trying to pass as German expresisoinsm)that the audience laughed at several non funny parts.I was embarrased for the performers

And trust me-if there had been an intermission they would have lost half of the house

$200 to be tortured-and I did not even get off

http://theguide.latimes.com/music/la-opera...rheingold-event

[Guest mineallmine]

Ahhh townsend that is BDSM Theatre/Opera style! They charge you really high admission! Keep you stuck in your seat the entire time and torture you slowly and for their own delight! And just when you think your about to get the pay off they torture you some more. Only to have it all come to an unsatisfied ending that leaves you feeling like you waisted your money.

My biggest dissapointment was Criss Angel Believe...which I bought 3 tickets for. It came to over 500 and I was only able to recover 120 of it, and only that because the show I saw was a preview and not a full show like advertised at the time. They still had not offically opened the show.

[Guest StuCotts]

Maybe there's just no way to make this particular production bearable. FWIW I've been helped through many a dispiriting Ring production by mentally running through Anna Russell's takeoff of the Ring. I can recite most of it from memory. No bragging; so can lots of opera queens of a certain age. In any case, I've had reason to be grateful to her for taking my mind off the on-stage mess and my martyred sitzfleisch.

Some young 'uns may not be familiar with her. For them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Russell

I know her stuff is available from Amazon. I think there's also a site where it can be viewed.

[AdamSmith]

Revealing my inner Philistine, the most bearable -- even enjoyable -- Ring cycle I ever sat through was PBS's 1990 extravaganza.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...755C0A966958260

Of course much of the enjoyment was just being able to go peepee, or fetch a short snort of Dewar's, as the mood struck.

Separately, Stu -- thank you beyond saying. Parody is the stuff of life for me, yet I knew nothing of La Russell. One's ignorance is boundless.

[nytb]

"Albrecht! . . . . . You remember Albrecht! . . . " Thank you SC for calling to memory that wonderful performer. She also did quite a number on Gilbert and Sullivan operettas as I recall. I tried and failed to rush for a seat at her sold out final performance at Carnegie Hall. But I did the same for Horowitz's last recital there as well. I DID get in to Bob and Ray but that's another matter.

I remember well that 1990 TV marathon. Several months later I was home with the flu and sort'a passed out while watching some obscure educational TV channel. When I came to again, the TV was still on and somewhere in the middle of Gotterdammerung Act I from the same series. From that altered reality, it took me some time to figure how long I'd been out of it. It's interesting to note that the producer of that series was the very Peter Gelb who's now the General Manager of the Met.

I avoided Wagner for decades. It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't his music I disliked, it was Wagner himself and most other Wagnerians that I both disliked and feared. But then I realized that I felt the same about Richard Strauss. I've seen all the Ring operas many times at the Met (same production as the TV series) and some performances have indeed been as excruciating as an unending root canal. Hildegard Behrens's Brunhilda comes quickly to mind ("But she was a great actress!" LOL). As a result, I've yet to "do the ring" for fear that a bad performer in Reingold or Siegfried would reappear in a later opera and poison the whole enterprise for me; and, as you note, tickets to a whole Ring cycle are not cheap. But I live in hope . . . . .

[Guest StuCotts]

"Albrecht! . . . . . You remember Albrecht! . . . " Thank you SC for calling to memory that wonderful performer. She also did quite a number on Gilbert and Sullivan operettas as I recall. I tried and failed to rush for a seat at her sold out final performance at Carnegie Hall. But I did the same for Horowitz's last recital there as well. I DID get in to Bob and Ray but that's another matter.

I remember well that 1990 TV marathon. Several months later I was home with the flu and sort'a passed out while watching some obscure educational TV channel. When I came to again, the TV was still on and somewhere in the middle of Gotterdammerung Act I from the same series. From that altered reality, it took me some time to figure how long I'd been out of it. It's interesting to note that the producer of that series was the very Peter Gelb who's now the General Manager of the Met.

I avoided Wagner for decades. It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't his music I disliked, it was Wagner himself and most other Wagnerians that I both disliked and feared. But then I realized that I felt the same about Richard Strauss. I've seen all the Ring operas many times at the Met (same production as the TV series) and some performances have indeed been as excruciating as an unending root canal. Hildegard Behrens's Brunhilda comes quickly to mind ("But she was a great actress!" LOL). As a result, I've yet to "do the ring" for fear that a bad performer in Reingold or Siegfried would reappear in a later opera and poison the whole enterprise for me; and, as you note, tickets to a whole Ring cycle are not cheap. But I live in hope . . . . .

A great Russell favorite of mine: "I'm not making this up, you know!"

It's a cliché that all opera queens hold all other opera queens' taste in some level of contempt. But the Wagnerians go out of their way to make themselves detestable. I can take just so much eyes-rolling-back ecstasy at being able to tell the Tarnhelm theme from the Niebelungenhass before I have to get away. Plus, most of them have an ear of the purest tin for singing. You're right about Behrens. Though you haven't experienced true horror unless you heard her some seasons back in Idomeneo, distilling as much vocal gruesomeness into Elettra's big aria as humanly possible. I felt for Mozart.

Opera queens do carry on a bit, don't we?

[Guest StuCotts]

Revealing my inner Philistine, the most bearable -- even enjoyable -- Ring cycle I ever sat through was PBS's 1990 extravaganza.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...755C0A966958260

Of course much of the enjoyment was just being able to go peepee, or fetch a short snort of Dewar's, as the mood struck.

Separately, Stu -- thank you beyond saying. Parody is the stuff of life for me, yet I knew nothing of La Russell. One's ignorance is boundless.

Glad to be of service. I consider it a benefaction to introduce anybody to Russell's work. Your thanks give me leave to meditate on the glow of my own good works.

[nytb]

Oh SC I DO remember Behren's Elettra! How could anyone who heard it ever forget it!! I can remember her down stage to the south (I never get stage left, stage right correct) crouched over and screeching at the top of her lungs while I tried to find space amidst my four box mates in a side box to crouch down and cover my ears. When I leave this mortal coil, I expect that screech to accompany me to the gates of hell unless, having endured it, I'm entitled to another fate for eternity.

[Guest StuCotts]

Oh SC I DO remember Behren's Elettra! How could anyone who heard it ever forget it!! I can remember her down stage to the south (I never get stage left, stage right correct) crouched over and screeching at the top of her lungs while I tried to find space amidst my four box mates in a side box to crouch down and cover my ears. When I leave this mortal coil, I expect that screech to accompany me to the gates of hell unless, having endured it, I'm entitled to another fate for eternity.

Neither one of us will ever be accused of letting our most vivid recollections go wan.

To remember stage left from right I picture myself on stage facing the audience (and singing Norma?). To my left is stage left, to my right is stage right.

[AdamSmith]

One cannot let this thread go by without tossing in Mark Twain's priceless chestnut:

"Wagner's music is better than it sounds."

... which he lifted, with credit, from his compeer Edgar Wilson Nye.

[TownsendPLocke]

For Adam Smith-and any others interested,Anna Russell's Farewell concert has been saved on DVD available via amazon(I bought 3 copies for friends who have only heard her on recordings) for $23 and it has the 18 minute Ring cycle and the Gilbert and Sullivan monologue also.

I am betting these are on Youtube also-I just cannot find it right now.

I am seriously debating on abandoning my tix for Die Walkurie next month.I cannot convince any of my friends to go with me

[caeron]

Thanks for the tip on Anna Russell. Some of the clips of this are on youtube, and very funny.

[AdamSmith]

Townie, thank you! Ordering it today.