dirac

That's an interesting idea, Jayne, but I hope I don't come across as what Calvin Trillin calls a "baby bigot" when I say that the last thing most opera houses probably want to do is encourage parents with infants to show up in significant numbers at the opera, symphony, or ballet. Even if there is a room to which they can retire discreetly until baby or toddler calms down, that still means at least several minutes of screaming or crying that the audience have to listen to until Mom or Dad decides it's time to leave and as you may know not all parents elect to do this in timely fashion.

GWTW, Perlman was right and so would the conductor who decided to carry on and I think that would be true even if some poor fellow had a massive heart attack and died on the spot. The theater personnel should get the ailing person/corpse out of there as quickly and discreetly as possible with as minimal interruption to the performance as possible. Couldn't agree more, richard53dog. Talk about a slippery slope.

Thanks for your review, abatt. Would be interested to hear from others who have seen the show.

Hear hear! I would note that Kaufman's criticisms could just as easily be redirected at the Russians for their flexibility-pyrotechnics. Is this Balanchine? Or just 21st Century artistic gymnastics trending throughout ballet? Interesting point, Jayne. I think extensions would have kept going up even without the example of Balanchine. The flexibility of the men today is quite something.

Good question, Simon. Difficult, indeed. It's not as if you can just lean forward and ask her politely to stop and yet at the same time I'm sure it was a serious distraction. I have never had such an experience at the ballet or elsewhere but perhaps others have?

Let me take the opportunity to plug Hall's menthol (your drugstore's house menthol will also probably do just as well).

Thanks, Quiggin. Sternberg was right to say that credits should be regarded with caution. Of course, directors have a reputation for hogging credit but in his heyday Sternberg was wearing a lot of hats.

Gosselin's not putting too much into rehearsal time, apparently. Lysacek is notorious for his orangeosity. Last night it was unusually vivid. He did well and is improving.

Thanks for the link, innopac. I see Rockwell’s feeling sorry for himself. I can’t say the “Balanchine orthodoxy” hangs heavy in San Francisco, where his works were barely seen this season, as was mentioned much earlier in this thread. And surely Mark Morris has received something well beyond “cautious approval"??

That's a very big claim. Look at the two parts:-- she asserts the existence of a "national Balanchine obession" -- she lumps three choreographers as "followers of Balanchine" As to the first claim: IS there a "national Balanchine obsession? Compared to what? To Serge Lifar? As to the second claim: ARE these three choreographers all "followers of Balanchine" in any real way way. "Follower" has a meaning in the English language. That meaning is NOT: "Hey, something makes me feel that these apparently unrelated things are actually connected." Based on the few Liang works I've seen I know that one could make a point about Balanchine influence. However, if Liang in this work did not do a good job, as Kaufman clalims, perhaps it's not a question of following Balanchine too well, but too poorly. To support her contention about Armitage, Kaufman asserts that the choreographer was "steeped in Balanchine's aesthetic while a young performer." Supporting evidence for what has happened since Armitage's youth: both used Brahms lieder at least once in their lives. The fact that Balanchine used Brahms lieder (Liebesliederwaltzer) successfully and that Armitage (in the work under review) may have used it poorly, is neither here nor there. By the time she gets to Fonte's work, the final one on the program, Kaurfman seems to have forgotten or gotten fed up with her theme. The Balanchine connection is dropped. Instead, we get references to the Kama Sutra and Torville and Dean -- not the first things that come to mind when you think "Balanchine." A reader doesn't have to know much about ballet to suspect that Kaufman, in her introduction of Balanchine into this, is taking us on a voyage to the Land of Exaggeration located somewhere on the Planet Malarky.

Great story. Coughing is tricky, especially because a cough can linger for days or weeks even though you're no longer ill. But you should do everything you can to minimize it and not honk uninhibitedly.

Thanks for that story, cubanmiamiboy. Sounds as if it wasn't the first time Tilson Thomas had been distracted by a phone or PDA in the front rows.

sidwich, you are absolutely right to say that to assume all directors exert the same degree of control is as inaccurate today as it would have been in 1939. But I think the power position of the director has grown stronger over the decades and the generalization is a fair one. The auteur theory is a different animal entirely and I wasn't really thinking of that. Of course, if you're trying to direct Warren Beatty, you might beg to differ. Kaufman is an outlier, I'd say. It's not often that a writer gets veto power over who directs. He did write and direct Synecdoche, New York on his own so perhaps even Kaufman wanted a little more control, but I don't know what his reasons were. (I remember Nora Ephron being interviewed years ago about writing When Harry Met Sally and she said although the experience was a pleasant one she had no control over anything and she realized that to get that authority she'd have to direct.)

Yes, thank you leonid, I know who Enright is. At this point I'm kind of sorry I mentioned it......

I agree, bart. It's ultimately uninteresting, and does little to advance the conversation. Agree the logic is not convincing. She's blaming Balanchine for a couple of what sound like uninteresting new pieces. That was my impression, as well. Post readers will be in for a long haul if Mr. B is going to be held responsible for every mixed bill of abstract dances Kaufman's not happy about. (The nitty gritty of her position, for and against, was discussed pretty thoroughly earlier in this thread.)

I didn't say anywhere in my post that he wasn't the director, leonid, only that the movie might be better described as a Wallis production. My point was that to identify a film as "Director X's movie" is something of an anachronism because in old Hollywood the director did not always exert the same control over the production that he usually does today. (Some, like Hitchcock, did.) Given some of the other names on the list you so helpfully provided, Enright could indeed have been along for the ride. Powell is a different case and an important director, but it may be worth remembering that the director is not always the onlie begetter of the movie you're watching.

Thanks, volcanohunter. I hope you will forgive me when I note that "On Your Toes" might better be described as a Hal Wallis picture (made at Warner Bros. with Jack Warner as head of production; unlikely that Enright made any major decisions on this movie, for better or worse, although I could be wrong). The Red Shoes can certainly be described as Michael Powell's The Red Shoes but note it is a production of The Archers, with writer Emeric Pressburger as Powell's collaborator. Pardon the pedantry.

Kaufman's at it again.

It is rather like those zombie movies where the thing keeps coming at you until you shoot it in the head, isn't it? But as long as posters find it interesting they're free to post and carry on a discussion. The Tweeters will keep on tweeting no matter what we say here and good for them.

Not at all, Simon, just go ahead and abandon your allies at a pivotal moment in the battle. Lord Stanley, I presume?

The effect is rather like The Skinhead Hamlet, isn't it? (Warning if you click on the link; remember it's the skinhead Hamlet, with the attendant raw language.)

Hard to say, innopac. The use of electronic devices for communicating is increasingly second nature. Difficult to imagine that tweeting is any more serious a distraction than other ways of passing time backstage, but it's more public.

That's a good question, 4mrdncr, but I'm not sure even so if Poe could be included. It's great that you mentioned Sleuth, because Andrew Wyke as a writer of mysteries is eminently qualified for our list. I saw the remake with Caine and Branagh recently - horribly misjudged. I don't know about the windmill set for Deathtrap but would be interested to hear from anyone who remembers the original production.

"I don't use a pen. I write with a goose quill dipped in venom....."

Thanks for posting, miliosr. Sorry to hear this.