Went to see Cosi fan tutte last night with Gigi. Lovely. I love the new opera house. I'll admit it though - where we were sitting made me a little dizzy - that place is like, you know, in that piece of shit Star Wars movie, when the Senate was meeting - the tall one. It's tall, in other words. I have a bad time with heights I can't fully explain. Some stupid vague adolescent poetry of self-destruction, I suppose, because it kept striking me how cute I would look in the dress I was wearing if I hopped over the railing.
And I'll also admit that the spartan-but-impressive aesthetic doesn't play to my tastes. What can I say? The Opera Garnier got a roof mural by Chagall . . . we have a five-story sanded glass staircase that makes me nervous. I'll take the Chagall any day - I know he's dead and honestly I've almost completely stopped paying attention to modern art that isn't Figaro's so besides him I don't know who they could have got for it, but they could have got someone, I'm sure. Had an international portfolio competition so some kid could make their name overnight.
By the way, did you hear the owner and attempted seller of Picasso's "The Dream" put his elbow through it? Bloody fool. I don't like Picasso on a day to day basis - looked like a brutal womanizing pinko who was bluffing his way through half the time - but I love "The Dream". I have a mounting of it over my bed to help inspire sexy dreams. It was going to go for USD$139 million, can you imagine? And when he was showing it to the agreed buyer he stumbled and put his elbow through it. Poor "The Dream".
Speaking of sexy, "Cosi fan tutte" was sexy. Lovely building and perfect acoustics aside. The COC pulled together a set that really worked for once, I mean really worked. I was shocked! And the singers were great - Despina (Shannon Mercer) staying stronger in the acting than the singing, but that served her well when she dressed up as the notary and stuff. The lady who sang Dorabella, this awesome buxom singer Krisztina Szabó who I think did a gypsy in Carmen last year singing that tarot card song, was just - so - engaging, so good.
Anyways, you know what the plot of "Cosi fan tutte" is, right? Three guys and the chambermaid trying to headfuck Dorabella and Fiordigli into being unfaithful? Mozart was such a clever little Masonic fuck. I had never fully appreciated the point of his libretto before - that hearts and emotions are unfaithful and that's where reason must step in - and I found it awfully interesting. I'm trying to get used to the idea that emotion is at the base of rationality, which my analyst won't let go. And while I can say that, and believe it, see it in my own behaviour and rationalizing, it has made me beg the question of where, therefore, rationality gets really useful. The answer of "Cosi fan tutte" seems to be that the role of rationality is to protect the emotions. That's an answer I can work with.
6 commenti:
Le rêve.
I like your analyst's idea. Did he tell you how did he arrive at it?
Of course emotion is at the base of rationality! Every good Cancerian knows that from the moment they're born. :) I like your conclusion better that rationality's role is to protect the oh so fragile emotions. It's true.
I didn't hear that about "La reve". Can you believe that someone would actually pay $139 million for something? Why don't they donate it to a worthwhile cause instead if they have that much money to burn. Wow.
Lady, I appreciate the correction. How about, since he was Spanish and I'm English and I don't speak Spanish and the Mac I use in the mornings doesn't have accent keys I understand, I just say "The Dream" and your language and every other language with stupid genders and stupid accents shaped like stupid hats shove them up their stupid bottoms?
Jiri, emotions being the starting point for rationality ties in nicely to the Jungian idea of how the brain works, but it's also current idea in anthropology, which shocked me after I spoke about it with my analyst and then came across it in Steven Mithen's "The Singing Neaderthals."
Mel, I love "The Dream" but I couldn't imagine paying $139 million for it. Maybe it's a prestige thing. People pay anything for prestige. I don't know.
People are dumb. Mmm..prestige..anyone else want to see The Prestige with Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale? Yum yum yum!
Honestly. If there's a homoerotic subtext, I am SO THERE.
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