It is Saturday 9th November 2013 mid to late morning after a long sleep of nine hours, once interrupted and a leisurely start with a cup of coffee and a single slice of burnt toast as I failed to buy milk yesterday and even managed to waste precious drops in a spill from the little that I have for the coffee. It is chill turning colder. I have just reloaded the car with breakdown emergency kit, shopping bags and my shoulder bag with spare glasses of every description.
I have checked my financial accounts on line arranged with no credit card payment due and bank account looking healthy and sorted the rest of the day with working further on this writing about the Theatre and also thinking ahead to week coming. It is FA Cup day with Gateshead away to Oxford and got a good 2.2 draw and Sutton United at Kidderminister were thrashed 4.1 while Hartlepool had good home win 3.2 and Mansfield 8.1 away to St Albans, Newcastle are at Tottenham on Sunday on TV and take precedence over Sunderland at home to Man City who are expected to lose.(discovered their game is also on TV.
This afternoon I shall watch the rugby league from Hull where England play their next must win World Cup game against Fiji while England play Argentina in the other form of Rugby I will then make my way immediately to Asda and Cineworld Bolden first to check if they have an extra large size of a winter coat with lining and then for milk and salad stuff, dried figs and anything else which takes my fancy. I am taking a defrosted small quiche. With me after enjoying a small pepperoni pizza £1 for lunch with some black pepper.
Yesterday I bought a black Winters coat without lining the Asda Shields for only £19 extra large but not in length and on reflection after just doing a check this was not a great move as the one I have been using which I though has a paint mark and cleaned to be OK and longer. While doing the sort I note a green Mac coat which also had come good fro use next summer spring summer season after a good clean and with another check sometime it should serve very well. I also checked the grey coat with inner lining but after removing the lining I noted an outer pocket care so this will be held as reserve but together these development raise a question mark over the need for one with living but I still check the position at Asda later to day.
The relay this evening is from the Metropolitan Opera and is Tosca with at early start at five to six . I am reminded that I need to set up for recording Strictly and the X Factor on the Sky Box. Checked that the Life of Pi film was recorded for future viewing having watched Syriana last night although I had seen the film before but cannot remember if this was in theatre. It is everything happening day as England’s men and women are also playing Rugby Union internationals in 3 D. By has secured rights to show Champion league games and Europa League for the three years from Sky and ITV fro £900 million. This is a game changer and I will have to reconsider the decision to stick with Sky Internet and not switch back to BT,.
On Monday I am going to spend a day at the Metro centre with in the morning to Ikea for Boxes and perhaps for a Winter coat if no luck at Asda this evening and then after a light lunch I am going to the 2.40 performance of Gravity in Imax 3D at the Odeon there after a great review by the good Doctor Kermode who reckons that this is the film to see in 3D. On Tuesday to Newcastle for a lecture on former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher by her biographer. Not sure about the rest of the week so far and time presses, Time for some exercise I think and still not progressed further with the 50th Anniversary of the National Theatre than achieved yesterday.
Before making progress I decided to take the opportunity to find about the other 750 productions not included and that led to checking if I had seen the play performed by the Royal Shakespeare company or elsewhere looking through my live theatre programmes which were upstairs three boxes, one small with RSC Shakespeare programmes, one with other RSC productions and one large box with the rest. I then decided I would make no progress without separating the programmes into categories, All Shakespeare, all other plays, Musicals, Opera, Music concerts, Children’s and a miscellany. And then putting the programmes in alphabetical order I decided this was too big an undertaking to undertake immediately and decided to leave perhaps until later next week..
I watched the American X factor in which Simon Cowell still participates with three ladies and though the British artists in our own series compare favourably.
The must win Rugby league game against Fiji is proving as tough as anticipated and the coming out all firing by England nearly worked but has failed so far with a ball fumbled before making the line and Fiji who nearly scored the last time I paid attention has now scored a try, but wow as I look back England have level to 6,6. I have the sound turned off.
I have undertaken about 25 minutes of sports exercise and as half time has been reach in the Rugby I will have a drink of cold water and undertake 35 minutes of Wii Fit exercise, get myself ready forgoing out and then watch any of the game left over. I was only able to complete 25 mins thus 50 in total before deciding I had to get myself ready as four o’clock approached, meanwhile England had scored 4 tries not one two or three but four while I exercise to be 30 6 up when I checked and on coming down they have scored another not converted to be 34 to 6 ahead and with only 11 mins left the game looks won but given the speed of the England score, one can never say a win until the weight challenged lady stops singing
It was time to get myself ready and be away preparing a cool box but while I did this I forgot to take the defrosted quiche and a flask of soup with me as it was getting colder and anticipated it would get colder still.
There was a red coat at Asda which appealed but not quite big enough or with the length that I wanted so I left for the look at what is available at the Metro centre on Monday,. I bought some thermal socks in brown and greet expensive for me for £13 for 6 pairs and then the milk, a lettuce and some figs in the food store returning these to car before seeking some tea, reduce price prawn mayo sandwich for £1 and a bottle of Pepsi Max for 87 which I enjoyed upstairs reading a little from the Montalbano Track of sand but then spilt about half the drink across the table, what a mess which I was able to clear up a little with paper serviettes and then making a quick retreat arcing at the cinema theatre a little early although there was quite a crown already seated, specially compared to earlier performances in the week. It was not a night for ice cream so I enjoyed a coffee 2,25 from the new Starbucks converted from the previous theatre owned area as it was too cold to go across to the MacD. After the show I had to use the new Deicer rapid response can to clear the windscreen and on return I enjoyed the quiche, some figs and some lemonade before going to bed around 11.30.
The Metropolitan Opera relay as I have reported on all my visits provides an all round better experience than elsewhere because oft the ability to watch scenery being dismantled and moved around as well as the excellent live interviews with performers and technicians. On this occasion there was a bonus watching the former great conductor James Levine who had been with the Met for decades in rehearsal for Falstaff after his absence for over two years. He had retired after 50 years as a professional musician because of intense back pain. He was operated successfully to stop the pain but fortunately eh then ha d a much more damaging fall which rendered him into a wheelchair with almost no lower limb control however we physic therapy, hard work and a lot of support from family, friends and members of the public he is able to conduct again and watching the rehearsal we witnessed his intense professionalism and control. I had not planned to watch Falstaff because a comic opera is not my cup of tea despite is great ensemble singing. However I may go because just out of appreciate for his courage and determination and which I am sure will proving a great emotional experience for the audience as well as for him.
I have experienced a performance of Tosca from the Met before viewed on TV via their on line subscription player and was therefore aware of the story and that the opera contains a great Aria two by the male lead and one by Tosca in each of the three acts.
Tosca is played by Patricia Racette a mature substantial figure who although miss cast as the young innocent Madam Butterfly in Puccini’s Opera (which was one of my first experience of the Met relay back in 2009) has the emotional power and intensity in her singing which moved me to tears. As Tosca she had to give a sustained emotional force throughout, first a jealous woman threatened by what appears to be her lover’s attraction to another woman he had seen enter the church where he is suppose to be painting a Madonna and then fuelled by the evil commander of the French forces occupying Rome, who gives the impression that the woman has gone off with the lover to his secretary cottage in the grounds of the church.
There are strong chords between Tosca and the les Vepres Siciliennes, in that opera concerns an occupying power and a resistance movement in this instance led by Angelotti who we see escaping from prison, the Castel, del Angelo in Rome and which I have visited. He is hidden first in the church where he makes use of the meal left for the painter by the Sacriston. It emerges that woman who has come to pray had no interest in the painter but had come to leave clothing in the chapel, a dress and a fan so he could leave the city dressed as a woman with the fan hiding his features.
Unfortunately the alarm is sounded before the escape plan can be effected so the artist painter takes Angelloti to his cottage, mentioning that there is a well with half way down a passage to small cave. In the rush he leaves the fan which belonged to the sister and has the family crest. This is found by the ruthless governor Scarpia played by the Baritone George Gagnidre to brilliant effect. He persuades Tosca to go off in search of her alleged miscreant lover followed by one of his men who sees where the artist is located but when they arrive the escaped prisoner cannot be found so they arrest the painter played by the great tenor Roberto Alagna who I last saw in the Met Carmen and who is playing this role in the Christmas New Year production at the ROH which I will experiencing in person in the New Year and where the tickets arrived last week.
I felt his voice has become stronger and richer than previously although it may be more to do with the nature of the two roles and his two arias brought the house down as they say such was his emotional power. Scarpia then has Tosca also brought to the palace where he is seen being entertained by three women to commercial virtue and where he plots to use the situation of power to possess Tosca. He openly sings that his interest is only one of lust and that once achieved he likes to move on, rather like former President Kennedy who got a headache if he did not have sex with a new woman everyday. In this instance Scarpia preferred situation where he took women against their will and in Tosca is his best challenge to date because of her spiritual strength she sings in the Cathedral choir as well as commitment to one man and intolerance of unfaithfulness. He ensure she is a witness to the torturing of her lover and then offers them freedom if she accepts his lust. He explains to that the lover will be shot but this will be a fake as the guns will fire blanks and he tells his henchman to undertake a similar execution to a previous occasion. What Tosca does not know is that the previous execution was also a fatal one presented as a fake to get his way with someone else.
She yields up the hiding place to the despair of her lover. Angelotti is reported to have committed suicide rather than be captured.
After Scarpia signs the release warrant Tosca chances on a knife and stabs the lecher to death. She visits the jail as requested earlier and explains what is to happen to her lover and that he must pretend to be dead and not move until the soldiers leave. To her horror she finds that he has been killed and this coincides with the discovery of the body of Scarpia. Rather than face capture she throws herself off the battlements to her death. This proved to be one of the great operas an amazingly I then discovered there is to be a performance locally at the Sunderland Empire next April
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