West Side Story 2021

 

	1961	2021
Tony	Richard Beymer (voice:  Jimmy Bryant)	Ansel Elgort
Maria (Bernardo's sister)	Natalie Wood (voice:  Marni Nixon)	Rachel Zegler
Anita (Bernardo's girlfriend)	Rita Moreno (voice:  Betty Wand)	Ariana DeBose
Bernardo (head Shark)	George Chakiris	David Alvarez
Riff (head Jet)	Russ Tamblyn (voice:  Tucker Smith)	Mike Faist
Officer Krupke	William Bramley	Brian d'Arcy James
Lieutenant Schrank	Simon Oakland	Corey Stoll
Doc's shop keeper	Ned Glass as Doc	Rita Moreno as Valentina

These are comparative cast lists for the two movie versions of Bernstein's West Side Story.  The lyrics are by Sondheim.  All the main roles were dubbed in the 1961 movie while none were in the new one.  Voice:  means the name of the person who is actually singing.  I was fascinated to see Rita Moreno sang here but was dubbed in the earlier version.  Curious.  After all, Rita has a Grammy.

If you were paying attention, at the very beginning they are talking about urban renewal in that part of New York City and show a photo of Lincoln Center which opened in 1962.  The film showed street signs from that neighborhood.  So there was a slum there before it was torn down.  I liked all the old cars seen parked in the street.  This is my era, apparently.

I enjoyed this remake and found it very emotional.  The dancing was top quality and very professional, but the same cannot be said for the singing.  Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if the volume was turned up a bit.  The singing wasn't bad, just insignificant.  Live in the theater it would be louder because the cast would be chosen partly for their singing and then amplified. 

There was a lot of untranslated Spanish with quite a lot of "Speak English" remarks.  I only know tiny bits of Spanish.  The story was darker and more violent.

In my review of West Side Story at the Sacramento Music Circus I said, "The way the production looks is how the story is told.  One group runs quickly off the stage and is replaced by another.  'Who are these people?' is a question that should be instantly answered." It was at the Music Circus, but it was not here.  It was no easy trick to tell the two groups apart.  I found this a particular problem.

Tony loses his cool for a moment and changes everything.  This is the heart of the story.  One should see it again.  Don't miss this.  The young man who plays Tony is particularly beautiful.

Hamilton Disney+

Jonathan Groff - King George III
Daveed Diggs - Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson
Leslie Odom Jr. - Aaron Burr
Lin-Manuel Miranda - Alexander Hamilton
Phillipa Soo - Eliza Hamilton, wife of Hamilton
Renée Elise Goldsberry - Angelica Schuyler, sister of Eliza?

Christopher Jackson - George Washington

I am watching the Disney+ version of Hamilton, 2020.  This is not a movie of a musical like The King and I, but rather a movie of a live performance of the musical.  You are there.  The guys above are the USA founding fathers.  The guy on the left is Aaron Burr and next is Alexander Hamilton.  They are in their uniforms for the revolutionary war.  No wigs, and certainly no racial makeup.  Each actor looks like they would look on the street.

The plot runs from when Hamilton is studying law and runs through the duel where he dies.

Lin-Manuel Miranda both created this and plays the main character.  The content is astounding, but it goes by so fast that some plot points are lost.  My version doesn't include text.  The quality of the reproduction is excellent.  I have another copy but it's the usual too loud orchestra and fuzzy diction.  The Disney+ version is much better.

I can see the attraction.  It may be the most American thing that ever existed.  It's an opera because there's almost no talking.  Constant singing is opera.  Rap replaces recitative.  I don't know if I will ever feel the urge to see it again, but if you are American, you will need this.  I don't know what other people make of it.

Burr knows he will be remembered only as the man who killed Alexander Hamilton.

Cats the Movie

Jennifer Hudson ... Grizabella
Judi Dench ... Old Deuteronomy
Taylor Swift ... Bombalurina

In spite the terrible reviews I went to the movie Cats, a musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber.  It starts very slow, but ends nicely.  Judi Dench is her usual glorious self.  I got the plot for the first time.  The only thing that I absolutely hated was they have the excellent Jennifer Hudson to sing Memories, and they make her croon it except for one brief loud section.  Just remind yourself that it's Cats.

The people who are complaining seem to be people who have never been to the opera. 

Revival of The King and I

Kelli O'Hara as Anna Leonowens
Ken Watanabe as King of Siam
Ruthie Ann Miles as Lady Thiang

Directed by Bartlett Sher

From the perspective of 2019 Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I seems very different.  Is this cultural appropriation?  We have cute oriental children, a king that goes barefoot, bowing while curling up on the floor, etc. etc. and so forth.  Who knows what the true reality is? The English conquered the world and never reconsidered their own values. 

The musical is based on the memoirs of Anna Harriette Leonowens which were published after the American civil war, while Uncle Ton's Cabin was still well known.  This novel is a topic in Anna's lessons with the children.  They notice that this contradicts what their father has taught.

Anna does not come as a conqueror.  She is hired to teach the children and receives a salary.  She teaches English ideas.  But that is why the king has hired her.  He wants to find a place in this world filled with European conquerors.  He wants to appear to them to be civilized, perhaps realizing that they are filled with cultural prejudices.  It's best to just go with it.

Kelli O'Hara projects the classy but not too classy tone of Anna.  She sings sweetly and does a nice waltz [oops--polka].  I wasn't too sure about Ken Watanabe at first, but he won me over.  Tuptim's lover was a beautiful young man who was not that great as a singer.  Ken sang the king's songs resulting in melodies I don't think I've ever really heard before. 

It ran on television.  It's worth a look.

Cabaret Revival

Master of Ceremonies  Alan Cumming
Sally Bowles  Michelle Williams

I am viewing a film of the 2014 Broadway revival of Cabaret.  I can easily see why Alan Cumming won a Tony for this.  I also remember him saying when it ended how glad he was to never have to wear the costume again.

The music is stimulating, but as the show goes on, NAZI salutes and arm bands appear.  This is the real thing with all the ugliness left in, something that doesn't usually happen in movies.  The politics is hard to take, but I'm glad I saw this.

Porgy and Bess on Broadway

Bess - Audra McDonald
Porgy - Norm Lewis
Sportin Life - David Alan Grier

I am watching a “non-television” film of Gershwin's Porgy and Bess from the 2012 Broadway production.  Until I saw this, I did not realize that there are actually 2 so very different versions of this work.  Until now I have only been aware of the opera version where all the text is sung and accompanied by a standard opera orchestra, the original version from 1935.

The Broadway version is substantially shorter and includes spoken dialog written for this production.  The sound of the recording isn't good enough to understand most of this.  As an opera fan and musician, I very much miss the sound I am used to.  I'm getting more of a swing band sound here with a lot of brass, or perhaps it should be described as a pit band.  If there are violins, I'm not hearing them.  The singing is pretty good, but the backup kind of leaves them hanging.  I haven't kept in touch with the Broadway sound in the 21st century. Audra is classically trained, but I don't believe the others are.  This is just my opinion.

The aim here isn't opera but is instead to produce a realistic, life-like view of southern black culture.  It is felt that presentations by large opera companies don't achieve this.  There is a lot of realistic acting, occasionally approaching actual abuse.  I've seen Audra in a full length work before, live for Mahagonny, and she is astounding here.  She quit the run early because of illness.  I can see now that she spends a lot of time shouting, not a good idea for a singer.  I remember well going to sports events as a teenager and its effect on the voice.

Though Porgy and Bess has always been controversial, my own perspective doesn't really have anything to add to this argument.  Many count the entire story to be racist. Edwin DuBose Heyward who wrote both the libretto and the novel it is based on was southern white and of the planter class.  Read Audra McDonald's take on racism in Porgy and Bess here.

This is mind altering, not at all the Porgy and Bess of memory, but still one knows that it does not exist without Gershwin.  This particular version doesn't exist without Audra McDonald.  The general impression is one of intense raw power.  It's rather frightening.

I think it is regrettable that there is no commercial film of this.  I feel glad I saw it at all, but a commercial film would result in clearer sound, making the dialog easier to understand and the music more beautiful.  It did not woo me away from my operatic version.  I could almost count this as a new opera.

The Yeomen of the Guard

Conductor:  Anne-Marie Endres
Director:  Debbie Baad
 
Our Cast
Sir Richard Cholmondely (Lieutenant of the Tower): Timothy Power
Colonel Fairfax (under sentence of death): Anthony Tavianini
Sergeant Meryll (of the Yeomen of the Guard): Mike Baad
Leonard Meryll (his Son): Samuel Palmer
Phoebe Meryll (his daughter): Paige Kelly
Jack Point (a Strolling Jester): Charlie Baad
Elsie Maynard (a Strolling Singer): Jadi Galloway
Wilfred Shadbolt (Head Jailer and Assistant Tormenter): Eric Piotrowski
Dame Carruthers (Housekeeper to the Tower): Lenore Sebastian
Kate (her Niece): Rebecca Cox


Gilbert and Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard played last night by the Sacramento Light Opera Theater.   If I stay in Sacramentlo long enough, Perhaps I will see them all.  This work is alternately called The Merryman and His Maid, which refers to the two strolling players. The action takes place inside the Tower of London during the reign of Henry VIII.  The yeomen guard the tower, as they do today.  They managed some excellent uniforms for them.

There is much to be explained here.  Some questions:

• Why is Colonel Fairfax under sentence of death?  Wikipedia says sorcery.
• What are Strolling players doing inside the Tower (not tourist attraction then)?
• Why does Colonel Fairfax want to get married before he dies?  Wikipedia says doesn't like heir.
• etc.

Plot:  Wilfred loves Phoebe, Phoebe loves Colonel Fairfax who is scheduled to die the next day.  Leonard wants Fairfax released because he saved his life in battle.  Leonard, his father and his sister hatch a plot where Leonard will hide and Fairfax will pretend to be him.  Phoebe steals the key from Wilfred and off we go.

Side story:  Fairfax wants to die married so his evil relation will not inherit his estate and offers a bribe to any woman who will marry him.  Elsie marries Fairfax in secret, Leonard hides and Fairfax appears in disguise as Leonard.

We end up with three happy couples and one very sad Jack Point.

The diction could have been better.  The songs were titled but the dialog was not.  I should have returned to the old days and read the plot before.  The music was excellent and well done.  My favorite singers were Anthony Tavianini and Jadi Galloway, the main couple.

The Gondoliers

Conductor:  Anne-Marie Endres
Director:  Robert Vann

Gilbert and Sullivan's The Gondoliers, presented last night in Sacramento, is a new one for me.  Robert Vann, the director and portrayer of Luiz, pointed out that it is produced less often than other G&S works because it is a big show with a large cast.  The ladies announce that they are four and twenty when obviously there are only twelve of them.  No one minds this.

The plot is also complex.

From Spain

Duke:  Mike Baad
Duchess:  Kathryn Peperkorn
Casilda, their daughter:  Tiffany Patterson
Luiz, attendant (or where is he from?):  Robert Vann

From Venice

The Grand Inquisitor:  Tim Power
Marco Palmieri, Venetian Gondolier (tenor):  Anthony Tavianini
Gianetta, Contadina, his girl friend/wife (soprano):  Carley Neill
Giuseppe Palmieri, Venetian Gondolier (baritone):  Charlie Baad
Tessa, Contadina, his girl friend/wife (mezzo-soprano):  Paige Kelly
Misc. girls and gondoliers

From Barataria

Inez, the King's Foster-mother (contralto):  Karen Lyman

Here is an actual gondolier posing for this picture.  Isn't he dreamy?

Our gondoliers wore shirts very much like this.  The red and white striped shirts are to distinguish the two gondoliers the girls are fussing over.  Our opera did not include any gondolas.

Plot:  There are gondoliers and there are girls chasing after them.  However, only two of the gondoliers seem to hold interest--the Palmieri brothers.  It is fascinating how much they resemble the gondolier in the photograph.  The Palmieri brothers tell us they are only honorary gondoliers.

They are blindfolded and select.  The other girls pair up with the remaining gondoliers and everyone gets married.

The Duke, Duchess and their daughter Casilda from Spain show up looking for the Prince of Barataria, the man Casilda married when she was very young.  A young man named Luiz accompanies them carrying a snare drum, presumably to announce the arrival of the Duke and Duchess.  Luiz and Casilda have fallen in love.  The King of Barataria has died, and the new king must be found.  The Grand Inquisitor tells them the new king is one of the Palmieri brothers, but he doesn't know which.  The brothers decide to rule jointly.

Inez is found and tells who is the new King.  To produce the required happy ending only one of the characters can be the King of Barataria.  You must guess.

This was lively and entertaining and included no hit tunes whatsoever, unusual for a G&S opera.  It was well attended.

I want to thank Debbie Baad for the correct cast member names for the performance I saw on Friday.

Patience in Sacramento

Friday night began the run of Gilbert & Sullivan's Patience from the Light Opera Theatre in Sacramento.

Conductor:  Anne-Marie Endres
Director:  Debbie Baad

Poets 

Reginald Bunthorne (A Fleshly Poet) — Charlie Baad 
Archibald Grosvenor (An Idyllic Poet) — Timothy Power

Rapturous Maidens 

The Lady Angela — Paige Kelly
The Lady Saphir — Rhonda Thomas
The Lady Saphir — Jadi Galloway
The Lady Ella — Franchesca Sonoyama
The Lady Jane — Tiffany Patterson
Patience (A Dairy Maid) — Kate Murphy

Officers of Dragoon Guards 

Colonel Calverley — Michael Baad
Major Murgatroyd — Kevin Branson
Major Murgatroyd — Roy Domoe Lieut.
The Duke of Dunstable — Anthony Tavianini

This show is all about outfits.  Dress like people from ancient England, and you will be perceived as a poet and adored.  Dress like a modern person, and you will disappear into the crowd.  Suitable young women pay no attention to the suitable young men in the Dragoon Guards and instead go off pining after silly poets in old fashioned outfits.  The young women wear old fashioned outfits too and sigh and moan.  There are patter songs.  Irrelevant names are tossed about.  Francesca da Rimini.

Before this appeared in my inbox, I had no idea it existed.  It is fun.  Try to see it.

Mama Rose

This of course refers to Jonathan Kent’s production of Gypsy, music by Jule Styne, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, filmed from the West End in London and shown recently on  Great Performances on PBS.

Above are Imelda Staunton as Rose and Lara Pulver as Louise, or Gypsy Rose Lee.  The show brings a lot of memories for me.  I vividly recall fantasizing myself in the role of Mama Rose, the star of the show in spite of the title.  She waited until it was too late to have a career herself.  As of course did I.  I also remember Gypsy Rose Lee on her television talk show. She would flirt with the camera.  I have also read Gypsy's murder mystery called The G-String Murders.

A number of famous women have done Mama Rose:  Ethyl Merman, who is very easy to imagine in the role, Angela Lansbury, and Tyne Daly to name 3.  Imelda Staunton is intensely bitchy in the part, intensely angry and completely believable.  It is a far different experience from the "nice" movie.  The show has only a few hit tunes which are repeated.  If you missed it on TV, watch it on the PBS website.

The Wiz

Witches from The Wiz

The Wiz live on NBC played Friday night.  This was at the same time new and not new.  It's the same story only not.  Everyone was fabulous, especially her "Queenness" Queen Latifah.

The Queen is the Wizard.  "Ease on down the road" was the only song I recognized.  This is a lot of fun but Toto doesn't go to Oz.  It plays again on Dec 19.  I missed this when it starred Diana Ross, but don't miss the rerun.

Sweeney Todd

Conductor: Patrick Summers
Production Designer: Tanya McCallin *

Sweeney Todd: Brian Mulligan
Mrs. Lovett: Stephanie Blythe
Johanna: Heidi Stober
Beggar Woman: Elizabeth Futral
Anthony Hope: Elliot Madore *
Adolfo Pirelli: David Curry *
Tobias Ragg: Matthew Grills
Judge Turpin: Wayne Tigges
Beadle Bamford: AJ Glueckert

The great performers fund of the San Francisco Opera is accumulating money.  Gerald Finley who was supposed to sing here and Diana Damrau who was supposed to sing Lucia have both cancelled to be replaced by less expensive but still very fine singers.  My Brian Mulligan experiences have included an excellent Valentin in Faust, a very nice Marcello in La Boheme, and a less significant role in last season's magnificent Les Troyens.   He was everything you might want in a Sweeney Todd.  The entire cast is made up of excellent American singers.  The star of the evening was the very distinguished Stephanie Blythe.  Heidi Stober and Elizabeth Futral deserve special mention.

The way you tell what is an opera is by including all musical theater that can be performed by an opera company made up of opera singers and an opera orchestra.  Sondheim's Sweeney Todd qualifies.  This work has only recently seeped into the opera house where it can be heard with supertitles.  The libretto, also by Sondheim, is very wordy, and sung quickly with fake English accents.  Tough.  The real Brits Emma Thompson and Bryn Terfel were much easier to understand.  The most fun part was the section where Todd and Lovett are describing the taste of the pies according to the profession of the victim.

I think this was a Sweeney Todd of very high quality, if you like that sort of thing.  As my fourth viewing, I found that I was growing tired of it.

Editorial comment:  the only excuse for doing a musical instead of real opera would be the filling of the seats.  This did not happen.

After the performance Patrick Summers received the San Francisco Opera medal.

Hair

Last night I put on my dashiki and my wrist bands and set out to see Hair (also called Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical) at the Sacramento Music Circus.

West Side

Last week I went to the Music Circus to see Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story.  I only remember seeing the movie before.  It's another show with lots of dancing.  The director and choreographer was Jerome Robbins.

Tony:  Justin Matthew Sargent
Maria:  Carolann M. Sanita
Bernardo:  German Alexander
Anita:  Desireé Davar,

Everything is very heavily miked which I'm not used to.  There are no supertitles, and since it's theater in the round, they are frequently facing away from you.  The pace is frantic and intense which I think people who enjoy musicals like.  St. Louis does opera in the round but with supertitles.

I was discussing this with my neighbor who said she saw it with a friend that is Puerto Rican.  Her friend complained about the clothing and the accents.  Puerto Ricans don't actually wear red and black all the time.

I feel it is important to explain this.  Theater and reality are two widely different things.  In real life people just wear what they wear and look the way they look.  If you are old enough to have lived in New York at the time--it premiered in 1957--you might know what people looked like in that time and place.  I vaguely recall button down collars, petticoats.  The purpose for putting them in consistently colored clothing isn't to accurately portray them--it is to clearly differentiate them from the New York kids in the rival gang who wore oddly pastel clothes.  When I go to a show, I don't like to be spending my time trying to figure out who each person is.  That's what the production is for.

The way the production looks is how the story is told.  One group runs quickly off the stage and is replaced by another.  "Who are these people?" is a question that should be instantly answered.  I always remember the Aida in Rome where the principals and the chorus all wore similarly designed outfits.  Which one is Radames?  Constant puzzlement is not a desirable quality in a production.

A theater production isn't trying to be a movie, although the use of films as background is increasing.

Into the Woods

I was going around the circle at Curves the other day, and the attendant was complaining about the new movie Into the Woods.  For her it had two endings:  the expected fairytale ending and the second dark one.  She also was surprised that there were musical numbers.  I tried to explain that this was a film adaptation of a classic musical comedy by Stephen Sondheim.  Who?

There has been a wide range of reactions to this film.  I imagine the range would depend on whether you had ever seen it as a musical.  It was done live here in Sacramento a couple of years ago, so nothing really surprised me when I saw it today.  I thought as film adaptations go, this one was excellent.

How could you want a better witch than Meryl Streep?  Or a better wolf than Johnny Depp?  I was especially impressed with the diction.  Every one of Sondheim's words could be clearly understood.  I think the movie's flaws are the musical's flaws.  I think Sondheim couldn't bear to write a fairytale ending.

Anything can happen in the woods.

P.S.  I've never really been a fan of Sondheim, except as a lyricist.  His first big project was writing the lyrics to Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story (1957), possibly the best of all American musicals.  These are truly great songs. Sondheim, it seems, thinks they're too poetic.

He's been very busy since then.  He's done a lot of shows that I've never seen, and people seem to like to sing his songs.  But a string of songs by Sondheim generally makes me cringe.  I can only tolerate Judi Dench singing "Bring in the Clowns," for instance.

Early in the blog I wrote:  "While I was in London, I tried to see Sunday in the Park with George, mainly because I've never seen a Stephen Sondheim musical. Unless Sweeney Todd is Sondheim."  I went on to say,  "Sondheim is short choppy phrases of three to six syllables with tunes played on the black keys. All the tunes sound exactly the same. How does he do that? Perhaps it's a minimalist musical."

But then I kind of liked Sunday in the Park with George when I saw it on Broadway.  Still no hit tunes, but I kind of liked the content.  With Sondheim it's more words over music.  Ideas over execution.

And then this year came the marvelous Sweeney Todd at Lincoln Center with Bryn Terfel and Emma Thompson, a truly great event.  Their gigantic personalities raised it above itself.

I can only shrug.  He's too significant to simply ignore, but musically he never grabs me. I'm now going to retire Into the Woods and Sweeney Todd.  Enough.
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Sweeney Todd at Lincoln Center

This was my third Sweeney Todd by Stephen Sondheim:  the first was a pirate DVD with Angela Lansbury; the second the movie with Johnny Depp, and the third this wonderful concoction from Lincoln Center with the New York Philharmonic.  I must say I much prefer this cast with the always charismatic Bryn Terfel as Todd, Emma Thompson as a completely daffy Mrs. Lovett, Philip Quast as Judge Turpin, Jeff Blumenkrantz as The Beadle, Christian Borle as Pirelli, Erin Mackey as Johanna and Audra (The Great One) McDonald as The Beggar Woman.  Audra also introduced the show for PBS.

If you look behind the performers you can see people playing instruments.  They wandered crazily along narrow paths between sections of the orchestra.  The performers carried the show.

If you missed it, perhaps you can find it on PBS.

Show Boat

Last night's performance at the San Francisco Opera of Jerome Kern's Show Boat, book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, was my first musical at the opera. 

I want to write about the use of amplification in this performance.  A friend told me that the first performance was criticized because the spoken dialog could not be heard.  I'm sure no one, including certainly me, would object to amplifying the spoken dialog.  Opera singers are trained to project their singing voices, but speaking is not that common in opera and when it is found it isn't nearly as large a part of the performance as it is here.  So fine.  The microphones and speakers used were fine for talking, but it was immediately apparent that this was going on.

The problem arises when the songs are heard.  Microphones in a large theater distort the sound.  Everyone starts to sound the same.  My friend didn't believe that "Old Man River" (sung superbly by Morris Robinson) was amplified until the repeat in Act II where it had been shut off.  Only without amplification do you hear the natural sound of the voice.

We had a couple of straight actors in Bill Irwin as Cap'n Andy Hawks and Harriet Harris (from Frasier) as Parthy Ann Hawks, his wife.  Bill was fabulous and even sang a little bit.

Our opera singers were Patricia Racette (who can do anything) as Julie, Heidi Stober as Magnolia Hawks who danced a bit and was beautiful in the role, Morris Robinson as Joe, Angela Renee Simpson as Queenie, and Michael Todd Simpson as Gaylord Ravenal, the gambler who marries Magnolia.  Can opera singers sing musicals?  When the musical is Show Boat, absolutely.

Francesca Zambello's production of this great American musical was shared with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera and Houston Grand Opera.  For me it worked.  The costumes reminded one of candy canes.  Each scene was clear and moved smoothly and quickly to the next scene.

The score is full of famous American songs, more than you expected.  Racette sang "Can't help lovin that man of mine" and "Just my Bill" in a convincing American pop song style.  Heidi and Michael sang "You are Love," one of the truly great songs.

The house was full.  Francesca Zambello production.

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Into the Woods

I'm trying to get out and about in Sacramento a bit more and happened on Sondheim's Into the Woods produced by the Light Opera Theater of Sacramento.  The overall quality was very pleasing.  I and the audience liked very much Little Red Riding Hood played by Kelly Cullity.

You'll find it tonight, tomorrow and next weekend at 2791 24th st, but watch out for the neighborhood parking.

Les Miz

I knew when I went to the Les Miserables movie that they were all recorded singing right on the set.  What they didn't say was that they all tried to hide this from whoever else might be on the set with them, that they all whispered their way through their parts.  I hate that.  Sound as crappy as you want, but belt it out there.  I got some ugly looks when I said the only person trying to actually sing was Russell Crowe.  His voice isn't very pretty, but at least he was trying.  I kept wishing Susan Boyle would come on and do "I dreamed a dream."  [Guilty secret.]

Helena Bonham Carter and Sasha Baron Cohen were fun.

One of my Facebook friends said she wanted to rush home and brush her teeth.  If you haven't seen the movie, you won't get this.
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Porgy and Bess on Broadway

Listen to this interview with Audra McDonald.  Click where it says Listen.  She likes the same versions I do.  Don't you love it when that happens!  Unfortunately, I can hear the strain she talks about in her voice when she talks.  There is singing.  Wonderful singing.  She makes Bess the center of the drama, which I haven't seen before.