Sunday, March 11, 2012

Oh Carmen, you whore!!!



I saw Carmen, the opera, last night. I had never seen an opera before, so when I seen that my school was putting on a production of it, I could not pass up the opera-tunity. So I went and got my tickets early, apparently VERY early. I did not even really pay much attention when I was getting the tickets, and the ticket lady did not really ask me where I wanted to sit. So I unsuspectingly got these what turned out to be pretty damn good tickets.

I asked one of my friends if she wanted to go with me. And luckily, she said yes. It is not really that I was excited about her going, because I necessarily wanted her to go with me. I just have this very weird thing where I cannot stand to go to things alone. I always feel like people are staring at me if I'm alone. I know that that is weird, and I have gotten a lot better over time, but I still feel like people are staring at me.

I was growing more and more excited as the days passed. I could not wait. I had never seen an opera before, and I had at least heard of Carmen. I mean I had utterly no idea of what the hell the damn thing was about, but I had at least heard about this particular opera.

The night came, and I could barely contain my excitement. Looking back, I can tell that I was probably a little too excited. Especially for most college students, who only go to these things because they are required to for a class, or can get extra credit. They even have little people standing outside of the door with little “hey-I-at-least-showed-up-and-am-deserving-of-something” slips. Me being apparently the weirdo that I am have never had the honor of getting one of these things.

I arrived at the theatre, after I had to change cloths, because again I’m a weirdo. I cannot go to any performing art show without at least being somewhat dressed-up. But as soon as I walked into the door, I knew I was a tad bit underdressed. But oh well, I could have cared less, I was excited. Well we went into the theatre and tried to find our seats, causing me to actually look at the ticket seating for the first time.

A-4 and A-5. Holy shit, these things are for the first row. I was expecting at least toward the front, but no, front freaking row baby. My friend and I made our way to our awesome seats, and man they were good. I had always heard of this mythical space called an orchestra pit, but had never seen one myself.

The lights dimmed, and the show was to begin momentarily. The choir entered, and we didn’t clap. The conductor entered, and we clapped. I at first did not see him enter, and I thought that we were just clapping for fun, as a bit of encouragement for the performers. Mr. Conductor left us, and went to his mysterious dungeon under the stage. The hidden orchestra began tuning their instruments, which I initially thought was the beginning of the show, and was not impressed AT ALL! Then, the show finally began.

There was a lot of singing, and I mean a lot. I am not a big fan of musicals, because usually they are pretty stupid in my opinion. I mean who the hell really breaks out in a show tune right before they are about to die. But this was a bit different, because I enjoy classical music, not in an obsessive or A Clockwork Orange way. I just appreciate the classics. I did not know that I had heard many of these tunes, pieces, works, whatever the hell they are called, before.

About a quarter of the way into the performance, I realized something. My freaking seat was extremely uncomfortable. These things were tiny and hard. I had nowhere to even think about getting into a comfortable position. I guess some sadistic designer intentionally made them this way, so that you do not get to comfortable and fall asleep, and so that your constantly adjusting so that you cannot focus fully on the show, just in case they fuck something up. Maybe at least a substantial portion of the audience will be adjusting their selves to obtain a temporary level of comfort.

I am sure that all of us have experienced some seating like this. The kind that make you swear off seating for ever. Well to make things worse, I am the kind of guy who likes to sprawl out a bit. Not like some sort of huge slobby blob, but I do like to, you know stretch. Well I usually do this by putting my arm around the chair next to me, but when you are not in some sort of relationship with this person, either intimate or familial, this can become a bit awkward. So not stretching for me, since I was neither intimate (nor hoping to be) or family with my accompanying person.

 But after the first quarter (like football) of the performance, I was itching to get up and enjoy a break from these god-forsaken chairs. During the second quarter, I look over to my friend and she is all sprawled out in her chair. She looked like someone who is trying to sleep in a hospital. Slumped way too far down with over half of their body sticking out of the chair. Then thank god, we were free for a bit, it was the much awaited intermission.
 After we made our way back to the chairs, I told my friend that if I put my arm around her I am not trying to come onto her. Once again, there was the weird no clap, clap thing as the choir and the conductor entered. The performance once again commenced, and my discomfort continued. But fortunately the second half (again football) is always very short and sweet. I guess that they know that they are not going to keep you in these sadistic chairs for long after you have tasted the sweet freedom of the intermission.

The show was pretty good, Carmen turned out to be a whore. She tempted this one dude named Don José into deserting the army to be free with her. But, being the whore she was, she quickly got tired of him, and fell in love with this other dude. I can’t really blame her. Instead of a dopy soldier, this Escamillio was a freaking bull fighter. Well dopy José gets pissed, but leaves Carmen because his mummy is dying (dumb ass mama’s boy). Carmen (little whore) goes to one of Escamillio’s bad ass bull fights. Dopy José shows up and Carmen tells him that she no longer loves him and wants to go and screw bad ass Escamillio for a while. That last part was not exactly said, but it was implied. Well José gets all pissy, and turns into this little bitch and keeps throwing Carmen down as she tries to leave. I found this particularly funny, because the dud playing José was huge (thing football player huge) and Carmen was tiny. Not to mention that every time she got tossed to the ground my friend made out this weird sigh, like a “oh no he didn’t.” Carmen finally gets pissed tells him he was a bad screw (again, its implied) and throws him some mysterious ring that apparently José had given her. I don’t know where the hell this ring came from, because it is otherwise nowhere mentioned in the whole damn opera. José has this moment of “oh no the little whore did not just throw my precious to the ground.” José goes all Sméagol on her ass and stabs her. The he has some obviously faked regret and is all “oh shit I just killed this bitch.” And the curtain drops.

If anyone knows where the hell this play is set, please let me know. My program says Seville. But I thought that Seville was in Spain. This would not be no biggy but, they kept pronouncing dopy José’s name as JOE-seh, which sounds more French to me, because in Spanish it is HOE-seh. Then they pronounce Escamillo according to its proper Spanish pronunciation. So if anyone knows where the hell this thing is set please let me know 

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