Sydney
19.9.67
Well,
 |
| Peggy van Praagh |
here is
my first day overdue – and I’m still up in the air. Unless something comes up I
should be starting home later this week, but
---- (Heh, heh, heh!) last night I went to Don Giovanni (see below) and met Gerald Krug there. (He’s now to be
the Ballet Conductor - I think I told you, didn’t I?) He came over to me and
said, Had I ever done any ballet work, and I said only local groups at home,
and he said would I be interested, and I said, if there wasn’t any other work
available it was certainly better than nothing (very hard to sound keen and not so keen in the same sentence!).
Well, he said he was going to see Miss Van Praagh (she seems to run the Ballet)
tomorrow (that is, today) and if they needed me, would I be interested? So I said, yes, but that I couldn’t improvise or anything for them warming up etc; he seemed to think that that was a minor problem, and so he’s setting about it today. Well, that could be
interesting, to say the least. For one thing I scarcely know any of the music,
and it’s only about three and a bit weeks! Scream! But we’ll wait and see what
happens.
I’m
supposed to meet Robert Pikler today at lunch; I find he’s working at the Con,
where I’ve already been (think I’ve told you), but it might be interesting (!)
to see what happens when I go there with someone on the inside and don’t try
and approach it from the outer as before.
 |
| Jim Sharman |
Don Giovanni as produced in Aussie has been
generally disliked in other towns, particularly Melbourne, I believe, and I
find this hard to understand. The main cause of the trouble has been the set
which consists of nothing but a chequerboard pattern not flat on the floor, but
on an angle. [2018: raked, I presume.]
It’s black and white, but with various lightings appears as several other
colours throughout. With the exception of a couple of chairs (shaped like rooks)
and a square table there is nothing else to dress the stage at all. The whole
thing is surrounded by black drapes which people vanish into as exits. I felt, however, that nothing else was needed; DG is a fairly lively show, and the actors did plenty of wandering around, so I don’t feel it got boring. (Last night was youth night – for those under 26) (and they really enjoyed it – even laughed when the poor old Father got killed!). The producer is Jim Sharman, just 21, (and a friend of Glenda’s) and
I think he’s done a very good job. The characters are all well defined (they’re
all well written anyway) and we don’t have those funny little gaps that
normally occur in opera production – I liked it!
The
costumes were fabulous. Not done in black and white (fortunately – that would
have been a bit much!) but rather in a muted red, and various blazing whites,
and blacks with large chunks of gold etc on them. All the characters at the
beginning came down during the overture to the front of the stage, and donned
these hats and crowns that the chorus men gave them. The procedure was reversed
at the end. I like it!
No more
news just now, I’ll see if I can’t put this in with the letter from yesterday
which I haven’t posted yet.
Love,
Mike.
22.11.23 It's taken me five years to realise that two pieces of text in this post were transposed into an incorrect place. That sometimes happened when pictures were included. Anyway, corrected now.
