Separated at the 14th Street wig store: drag queen Lady Bunny and Disney princess Diana Damrau. Read more »
Here, on what appears to have been a rather chilly evening, are Michael Fabiano and his “mom” Renée Fleming in Die Walküre Lucrezia Borgia at the San Francisco Opera. Read more »
Awesome Anna Netrebko wraps her considerable talent around a the Europop hit “La Voix.” Note the correct use of hair extensions (without those ridiculous “rocker chick” bangs) and the plain but striking red gown. Read more »
We may have a contender in the category of Most Overdone Camp Diva Crossover Hair Extension.
What a concept, or La Cieca should say what a concept! This is Regie at its finest and most boldly satirical, genius that makes Graham Vick look like two-day-old steak frites. For this production of Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, the director (unnamed, alas in the YouTube clip below) utilizes the cinematic convention of the flash-forward in a postmodern epoch-bending variation. What if, this staging asks, Manon were to survive her various torments and travails? What would her life be like at, say, age 60? And what if, instead of hanging around mosquito-ridden Louisiana, she invested in a condo in Miami Beach [...]
Your feelings about the new Opus Arte DVD of Handel’s Acis and Galatea will have a lot to do with your tolerance for gentle whimsy. As a cultural consumer who tends to gravitate toward the more high-octane, Italianate drama of a Verdi overture or a Real Housewives of New Jersey hair-pull, I do my best to steer clear of pastoral operas about the lives and loves of those who tend sheep for a living, but an assignment is an assignment.
First things first: how are the clothes? Well, there’s enough leather to fill The Eagle ten times over, and there’s definitely fodder for intermission conversation: an adorable tweedy, puffy coat for Uldino; the pimped-out spiky bike helmet with the L.E.D. lights for Attila; all the L.E.D. lights in fact, like the ones that outline Ezio’s epaulettes; that insane blonde beehive wig with the single massive braid—worn, mais oui, with sparkly headband—that makes Violeta Urmana’s Odabella look half-Marge Simpson, half-Aubrey Beardsley Salome. But, good, bad, or crazy, the clothes are just that: clothes.
Tomorrow night’s performance of Attila promises to be a visual feast, especially for those of us whose visual aesthetic was crystallized in the 1960s era of gigantic hair, pearlized eyeshadow, liquid eyeliner and sharply tailored sportswear. And Violeta Urmana‘s look is pretty fierce too!
Cher Public