A gaggle of picadors from the Royal Opera demonstrate some of the choreography that didn’t make it onto the stage in this Francesca Zambello production of Carmen. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://youtube.com/v/ilDKRCbne6M” width=”425″ height=”350″ wmode=”transparent” /]
By La Cieca
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 Followers of trash TV will no doubt recognize the following clip from “Real Housewives of New York City,” in which big-boned socialite Alex and her gayish husband Simon prepare to attend opening night at the Metropolitan Opera … in a stretch limo …
By La Cieca
As we know, the “Wall of LGBT Role Models” has been deleted from John Doyle‘s staging of Peter Grimes at the Met. In fact, there were a number of other explicit gay references in the production that were omitted or toned down after the dress rehearsal. For example, here’s a rejected costume for Anthony Dean…
By La Cieca
Well, actually, yes, now you do. The New York Times is no longer the only major metropolitan daily whose music critic drools all over opera singers of the masculine persuasion. La Cieca is delighted to introduce the verbal stylings of David Mermelstein, who apparently is that gay man who has heretofore been trapped inside the…
By La Cieca
“I always cite the opera divas, like Leontyne Price. I mean, of course I’m an old fart, so I go back to these people who aren’t around anymore. But Leontyne Price and Marilyn Horne and Beverly Sills, I mean, they were glamour queens, and they were women who were not a size two …. It’s…
By La Cieca
Electric Elaine Eliane Coelho chews the scenery, leaves blood on the stage, and if there are any pregnant women in the audience, probably turns their fetuses gay right on the spot, all in just one scene from the gloriously gory melodrama from Carlos Gomes, Maria Tudor. Since YouTube embedding is acting a little odd this morning,…
By La Cieca
A reader sends this screenshot from his amazon.com account:
By La Cieca
Well, it says so right there on Page Six, you know it must be true: Michael Stipe injures his leg in a go-carting accident, The Duchess of York is accused of destroying the Brazilian coastline, and THE hipster intelligentsia flocked to Brooklyn Tuesday night to catch Patrick Stewart in Macbeth at BAM’s opening gala. Mikhail…
By La Cieca
David Gockley talks to a gay paper about fisting. (Well, when you’re running the San Francisco Opera, knowing these things is surely part of the job description.)
By La Cieca
So, who said this? “… all opera hovers on the border of parody. No other performing art — except possibly dance — so exposes its practitioners to ridicule. Part of the thrill of opera is pitting sheer volume against human limitations, the constant awareness of the possibility of failure.” Was it James McCourt? Ethan Mordden?…
By La Cieca
La Cieca has just heard that Neil Shicoff has canceled the dress rehearsal of Luisa Miller at the Met; Eduardo Villa (cover for the run) will do it. And La Cieca has heard further that Sergio Blazquez, scheduled to make his NYCO debut in La boheme in April, is having visa problems, so Gerard Powers…
By La Cieca
According to Gay City News, our editor JJ loved Angela Gheorghiu‘s Violetta, and he was more than a little enthused about Herr Jonas Kaufmann. Le public have spoken, and they want their video to stream quickly and reliably. So save this bookmark and visit frequently: it’s the parterre box page at Google Video. Here’s a…
By La Cieca
Our publisher JJ sounds off on recent productions of Romeo et Juliette, Zaza and Giulliame Tell (which sounds like a very full king-sized bed indeed!) in the latest installment of Gay City News. Meanwhile, La Cieca presents Il trittico on Unnatural Acts of Opera.
By La Cieca
La Cieca is feeling more and more doyenne-y by the day as she sees so many young bloggers sprouting up like so many tender little, uh, sprouts. Off to a rousing start is wellsung.blogspot.com, written by two little gay boys (or gay-vague boys) named Jonathan and Alex. La Cieca assumes they’re gay because they write…
By La Cieca
“Newcomers to opera sometimes don’t get the appeal of a dramatic form with so few surprises. Audiences know how Tosca ends before the performance even begins. Earlier this month, though, two operas provided some measure of suspense.” JJ’s latest reviews in Gay City News.
By La Cieca
“It’s always a treat to start the season with a pleasant surprise, and an exciting new dramatic soprano is one of the nicest discoveries of all—particularly when she heads up one of the strongest ensemble casts the Metropolitan Opera has fielded in years.” That’s our editor James beginning his 2005-06 season as a reviewer in…
By La Cieca
Music fans of all orientations, gay, straight and bi (oops, the Times says you don’t exist, my mistake), well, anyway, music fans around the world finally have news worth talking about. No, we’re not talking about Alberto Vilar, but you’re getting warm. Which is to say, it’s good news. Sir Elton John and George Michael…
By La Cieca
Norman Lebrecht has lost his fucking mind. My second favorite in this rabid rant is how Wieland Wagner (the “competent” stage director) had the middle name “Adolf.” (Wieland was born in 1917, six years before his mother Winifred met the fellow Lebrecht insinuates was his namesake.) The number one brain-fart in the piece is Lebrecht’s…
By La Cieca
