Unexpected

The 2015 – 2016 Symphony season began last weekend with a program that included Beethoven’s Symphony #9 as well as a relatively new piece by a contemporary American composer named Adam Schoenberg (not that Schoenberg!). Both pieces were well performed and well received. Both Friday and Saturday night’s performances were sold out, a little unusual for a Classics series concert.

Once again this year, I am ushering. Because of that, we are trying something new this year. In the past we have purchased two subscriptions to the Classic series and I would generally limit my ushering efforts to the Pops concerts. Occasionally I would usher a Classics concert but, when I did, I would be seeing the same concert a second time. With a nod to the budget, this year we purchased only one subscription, for Harper’s Other Dad, and I signed up to usher the same performances. We don’t get to sit together during the concert but it saved us more than $1000 so it was well worth it.

The theme for this season is “Symphony Unexpected”. I’m not entirely sure what that means, perhaps the combination standards with 21st-century pieces. Whatever the rationale, it is a significant improvement over last year’s theme, “It’s Tito Time” in honor of our then-new conductor. The season brochure shows a close-up of a tux but rather than the typical black tie, it is orange sequined. I guess that is the unexpected.

To continue that theme for opening weekend, Symphony Hall was decorated with orange bow ties on the glass doors and mirrors. And the ushers was asked (well, not really ‘asked’) to wear them. I didn’t mind. It was festive. I wish they’d told us before we arrived however so I would not have spent time tying a black bow tie before I left home.

Of course putting a large orange bow on the men’s room mirror creates a self opportunity too good to pass up. At least in my case, I’m not sure this can really be called “unexpected”.

“I’ve written a letter to daddy…”

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Wicked and Miserable

I enjoy live theater. With the energy from the stage and the shared experience of being part of an audience, I think almost any live theater is worth seeing. Jukebox musicals and Neil Simon comedies test that theory, but I can usually find something interesting in whatever I see. The exceptionally good and the exceptionally bad stay with me. The rest fade from memory as pleasant evenings. Sometimes, for reasons unrelated to the production, events conspire to make a theater outing a night to remember, but not in a good way. Such was the case this weekend.

A few months ago a friend asked if Harper’s Other Dad and I would be interested in seeing Wicked. I’d seen the show before and enjoyed it but I’d not considered seeing it again on this tour. Still, it’s a good show and I have committed the Original Cast Recoding  to memory so, why not. It sounded like a nice way to spend a social evening with a friend. Thanks to a virtual cosmic convergence of unrelated events, however, it did not turn out that way.

I’d unwittingly gotten us off to a bad start by being cheap and buying seats in the upper balcony. Having seen the show before, I didn’t mind not having great seats. Being familiar with the venue, I knew it was better to stay toward the center and move higher rather than moving to the sides in the orchestra. I had never experienced the upper balcony however. The same design features that make it better to avoid the sides, also mean the balcony is very steep. Walking to our seats in the third row, when I diverted my gaze even slightly to the right, I was looking over the edge, past the lower balcony, and to the orchestra seats below. As someone with a touch of vertigo this was unsettling.

Our friend ended up with a family commitment in the afternoon so we were not able to meet him for dinner or drinks before the show. As it turned out, we never saw him.

Harper’s Other Day was beginning to feel the effects of food poisoning, he thinks from a bad avocado at lunch. We got to our seats but he fled to the men’s room before the lights went down. I was able to watch Act I from our seats. Poor guy, he was able to see some of it on the lobby monitor when not skipping to the loo. At intermission, I cautiously crept my way down the row to the lobby to check on him. He was feeling worse. I was not thrilled about making the pilgrimage back to the seats in the center of vertigo row so we left before Act II. There was more fun yet to come.

Because the show was sold-out, parking would have been challenging. This, plus my dislike for driving in the city of Tempe, even in good conditions, gave me the idea it would be better to park remotely and take the light rail. The train stop is only about seven blocks from the theater. It worked out fine on the way to the theater. Decorum mandates I withhold details but, owing to the food poisoning, the seven-block walk back to the train featured several impromptu stops. Happily, the wait on the platform was not long. I cannot say the same for the train ride back to the car.

Sitting beside someone trying mightily, and with only limited success, to retch quietly into a plastic cup is not a pleasant, even less so for him. Neither is the experience enhanced by the presence of a group of malodorous folks who were using the air-conditioned train as a much-needed respite from the triple-digit heat. None of my five senses was spared assault. Eventually, we reached our car. I drove home in silence while H.O.D. dozed uncomfortably in the back seat.

But the sun also rises. The next morning Harper’s Other Dad was weak but recovering after a long night spent up-close & personal with porcelain. We’d purchased season tickets with our missed friend so, if we don’t connect with him before. we will see him in a few weeks at The Book of Mormon. The only lingering effect of the evening is there is now a vague association in my mind between “Defying Gravity” and projectile vomiting. I wonder how long that will last.

Hysteria

The local 2015-16 entertainment season started, at least for me, with Southwest Shakespeare Company’s production of Terry Johnson’s Hysteria. The play premiered in London in 1993 with the formidable title; “Hysteria: Or Fragments of an Analysis of an Obsessive Neurosis” As such, it joins Brad Fraser’s “Unidentified Human Remains and the True Nature of Love” (1989) and Tony Kushner’s “The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures” (2009) in a three-way tie for most awkward title of a contemporary play that I’ve seen and enjoyed. Honorable mention goes to Edward Albee’s “The Goat or Who Is Sylvia?”. It appears the subtitle was dropped when Hysteria was published in 1995.

The play is a fictionalized account of a real-life meeting between psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and surrealist artist Salvador Dali. They met in 1938 in England where the Jewish Freud was living, having fled his home in Vienna ahead of the ‘Anschluss‘ between Austria and Nazi Germany. Afternoon tea shared by an analyst who plumbs the depths of the human subconscious and a painter whose work captures the stuff of dreams seems a natural inspiration for drama but an unlikely springboard for farce. In playwright Johnson’s hands it is both. Most of Act I is laugh-out-loud funny as Johnson employs every cliché of farce; scantily clad women, rapidly opening & closing doors, panicked attempts at misdirection, and a break-neck pace are all in evidence. There is so much more. The word hysterical has more than one meaning. Not all are funny.

The conflict of the play presents itself in the character of “Jessica”, a mysterious young woman determined to speak with Freud by any means necessary. Her presence, in various states of undress, fuels the farce but, as the reasons for her, seemingly obsessive, need to talk to Freud are revealed, the play becomes dark. It is not dark in the ‘dark comedy’ sense. The play becomes dramatically, viscerally, almost painfully dark. There are still elements of farcical humor but for much of Act II the audience must decide what is real and what is not and neither is particularly humorous.

Jessica’s revelations present layers of memory. Are Freud’s recollections of a his sessions with a past analysand real, or are they a self-serving rewrite of his personal history? Are the events that surface in the previous session notes recovered memories of horrific childhood trauma, or are they figments of the analysand’s imagination rooted deep in her psyche? There is no reliable narrator and the mantel of audience surrogate changes hands more often than Jessica’s scanties. The audience is challenged to make these decisions and the outcome affects how we interpret the actions of the characters on stage.

At times Hysteria is riotously funny. For those with even a passing familiarity with Freud and Jung it is also witty. The audience is left to create its own punchline about ‘Freudian slips’ as Jessica’s delicates change hands but the playwright is not above utilizing an obvious pun or double entendre when the opportunity arises. That said, Hysteria is not a play for the faint of heart. The themes explored are complex and incidents of trauma, while not depicted, are described in most graphic detail.

Another local company, sadly now defunct, described their productions as “talk provoking”. That description fits Hysteria perfectly. We talked about the play all the way home… and the more we talked about it, the more I liked it.  

And Then This Happened

Last spring I started volunteering at one of our local museums. There are a number of volunteer opportunities available but the one I enjoy most, at least thus far, is staffing the Information Desk. There is a nice variety of questions and it affords me the opportunity to interact with most of the guests. Working conditions are pleasant and most of the museum staff and volunteers are friendly.

Another group of volunteers usually on hand are the Gallery Assistants. We call them ‘Rovers’ because their assignment is to circulate throughout the galleries. They give directions, answer questions, highlight changes or updates in the displays and keep an eye open for potential problems. It’s like working at the Info Desk but with more walking and fewer brochures. Rovers are discouraged from congregating at the Info Desk and chatting with the Desk Staff (ie. me) or other rovers. Human nature being what it is, however, it happens. This is especially true right after the museum opens in the morning when guests are few.

Recently, during one such chat, I met a volunteer I had not encountered before. This is not unusual. There are more than 500 volunteers so I see unfamiliar faces all the time. Our conversation followed the usual volunteer chat outline; name? (Sally), how long have you been a volunteer? (2 years), what assignments are you trained for?, etc. When all else fails there is the weather (hot!) and the traffic (congested!). As this conversation progressed I mentioned I also volunteered as an usher at Symphony Hall. Sally said she had always wanted to do that so I explained how it worked and offered to give her the contact information for the volunteer coordinator. She eagerly said; “Yes, please.” That’s when this got a little strange.

While I looked through my phone for the information I’d offered her, Sally raised both of her arms above her head, palms out, and said; “My Lord Jesus Christ loves me. Jesus Christ is my protector. The Lord is my savior.” Then she looked at me, giggled, and inquired; “What comes next?”

Having been raised a Southern Baptist, I am not rattled by the occasional Pentecostal ejaculation but they don’t usually arise in idle chatter with complete strangers in secular settings. I looked up from my phone, smiled and said; “I beg your pardon?”

“What comes next? I don’t know the next line.” Sally replied.

“I’m not familiar with the prayer”; I replied. “It sounds a little like the beginning of Psalm 23 but that is ‘The Lord is my shepherd… not savior”.

“I don’t know that one” Sally said.

Just my luck, 9:15 on a Wednesday morning and the Spirit decides to descend upon one of the faithful and picks one who doesn’t even know the 23rd Psalm? Am I on one of those hidden camera shows? If this goes viral on YouTube I’ll be annoyed.

About that time some guests arrived so I gave her the email address I’d written down and turned my attention to the visitors. After what seemed like an uncomfortably long silence, Sally wandered off to resume her roving.

In hindsight, I wish I’d come up with a better response than, “I beg your pardon?” Perhaps if I’d said, ‘Amen’ it might have brought the experience to a more rapid conclusion. Not being my first visit to the evangelical rodeo, I knew not to say, ‘Hallelujah’. In fundamentalist-speak that is the equivalent of the chorus in Grease singing; “Tell Me More, Tell Me More”. It just queues up the next verse.

Harper’s Other Dad advised, in situations like this the appropriate response to; “What comes next?” is ‘Lithium or some other mood stabilizer’. I did not want to go there, however. I don’t recall whether it was Carrie’s mom or Sybil’s mom that said; “Beware of practitioners of the mind”. I take no chances. I am pretty sure both are friends of Sally.

Note to self: Email the volunteer coordinator to let her know I gave her contact info to a potential volunteer…. one with whom I’d rather not be assigned.