La Vie En Rose for 2008 April 28

On Saturday night I went to see The Sound of Music at the Palladium. As my siblings will (fondly I'm sure) remember, this was my favorite movie growing up, at least until I saw The Little Mermaid, so I was really excited about it. Well, it was pretty good and I enjoyed it. Some of the actors were better than others, unfortunately these were usually the supporting actors who were better. Max and the Baroness for instance, although Max was a lot older than he is in the movie so that threw me off! I have to remember the play came before the movie. There were a couple of songs that weren't in the movie, some of them quite good. But there was very little chemistry between Captain von Trapp and Maria, also Maria looked quite a lot like Hillary Clinton which was distracting. Also there wasn't as much development of their relationship as there is in the movie. I suspect a lot of that is those scenes they added in the movie would have been very boring on stage.

Overall it was really enjoyable, though. The main thing that struck me was how overtly political it was; much more so than in the movie. The Nazi question is central in the relationship of several of the characters, for instance it is actually the reason why the Baroness and Captain hastily end their engagement. The von Trapps' flight from Nazis becomes even more clearly the climax of the story; though, to be fair, my muddled view of things from the movie might have to do with those compulsive re watchings at the age of four, when I had no idea about anschluss or Nazis or anything like that. During the music festival scene, all these Swastika banners came down from the sides and the ceilings of the theatre, a very powerful evocation which made me a little bit uncomfortable! Also Rolph. In the play he actually doesn't betray him, but becomes compliant in their escape. A bit unfair on him then! Well, I actually think it works better but the logistics of theatre wouldn't have allowed for the heart-in-throat chase that ensues. Which is too bad because the nuns with the car parts are pretty much the best part of the whole movie.

Anyway a good time was had by all (me) and now I think I should work in a few more plays before the summer. It's globe season again!

I also realized that the Captain von Trapp would have been serving very near by stomping grounds during the FWW. Hmm...