Word: costa
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...admitted to Rio's Escola de Bellas Artes, dropped out a couple of times, managed to end up with a degree. Then he went to work for the man who did most to get Brazil's great modern architecture movement into full swing-Lúcio Costa...
Commissioned in 1936 to design a building for Brazil's Ministry of Education, Architect Costa summoned Le Corbusier from France, surrounded "the greatest man in modern architecture" with a group of students who have since become Brazil's best. Among them: Afonso (Museum of Modern Art) Reidy, Jorge (University City) Moreira, Niemeyer. Then Costa pulled out of the project after a series of disagreements. The others elected Novice Niemeyer as their leader, and their building, faced with blue, louver-like sun-breakers, became a famed architectural milestone...
Among the best of Da Costa's touches is the train scene: in a railroad car are nine traveling salesmen, some playing cards, others reading newspapers-the Wall Street Journal, selected by Da Costa as perfect for 1912 typography and makeup. During the long weeks of rehearsals, the salesmen, backed by a full orchestra, chanted an intricate number called Rock Island, passing phrases from one to the other in complex antiphony. As they spoke, the rhythms changed, grew faster and faster in time to the clackety-clack of the train...
...Philadelphia tryouts, audiences remained cold to this opening. Instead of throwing out the scene, Da Costa had a brainstorm: he threw out the orchestra...
This ear-catcher, signaled by a blast of steam, is The Music Man's curtain-raiser, an invitation for the audience to visit River City, and an underscoring of Director Da Costa's feeling that "the job of the theater is not to feed pessimism but to dispel...