Word: octavian
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Segal's play starts one year after Julius Caesar's death, when his adopted son Octavian returns to Italy. Octavian wants to reclaim his inheritance, which Mark Antony has stolen, and he is determined to fight for his fortune. Octavian was confident of his military power, but he needed some political clout, so he persuades Cicero to come out of retirement, go back to the Senate, and challenge Mark Antony's supremacy...
...Octavian gets corrupted, and makes a deal with Mark Antony--"at that point, Cicero is finished," Segal says. Octavian is forced to sign for Cicero's execution--reluctantly, he does...
STRAUSS: Der Rosenkavalier. Elisabeth Schwarzkopf as the Marschallin, Sena Jurinac as Octavian, Anneliese Rothenberger as Sophie, Otto Edelmann as Baron Ochs. Herbert von Karajan conducting the Vienna Philharmonic. Video Arts International; $79.95; hi-fi mono. Pride of place belongs to this classic, filmed at the Salzburg Festival and released in 1962. The cast is the cream of central Europe at the time: Schwarzkopf, regal but warm in what was her greatest role; Jurinac, an ardent youthful swain; Rothenberger, silvery voiced and breathtakingly beautiful; and Edelmann, a bumptious hick from the sticks. Karajan's mastery of the score so gloriously displayed...
...stage; there is little of the distracting crosscutting or ogling close-ups that later video directors have found so irresistible. One surprisingly awkward visual moment, though, occurs in the middle of the most famous line in the opera, the Marschallin's worldly wise "Ja, ja" as she withdraws from Octavian's life. Here the film leaps in mid-utterance from a long shot of Schwarzkopf to a close-up, calling attention to the camerawork when the viewer's concentration should be on the poignancy of the moment. Although the color has faded somewhat, giving the film an antique...