Word: presto
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...performance last night was warm but not Romantic, perfectly intonated, and technically amazing. When the second voice entered in the Fuga of the opening Sonata, a breathless incredulity came over every listener. In the Presto of the Partita in B Minor, his fingers literally clicked over the strings, picking out every sixteenth note, even giving each a slight vibrate. Loveliest of all was the Andante of the last work. Schneider never overdid the sentiment, and the steady beat of the pedal point through the melody held the music to a moving, but ever-calm reserve...
Capra made a few passes and presto! 1) much of Lindsay & Grouse's dialogue disappeared, and the cutting edge was flaked off; 2) the gadfly-buzz of the play's action slowed to a snore. To sustain the illusion of interest, Wonder-Worker Capra relied on a blaze of star-power: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Van Johnson, Adolphe Menjou, Angela Lansbury. But Tracy, as in all his recent pictures, lacks fire; Hepburn's affectation of talking like a woman trying simultaneously to steady a loose dental brace sharply limits her range of expression; Johnson, playing a Drew...
...whey, wild roots and tea. Her job on a Soviet dairy farm was explained "in quite a friendly way" by the ouprav (overseer). She was to follow the cows around, gather their dung, smear it over the wickerwork of nearby sheds. In time the dung would dry and then presto, said the overseer, the sheds would be habitable. For this she was paid a few kopecks a week, allowed to receive an occasional parcel from home...
...Presto! Back in London, the resident agent shelled out ?160 in exchange for the French francs, at the conservative black rate of 700 French francs per pound (the official rate is 480 to i). On an initial investment of ?75, the satisfied customer wound up with an ?85 profit...
...sergeant, hmmm? Do you have trouble being recognized at night? Do your men ignore you in the dark, huh, Sarge? See Joe Quartermaster and get your neon sergeant stripes. There's a pushbutton attachment. The slightest pressure and presto, your stripes light up like a Christmas tree...