Word: prompter
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...fact that greatly pleases U.S. operagoers-she represents a new trend in opera. As Conductor Tibor Kozma says: "Operagoers no longer will stand for three-ton tanks in the roles of innocent 15-year-old girls, or singers who stand in front of the prompter's box and do their daily dozen. They want acting. They want dramatic realism. Munsel and some others are representatives of a young generation of singers who are really singing actors." Patrice's manager, Sol Hurok, says with box-office candor: "You can listen with your eyes open...
...tantrum-tested wardrobe boss: "She's regular." She is also a hard worker and a serious student. She has to learn her roles letter-perfect, and for a good reason: "I'm as blind as a bat." Without her glasses, she can hardly see either the prompter or the conductor. Conductors like her because she is quick, clever and agreeable, "no prima donna in temperament...
Soprano Albanese was "all emotional." Backstage, she had the same hairdresser, the same wardrobe mistress, and the same prompter she had for her La Scala debut (in Gianni Schicchi) in 1936. But Albanese had apparently forgotten that Italians like their opera loud. Never noted for a big voice, in Madame Butterfly she concentrated on her acting; not once did she break a dramatic sequence to turn, in full voice, toward the audience. Moaned one critic after the first act: "Albanese has returned, but she left her voice in America...
...result is that "A Doctor in Spite of Himself" is funny in spite of itself. The cast doffs its wigs as readily as its hats; it flings props gleefully at the audience. A costumed prompter obligingly steps on stage when called. In this play there are several opportunities for violence on stage, and the cast wallows in them delightedly...
Waving a ludicrous 18-in. cigarette holder in her role of Fledermaus' bored, bemonocled Prince Orlofsky, Mezzo Stevens strutted center stage, put one foot on the prompter's box and waggled the holder at Box 23 of the Met's Diamond Horseshoe. Then, as Manager Bing winced in his box, she sang a switch on her song, Chacun a Son Gout...