Word: tableaux
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...details are incredible. Buffeted by cruel fate, the bird-girl sinks to enforced servitude in the establishment of one Madame Schreck, who runs a particularly nasty pornographic peep show. Fevvers, by now known throughout the London demimonde as the Virgin Whore, plays the Angel of Death in erotic tableaux. Hearing that her mistress has sold her services for a trifle, the rara avis explodes: "What, 50 rotten guineas for the only fully feathered intacta in the entire history of the world? Call yourself a procuress...
Less than ten minutes of the two-hour parade was taken up by the armed forces-6,000 soldiers followed by tanks, artillery and missiles. The rest consisted of a series of giant tableaux of moving humanity, depicting China's achievements under Deng, interspersed with battalions of dancers and students, all waving pompoms that transformed Tiananmen Square into shifting patterns of bright color. One huge float, representing the Yangtze River hydraulic project, had water gushing over a model dam; in another, a 14-ft. robot bunked, waved a bouquet of flowers and blurted out, "Long live the motherland...
Outstandingly conducted by Ozawa, a longtime Messiaen champion, the production is generally worthy of its subject. The title role, superbly sung by Van Dam, must surely be the longest individual part in the operatic literature. The saint appears in seven of the eight tableaux and does much, if not most, of the singing in each. At the composer's request, Giuseppe Crisolini-Malatesta based the sets and costumes on paintings by Fra Angelico, Giotto and Matthias Grünewald. As staged by Sandro Sequi, scenes are played in small, diorama-like boxes to emphasize the work's distant...
When U.S. Presidents go abroad, they usually make a splash by announcing bilateral agreements, making blustery speeches or starring in extravagant ceremonial tableaux. By contrast, Ronald Reagan's five-day trip through volatile Latin America last week was low-key. In Brazil, where Reagan spent half his time, there was no black-tie banquet, but an outdoor barbecue lunch. In Colombia, Reagan's limousine ride to the presidential palace was a few blocks, hardly a motorcade at all. On Saturday in Honduras, Reagan's final, fleeting stop, he only visited the air force base in San Pedro...
...song and dance sequence in the mostly unnecessary second act breaks up the repetition of these stationary tableaux. May's dance with the Devil and her bawdy-voiced burlesque manage to supply the flamboyance that the actress lacks...