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Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/62230
[ Circuit ] Smillie's Picks >>By Thomson Smillie Illustration by Bart Galloway Empty house Live relays to a movie theater near you might be the biggest arts news internationally. But not in Louisville. Tis column, uniquely for the region, has chronicled the rise, the irresistible rise, of Saturday-afternoon relays from the stage of the Metropolitan Opera since they began five years ago. Now, more than 2,200 cinemas worldwide — from Louisville to China, Korea, Russia and scores of European cities — receive them in a massive international love fest unrivaled by any other human event except the Olympics or World Cup. Exaggerating? Maybe a bit. But I do hear stories from Florida and other states with a high proportion of retirees (reflecting the older demographic of arts attendance) that you must subscribe for the year or at least book well ahead to avoid the risk of being excluded. Again, not in Louisville. Other arts disciplines have climbed on board: First in the United States was the Los Angeles Philharmonic under its superstar conductor, the young Venezuelan Gustavo Dudamel. Ten came ballet companies from Russia's Bolshoi to Covent Garden in London offering lavish productions. Ballet in 3D is the latest development. (Our Australian cousins rudely refer to male ballet dancing as "poof's football" and to its practitioners as "budgie smugglers." Aussies call parakeets "budgies," the implication being that male dancers smuggle them into their jockstraps. 3D ballet may be too up- close-and-personal for some tastes.) Drama presentations from London's National Teatre have included She Stoops to Conquer, which you'd think would pack 'em in. A friend went (I was out of town) at Tinseltown and reported he was one of six people in attendance. On one occasion, my wife and I sped across town to Tinseltown hoping to grab a final pair of tickets for the ever-popular Carmen, live and in 3D from Covent Garden. Our attendance had the effect of doubling the audience to four. [18] LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 5.12 Smillie in Carmen Retired market researcher and founder of louisvilleculturevulture.com, Jim Wilhelm, blames lousy publicity. Indeed, his website and free mailing list, which now comprises 850 fans, is the sole reliable advance notice — except, of course, a microscopic line in the show-time listings. But is there a deeper, darker reason? Shorn of the extraneous — a chance to dress up, seeing and being seen — does the product itself, even when performed to international standards, have little appeal to Louisvillians? Troughout May and June, these HD relays of the world's great companies appear on schedules at Baxter Avenue Teaters, Stonybrook, Tinseltown and the Great Escape in New Albany, including an encore of the MET's glorious cycle of Wagner's Ring. I have flogged this HD-relay horse to within an inch of its life (to no discernible effect!), so before I give it a long rest, I want to mention that in May there is no orchestral (Bourbon Baroque apart), operatic, choral or ballet live performance worth mentioning anywhere in the city. But there is an HD ballet at Baxter Avenue Teaters I shall not miss for the world, live on May 16 with a May 20 encore. Many decades ago, as a young child, I was taken to see the Royal Ballet's enchanting and life- enhancing show La fille mal gardée. (Te Poorly Protected Girl is a lame translation.) It is an old-fashioned tale of rustic love, with all the magic elements of a less-sophisticated age, including a hilarious male "pantomime dame" whose clog dance I can still recall with that special immediacy of childhood recollection. If attendance for live relays is going to remain in single or barely double digits, however, I have to ask: How long will cinema proprietors bother screening them? Final thought In the past, waiting tables was a rite of passage for college students and an honorable profession for all ages. I am now reclassifying it as a performing art. Te garrulity of the server's preamble often rivals Hamlet at his most dithery, and the efforts to prove he or she is your new best friend can tax the patience. Te art has its own vocabulary: "My name is Fred if you need anything," prompting the question, "What is your name if we don't?" Waiting tables has its own choreography, tableside genuflecting included. I observed a heavily bearded waiter do this at one of Bardstown Road's eateries and was tempted to prompt him with, "My name is Toulouse-Lautrec, and I am going to be your waiter." Tat was at the Bard's Town, but another Bardstown Road waiter, this time at Lilly's, surely reached the height of poetic fancy when, in addition to asking if we were ready to order, added, "Or would you prefer to enjoy some additional menu moments?" No romantic poet could have phrased it better. Columnist Tomson Smillie's book, How to Listen, Learn, Love Opera is available at thomsonsmillie.com or at Carmichael's.