The question often is “How many roses are there in “it?” The “it” being Gertrude Stein’s most famous phrase about the proverbial bloom so popular on Mother’s Day, weddings, the Bachelorette, or just when you need to convince that special someone that you spoke out of place and need a full-bodied tasty wine and wonderful Italian dinner and a crystal vase for the long-stemmed beauties that you are holding penitently!
To be precise, there are four “roses” in it (and no “a” at the beginning,) as opposed to more than four saints in Four Saints in Three Acts, which, to digress for a moment, was a super-hit and crowd favorite in it’s most recent incarnation as Gertrude Stein’s SAINTS at the just ended New York International Fringe Festival. (See previous post.)
St. Therese of the Roses: Roses and Saints, full-circle
» Read the rest of this entry «
The year was 1934. FDR was in the second year of his first term as President. The top movie of the year was “It Happened One Night” with Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert. And the theater and opera world were agog about FOUR SAINTS IN THREE ACTS!
The agogism wasn’t because the opera’s title was a lie, as there were more than four saints and more than three acts in the piece. Neither was the music by a not too well-known composer, Virgil Thomson, particularly revolutionary. Yes, it had an all-black cast, a first for an opera or theater work on Broadway (this was pre-Porgy and Bess), but what raised eyebrows and caused agogamania was the libretto by Gertrude Stein, that little read, but very much in the public eye, personality and transplanted American from “artsy-fartsy Paris!”
a few of the original Four Saints, standing, not marching, at this point
Why with lyrics from one of its most well-known refrains, why wouldn’t there be Steinmania across America?
“Pigeons on the grass alas.
Pigeons on the grass alas.
Short longer grass short longer longer shorter yellow grass. Pigeons
large pigeons on the shorter longer yellow grass alas pigeons on the
grass.
If they were not pigeons what were they.”
When Gertrude’s editor for the book version of the opera, Saxe Commins at Random House, raised questions about the libretto, she turned to him, stared him in the eyes and said “My dear, you simply don’t understand!”
Now, almost 80 years later, an exciting, new version of FOUR SAINTS, Gertrude Stein SAINTS!, comes to New York in a few weeks to the La MaMa Theatre, the historic off-off Broadway theater (it’s where the musical HAIR was created and performed in 1968), as part of this year’s New York International Fringe Festival.
These SAINTS! are marching in to the beat of a different drummer in more ways than one!
“Oh Lord I want to be in that number…!”
Here’s a bit of history and background:
“Our initial investigation into Stein’s work began with an all-male production of Four Saints in Three Acts at Carnegie Mellon University in February of 2013. Stein’s libretto offers no plot, no characters, and no conflict; it is a non-narrative text that can best be described as linguistic gymnastics. In all this absence, anything becomes possible and what we have discovered is a Theatre of Joy. The response to the original production was overwhelmingly positive and became an invitation for more. We have since added an all-female Saints and Singing, also featuring an original musical score inspired by American music created by insanely talented performers. The two works are combined to create Gertrude Stein SAINTS!, a powerhouse that explores gender, a theatre that replaces conflict with joy, and America.”
Under the guidance of director Michelle Sutherland, this production has also tapped in to the 21st century’s answer to the patronage of the Medicis or the generosity of the Rockefellers, Guggenheims, or Fords, by raising funds through kickstarter.com. The goal of the 21 day campaign is $9,000, of which more than two-thirds has been pledged and there is one week to go!
Lorenzo de Medici looking like a saint. Right?!
Be a part of this! Haven’t you always wanted to be a Medici or Rockefeller? And if you’re in or near New York City next month, get your tickets soon.
www.kickstarter.com/projects/1345434627/gertrude-stein-saints
If they were not pigeons, what were they? My dear, SAINTS!, of course! Now you understand!
With all due respect to the musical The Sound of Music, one of whose songs contained lyrics bastardized in the title of this post, we must bid adieu to the Summer of Steins in San Francisco. Both exhibitions SEEING GERTRUDE STEIN: FIVE STORIES at the Contemporary Jewish Museum and THE STEINS COLLECT: MATTISE, PICASSO AND THE PARISIAN AVANT-GARDE at SFMOMA end tomorrow, September 6th. And though both of them will be travelling, the first to the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC from October 14th – January 22nd, 2012 and the other one to both Paris at the Grand Palais from October 3rd – January 16, 2012 and then the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York from February 21 through June 3, 2012, the Summer of Steins in San Francisco will not be able to be replicated as the Fall, Winter or Spring of Steins in any of the other cities – this summer was just too special!
the movie Von Trapps bid their adieus!
» Read the rest of this entry «
