We had a fun time at the Metropolitan Opera last night watching Tosca, one of my favorite operas. The performances were marvelous and the sets were distinctive, if a little austere, a pretty radical departure from the heyday of Franco Zefferelli's extravagant productions (e.g., La Boheme). And Polina looked rather dashing in their new clothes - I commented that they looked like a younger and smaller version of the person I used to be, which is no surprise since I picked out the clothes.
We had box seats at the Dress Circle level, which is one level lower than when we saw Carmen, but the view was not quite as good because last time we were more in the corner of the hall with a more direct line of sight to the stage. Plus it was a little tighter in the box for tall people like me, although it's always nice to have space around you to put your purse and coat. Next time I'll know better which seats to get.
**SPOILER ALERT!** For those of you who have seen Tosca, there was a story my dad used to tell me about a diva who played Floria Tosca in a performance where at the end she was to jump down onto an offstage platform from the tower where she meets her death. The diva was a heavy woman, and when it came time to perform the dramatic leap, she simply turned around and refused to jump. Now that is playing a diva like a boss.
Anyway, after the opera when we were waiting for the subway there was a saxaphone player playing "E lucevan le stelle" ("And the stars shone") so we dropped a dollar in his case. When we got home it was about 11:30 pm, and Polina was showing me an article about athiests, which sparked a desire to watch Kevin Smith's riotous parody on religion Dogma. So that kept us up until about 2 am, but fortunately because of snow and ice, the office opened an hour later this morning so I could take a later train.
