Thursday night I was with my friend Cindy. We had discussed going to Crazy for You, but then Cindy said that she's always wanted to see Wicked. I said I'd go if we could get stalls tickets, so when we got fourth row seats, I was sold! This is actually my fourth time seeing Wicked, and my third in London, but I couldn't resist. It's such a good show. It's probably my second favorite musical, after Les Mis, which is absolutely the best. I can't wait for the film next year!
Before the play, we had dinner at a little Italian place across the street. The waiter was babbling in Italian at us, but when he asked how we were, I was at least able to say, "well, and you?" I've been using my handful of Italian words left and right! With luck I'll someday be able to use my whole phrase, "Io voglio un gelato cioccolato, per favore" (I'd like some chocolate gelato, please)
Then we took a stroll over to Buckingham Palace, which looks pretty cool, even at night.
In the intermission, I was trying to remember the name of the woman who was the first Elphaba on Broadway, when the woman in the row in front turned around to tell us that it was Idina Menzel, who is currently on Glee. We had a nice conversation with her, even though her grade-school-aged son kept turning around to tell her not to talk to strangers. She told us that her one regret in life was that she got into an Oxford semester program, and she didn't go. It was another reminder, as if the fourth-row seats weren't enough, of how incredibly lucky I am to be here. This truly is the chance of a lifetime!
After the show, we hung around the stage door, and Cindy got an autograph and a photo with Fiyero!
Friday morning, before our field trip, (more on that later. No, I did not just call you a moron) we stopped by the Royal Opera House to pick up my tickets for the Ballet on Saturday night. On a whim, I asked what tickets were available for "whatever is on tonight." Thank goodness the ticket seller didn't laugh at me. They were showing the Marriage of Figaro, and there was one ticket left for 13 pounds, but it was on hold at the moment, meaning that someone on the phone or the internet was considering purchase. I walked to the gift shop, but when I came back, the ticket was available. I was a bit concerned about whether I could appreciate opera, but I took the ticket availability as a sign that I was meant to see the opera! It was amazing! I sat next to a very friendly elderly couple who explained to me that the Marriage of Figaro was a good starter opera because it is by Mozart, who is amazing, and it's funny, so it's easier to appreciate. It was definitely funny! At the intermission, I was talking to the couple again, and the woman told me that when she first went to see operas, they didn't have surtitles. I'm really glad I live now, because I don't think I would have appreciated that at all without surtitles, but with the surtitles, it was incredibly easy to follow, despite all the mistaken identities and ridiculous disguises. My favorite line was this: when two lovers are about to go into the woods to carry out a romantic encounter, the woman says, "but it's so dark" and the man says "I'm not going to be reading!" I was really glad that the opera was in Italian, because even though my Italian is terribile, I was able to pick out some words. I think I'm going to have to start saying pazzo instead of crazy! It's far more poetic! One of my friends has seen a lot of opera, and she warned me that it was likely to put me to sleep, but my uncomfortable seat and uncomfortable angle kept me awake. There's a reason my seat was only thirteen pounds! I could have touched the ceiling, and the opera house is about ten stories tall, so that's saying something. I was glad of the railing in front of me, because I felt dizzy at a couple of points, and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't survive the fall to the stalls below. Still, the opera house is beautiful, and I can't afford the good seats, so I'm very glad the cheap seats exist. I had a pretty good view of two-thirds of the stage, and opera is more about hearing than seeing, anyway. I'm just glad I had a good view of the surtitles.
On Saturday I got up and made my way to the Novello Theatre to buy day tickets for Crazy for You. I loved it last summer when I saw it in Regent's Park, and it was just as good this time. As it turns out, it was almost exactly as good, because it was the exact same cast. It's a bit strange. I was expecting Les Mis and Wicked to be the same, but those casts are almost entirely different than they were when I saw them last summer. Crazy for You, on the other hand, has the exact same cast, costumes, and set as it did last summer in Regent's Park. I got a very good seat pretty cheaply, but I wish I'd asked to sit a few rows back so that I could have had an aisle seat. I'm getting tired of being squished in between people in the center of rows. I'd rather have a worse seat, but room to breathe. At least the theatre was beautiful:
After Crazy for You, I had about an hour and a half in which to get dinner, so I meandered over to a tiny little street called New Row, just off of Covent Garden Market. I'd already eaten lunch at a Mexican restaurant there, but there were so many cool looking places to eat that I decided to come back for dinner. I got a baked potato at a place called Spud, which only serves baked potatoes, then I went just down the street to a store that makes its own gelato on the premises, in a kitchen in the basement. I just love the food here!
My second performance of the day was called Exposure: Dance at the Royal Opera House's Linbury Theatre. I was enchanted with Draft Works there just a few weeks ago, so I again picked front row seats (with a significant student discount). Unfortunately, I only liked the first and last of the four pieces. The two in the middle were far too much like modern art for my enjoyment. I like art which tells a story, which encompasses most traditional musicals and ballets, or art which demonstrates skill. I can appreciate modern choreography in ballet because I can appreciate the skill of the dancers. The first piece at Exposure: Dance involved a young woman climbing a rope. I'm not sure I could have climbed that rope if my life depended on it, but she seemed like she could have climbed it using just her toes! It was phenomenal! I don't understand it, but I can still appreciate her skill. I read in the programme that she used to work with a circus. The last piece was pretty good too, although I really didn't understand it. The dancers were playing some sort of a game by throwing water bottles with glowsticks inside. It was very cool looking, but I was pretty afraid I was about to get a water bottle in the face. They did miss a few catches, but thankfully none of the water bottles hit the audience.
What really frustrated me was that the performance was supposed to take two hours. I had read this on the website and I confirmed it when picking up my tickets. The performance started at 7:30, so it should have been over at 9:30. I had a ticket for a train departing Paddington at 10:15, leaving me forty five minutes for a trip which I assumed would take about 25 minutes. The performance ended twenty-three minutes late! I ran out of the theatre to the tube stop. I shoved past people, took the elevator, ran to the platform, spent the whole ride on the tube trying to catch my breath, changed trains at a run, ran through the station in Paddington, ran up the escalator, and still arrived four minutes late for my train. I was not happy. Because my ticket was only good for the 10:15 train, I had to purchase another ticket, even though I knew it wouldn't be checked. I paid almost fifteen pounds for a new train ticket, which, sure enough, I didn't need to show once. The ticket barriers were open at both stations and there were no ticket inspectors in sight. It was an unpleasant end to a very pleasant weekend.
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