Getting over a show is like getting over a cherished lover.
The relationship starts out imperceptibly. You’re just reading the script and doing research, nothing more. You’re quite critical of it in the beginning, finding faults easily. Every now and again you realize that you’re thinking more about the topic of the show than about your loving family, but you tell yourself that’s normal. You’re working on a show! You’re supposed to be thinking about it!
Then you hold auditions. The characters you’ve been picturing in your head gain real shape, real voices, real feelings. You’re giddy with excitement! You feel a connection, definitely useful for the task at hand. It’s as if everything is in black and white and the actors that you end up casting are in color.
Rehearsals!!! You actually manage to maintain your professionalism through the first couple of weeks. Rehearsals are work, and nothing more. You are doing your job. But after a while you finally admit to yourself that it has happened. You fell in love with the show. You count the minutes until you can go back to the theater, to your love.
This love is not sudden. Over the weeks of rehearsals, it has been growing steadily. This love is not ardent. You take it one day at a time, enjoy every small interaction, relax into each scene. But you fell deep, and you don’t fight it. It engulfs you, like the petals of a tulip closing up around you tenderly. You can’t stop thinking about it. This love is obsessive.
The weeks that follow are at the same time a blur, and the most focused you have ever been. In addition to being in love with it, you’re very good at what you do, so the show and the actors reward you for it. Your love is requited. Bliss…
When opening night comes around, somehow you think that this will be the culmination of all the hard work, all the love that you have poured into it. The climax of your love affair… But it’s not. Because opening night is the moment when the show gives you a last passionate kiss, a sad superior smile, and then turns away dashingly to go cheat on you with the audience. And the actors. And the stage manager. And the crew. Whore.
So you smile sadly and superiorly back and start the process of getting over the show. You try to keep busy around the house, but you find a million reasons to look at the poster one more time, or check Facebook for any activity related to the show. You go back to the theater to see it again, all dolled up and brilliant. It looks good, better than when you last saw it, and you feel proud. And you miss it. With time, of course, it gets easier. But you have given it a part of you that you will never get back.
And you miss it.
Marjorie Hazeltine and Myles Rowland in The Star Without a Name, translated, adapted, produced and directed by Ana-Catrina Buchser after Mihail Sebastian’s “Steaua fără nume”. Dragon Productions Theatre Company, April 2015
Clara Hirsh and Martin Gagen in What a Wonderful Life: The Live Radio Play, adapted by Joe Landry, directed by Ana-Catrina Buchser. Bus Barn Stage Company, December 2012.
Keith Marshall and Gloria McDonald in Green Whales by Lia Romeo, directed by Ana-Catrina Buchser. Renegade Theatre Experiment, February 2012
Michael Wayne Rice and Sara Luna in “Green Whales” by Lia Romeo, directed by Ana-Catrina Buchser. Renegade Theatre Experiment, February 2012
Arcadia Conrad and Ben Ladomirak in The Caucasian Chalk Circle by Bertolt Brecht, directed by Ana-Catrina Buchser. Dragon Productions Theatre Company, August 2006
I was 4 years old when my parents first took me to the symphony at the Romanian Athenaeum in București, Romania. I don’t remember it, but my mother tells me I sat quietly and stared at the walls.
The Romanian Athenaeum Concert Hall. Photo Mihai Petre from wikipedia.org
We continued to go to the Athenaeum on a semi-regular basis until I moved away from Romania as a young adult, and I remember clearly that I used to come up with fantastic stories about the different pieces of art on the walls and ceiling of the concert hall. The music that was being played on stage was the soundtrack. The stories changed quality as I aged but they always came with the music, such that after a while, I started imagining stories whenever and wherever I heard classical music. Even today.
The strongest inducer of fun images from the Athenaeum was the organ. To this day I think it looks like two giant gates resting on highly reflective ice, gates that are about to open. Things that my imagination saw coming out of those gates: little pink pigs in tutus, group-dancing on the ice; imposing queens and kings in luscious fur capes and hats, gliding to the music; armies of WWI soldiers who came from the Fresco (more about the Fresco and soldiers later); piano keys, running away from the soloist’s fingertips; sinister empty space flowing heavily toward me; etc.
Romanian Athenaeum Organ. Photo mada
This is where the kings and queens with their fur capes from my imagination would come and sit when they were tired of ice-gliding. Kings preferred the seats with slanted overheads, queens, the curvy ones, of course.
Romanian Athenaeum seating, fit for imaginary kings and queens. Photo bucharestdailyphoto.com
Then, there were the sexy angels. As a little girl, before the concept of sexy entered my world, I used to thing that they looked appetizing, in the way little kids might look appetizing to the wicked witch in Hansel & Gretel. Especially served with fish and trees of lettuce (do you see these in the photo below?)
Romanian Athenaeum ceiling. Photo bucharestdailyphoto.com
When puberty hit, their curves and body position gave me all sorts of fun things to think about, conveniently sometimes associated with Heaven, and sometimes with Hell, when I still believed in that stuff.
Romanian Athenaeum ceiling detail. Photo bucharestdailyphoto.com
Finally, there’s the magnificent Fresco that surrounds the concert hall, except for where the stage is. As a sign of nationalism, Romanian painter Costin Petrescu won the competition to create the Fresco over Austrian painter Gustav Klimt – who was much more famous, but foreign. Petrescu worked on the Fresco for a period of 5 years, 1933-1938. And because I’ve always examined it trying to piece together all the different historical moments it depicts, but never fully succeeded, I finally looked them all up and am going to describe them here for you and me both.
Part of the Romanian Atheneum Fresco
All following photos of the Romanian Athenaeum Fresco are from turistinbucurestiro.blogspot.ro/2013/07/fresca-ateneului-roman.html
1. The Roman Emperor Trajan entering Dacia, surrounded by his army and Dacians (the ancestors or Romanians).2. The colonization of Dacia by the Romans3. The Union of Romans (soldier) and Dacians (woman, often war widow) which led to the Romanian people.4. Barbarian Invasions5. The Beginnings of patriarchal life after the Barbarians were defeated.6. Romanian peasants settling down and taking ownership of their land.7. Welcoming foreign travelers with bread and salt, a symbol of a peaceful nation8. Mircea the Elder, ruler of Valahia (1386-1395 and 1397-1418)9. Alexandru the Good, Voivode of Moldavia (1400-1432)10. The Romanian Crusade against the Turks. Depicted are Iancu of Hunedoara, Vlad II “The Devil” (father of Vlad Ţepeș) and Stefan the Great.11. Ștefan the Great, Prince of Moldavia (1457-1504)12. Neagoe Basarab, ruler of Valahia (1512-1521) and his wife Despina13. Mihai the Brave, Prince of Valachia, Transylvania, and Moldavia (1593-1601)14. The Beginnings of Romanian Culture: Matei Basarab (ruler of Valahia 1632-1654), Vasile Lupu (ruler of Moldavia 1634-1653), Dimitrie Cantemir (learned man and ruler of Moldavia 1693-1711), & Constantin Brâncoveanu (ruler of Valachia 1688-1714)15. Horea, Cloșca and Crișan, who led a revolt in 178416. Tudor Vladimirescu, leader of the 1821 Valahian revolution17. Avram Iancu, leader of the 1848 revolution against Hungarian troops18. In 1848, Valahia and Moldavia unite in fraternity and justice19. Alexandru Ioan Cuza, (1820-1873) the first ruler of the United Principalities of Romania20. King Carol I (1866–1914) and the War of Independence21. WWI in Romania, 1918. These are the soldiers I imagined going into the wall and coming out of the icy gates of the organ22. King Ferdinand I (1914–1927) and Queen Maria, the first king and queen of the fully united Kingdom of Romania23. This stamp depicts King Carol II of Romania (1930–1940) and his son King Mihai of Romania (1927–1930, 1940–1947). This part of the Fresco was covered by communists with the image belowThis image of Romanians celebrating together covered the Fresco of King Carol II and King Mihai. During Communism, the entire Fresco was covered with red velvet, to hide the important part Monarchy played in the history of Romania.
I recently went to a concert at the Romanian Athenaeum and while listening to the orchestra, memories of childhood flowed freely. I believe that this beautiful place played a role in my definite inclination toward classical music. I don’t remember feeling bored as a child in this concert hall (whereas I have felt bored in others). And although I know that the mere repetition of music is enough to get someone to eventually like it, for me it was more than just repetition. It was the building, the atmosphere it created, the incredible architecture and art of the place, and the stories that it inspired in my young impressionable brain.
The world gives me sources of inspiration for my theatre, music, and writings almost every day. This is my attempt to understand and collect them, by writing about them and sharing them with you.
If you see anything in your daily life, or if you think of something inspiring to write about, please send it to me. I will publish it to my blog. Go to ana-catrina.com for contact.