Foolery Gives it To Ya Straight: Carmen
Because you probably didn't spend your Saturday afternoon making soup and cleaning the kitchen with the radio on, I'll just bet you missed the Metropolitan Opera's NPR radio broadcast of Carmen, one of the most popular operas in the world. Well, I'd better explain it to you then.
See, Carmen is a beautiful gypsy woman in Spain. She's rather trashy, but we don't hold it against her, because she's also a thief, and we do pretty much hold that against her. Think Cher.
(Photo stolen from these guys)
Well, not so much . . . try again.
(Photo stolen from these guys)
That's closer, although I don't think they had collagen injections in those days. So Carmen works in a cigar factory and she meets a very handsome, though upright and proper, Don Jose, a soldier. How about Enrico Caruso?
(Photo stolen from this site)
. . . although I think he's a little young for Cher. Don Jose ignores the flirtatious Carmen, which, of course, makes her crazy, and she teases him. Lord, she's a shameless flirt.
So, of course Don Jose falls for her, and falls hard. Was it her beauty? Her voice? No, it couldn't have been her voice; remember "Half Breed"? Maybe it was her penchant for wearing rubber bands on aircraft carriers?
(Photo stolen from this site)
Don Jose falls like a stone for this strumpet, and goes AWOL from the army to join her band.
(Photo stolen from this site)
MY EYES! MY EYES! Uhhh, sorry, not that band.
(Photo stolen from this site)
No-no-no-no-no, I mean her BAND OF GYPSIES, TRAMPS AND THIEVES!
(Photo stolen from this site)
Okay, now you've got it.
So. Don Jose runs off with Carmen, who really doesn't give a rip whether he does or doesn't, and -- hey, who's that sparkly NEW guy? The toreador Escamillo, va va VOOM!
(Photo stolen from these guys)
. . . only not so swishy. One thing leads to another, yada yada yada, and Carmen is on Escamillo's arm going to the big fiesta. (She's probably trying to steal his wallet.) Don Jose shows up and is enraged to see the love of his life looking like a cheap floozy . . .
(Photo stolen from these guys)
. . . so he does the only logical thing -- he stabs her. You'd kill her, too, if she sang like Cher. Oh, and there are some other people in this, too, and a LOT of singing. And great costumes by Bob Mackie, and really, really great music that you won't hear on Adult Contemporary 105.7, and not a word of English. Did I mention that the whole thing is in French? Yup. Carmen is a French opera about hot-blooded gypsies and Basques in Spain, as performed by an Armenian-American who pretends to be Cherokee.* The end.
I didn't even know Cher SPOKE French.*
*Neither Cher nor Bob Mackie had anything to do with Carmen, or any other music, for that matter.
LOL!! What a great tutorial. I'll take this over Cliffs Notes any day!
Kit
Posted by: Kit | February 26, 2008 at 05:39 PM
Thanks for the trip down memory lane. I don't think I'll be borrowing her rubberband any time soon.
Posted by: Asthmagirl | February 26, 2008 at 06:43 AM
When was Cher a Vegas showgirl? lol
That rubber band makes me itch too but not for the same reasons I'm sure.
Posted by: Anthony | February 25, 2008 at 07:51 PM
Why did you put a picture of Borat in with the pictures of Cher?
Posted by: gubby | February 25, 2008 at 05:52 PM
This was HI-LARIOUS! (imagine this said in hillbilly accent).
I learned so much. Like: Cher has a tatoo down there by her pubic, umm, "region".
Posted by: The Mom Bomb | February 25, 2008 at 01:53 PM
You're so cultured. All NPR and stuff. I know nothing about opera, of the Cher variety or otherwise, so this has been most informative. And that rubber band makes me itch and cringe every time.
Posted by: Sarah is Ok | February 25, 2008 at 09:03 AM
I'm an opera numb-skull. If you had told me Cher sang in Carmen, I would have been likely to believe you. If you told me Enrico Caruso was really Sonny at a halloween party, I would have believed that too. I love to listen to opera, but my knowledge of it is ZERO!
Posted by: Jessica Keith | February 25, 2008 at 07:44 AM
Heh. Heheheh. Umm...I have a confession. Oh, dear.
I don't really enjoy Karaoke much, but my best girlfriend does. Sometimes I go to keep her company, usually under duress. She does a better than passable "Go Ask Alice." If she buys me many, many drinks (MANY!!), she can sometimes persuade me to do the one song she loves to hear me sing above all others. Oh, my.
Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves. She swears I sound just like Cher. I swear I sound just like a drunken walrus yakking up it's last sixty fish.
Thank you, and goodnight.
Posted by: Kyddryn | February 25, 2008 at 07:16 AM
Yet again another hilarious, informative, and visually stimulating (except for the pic that seared my eyeballs) post from Foolery. The one thing that had me wondering, though: how on earth did you get so much detail about the costumes from a RADIO broadcast of Carmen? You seriously are a genius!
Posted by: MommyTime | February 25, 2008 at 06:30 AM