Word: commedia
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...title of the second offering, a farce called "Harlequenade," seems to derive from the plays done by the Commedia del Arts in 13-15th century Italy. The actors then had no scripts, but improvised from a stock situation. An analogy would hold between one of these situations and the framework of a rehearsal of "Romeo and Juliet," in which Mr. Evans and Miss Best, as a famous and fabulous theatrical couple, play the title parts between miscellaneous interruptions in the course of the rehearsal. The play parodies the ingrown frame of mind often found in the theater where...
Complained New York Times Critic John Martin: "If Miss Bettis is not careful, she will talk us all to death...Apparently all dancers have to learn sooner or later that even more to be avoided than sprains and charley horses is the Commedia dell' Arte, and Miss Bettis has undertaken to learn the hard...
...heritage: Greek art and intellect, Roman law and government, the Christian religion. It is the heir to England's Magna Charta, to France's cathedrals (and France's revolution), Italy's Renaissance and Germany's Reformation, to Don Quixote, the Divina Commedia, the Nordic sagas. Lacking a fixed geographical border, it has included the Slavs and Magyars of Eastern Europe when they chose to accept the European heritage. It has never included more than the fringes of Russia...
Italy has had a visible sense of humor, from the time of the commedia dell 'arte. Italians can still crack jokes (however unoriginal) about their miseries. From Lisbon last week New York Times Correspondent Herbert L. Matthews, on his way home from Rome, sent revealing samples: > Benito Mussolini visited a fortuneteller who told him that he would die on the eve of Italy's greatest holiday. She was unable to tell him just which day that was. When he asked his wife her opinion, she replied: "I know. It's the day after...
...Morgan described the interview: "He began hollering at me and yelling for me to dismiss Mrs. Preston Davie. . . . 'Fire that dame! Fire that dame!' he kept yelling." Mr. Morgan decided that the time had come. He handed over his resignation. LaGuardia snapped it up. Shouting, "La commedia è finita!,"* opera-loving Fiorello waved Mr. Morgan goodby, threw Mr. Morgan's secretary out after him and demoted Mr. Morgan's chief inspector. Gritted Mr. Morgan: "A complete and utter outrage...