Stravinsky or Richard Strauss would have given the screw another enharmonic wrench. Act III. saw the Queen attired at once so sonorously and exquisitely, that the vast audience gasped with admiration. It is the tavern scene that will save the tawdry work. It is already town talk and there are rumors of its sensationalism at midnight. The anatomical wigwagging of the two golden lads set the lobby buzzing.
Nothing succeeds life true spirituality.
Mary Garden was Cleopatre, as she was Melisande and Thais. All she did was to look beautiful and turn on the full voltage of her blandishments. Men went to the ground before that dynamic yet veiled glance like soldiers facing a machine gun. It is uncanny the emotion she projects across the footlights and with such simple but cerebral means. That she would have been burned at the stake a few centuries ago, this lovely witch is no conjecture.