Ever since LeBron James left the only
thing significant about Cleveland is the world-famous Cleveland
Orchestra. Yes, part of the reason Michael Jordan withdrew from
public life was how he still hurts from the time the woodwinds
section scored big against the Chicago Bulls in the NBA Playoffs.
Show your appreciation this Tuesday at
Severance Hall, in University Circle, when the Cleveland Orchestra
performs a live soundtrack alongside a golden-oldie cinematic icon
that’s still about 20 times better than most of the garbage on
screens in 2012. I speak of Charlie Chaplin’s MODERN TIMES,
a pantomime masterpiece starring Chaplin as “the worker,”
supposedly the final iteration of his Little Tramp alter ego. The LT
is a frazzled assembly-line drone who suffers a hilarious nervous
breakdown on the job (this being 1932, it's comedy; today Charlie
would just grab a gun and kill everyone). Fired, he goes looking for
employment and humanity in a Depression-era world of shantytowns,
waifs, strikes and huge machinery.
How the Orchestra will serenade
alongside this is a most interesting proposition. Under considerable
commercial pressure in the early sound era, Chaplin actually
considered making MODERN TIMES a full “talkie” and did some
dialogue-laden test sequences. But in the end he decided he much
preferred the high-speed rhythms and nonverbal antics of the silent
cinema. So he did a hybrid, leaving most of the narrative wordless,
writing his own recorded music score (which the Orchestra will
perform) and inserting occasional sound effects and audio stuff –
most famously, a catchy melody in pure gibberish that the
worker/Little Tramp trills during a brief, doomed stint as a singing
waiter. It seems that a live chorus of singing waiters will perform
alongside the Orchestra in Severance Hall.
And since the Cleveland Orchestra, like
the laborers in the movie, have lately been embroiled in union
controversy and threats of walkouts, the synergy could hardly be more
apt (unless of course the Orchestra departs Cleveland over the
weekend and moves to Florida to play for the Miami Heat). MODERN
TIMES with the Cleveland Orchestra performs at 8 p.m. on Tuesday,
Dec. 11. Tickets begin at $55. For more information log onto
www.clevelandorchestra.com, or call the box office at 216-231-1111
(toll free 800-686-1141)
For a full Cleveland Movie Blog review
of MODERN TIMES, click here:
http://www.clevelandmovieblog.com/2011/05/modern-times-may-6-at-730-pm-and-may-7.html
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