What a glorious weekend we had! Your trusty Phartbloggers started the weekend with the Catholic rite of passage known as Pre-Cana. You see, to get married in a Catholic church, you must go through a preparation class of sorts. Jesus approved our union, and we passed with flying colors. We even got to keep the newlywed-game-ish worksheets, and we received a nifty certificate. And Therese wasn't completely mortified to be engagement ringless for the weekend. Conveniently, she scheduled her ring to be "worked on" over this important weekend. The fact that it was also a girls' weekend for her and her La Salle friends had absolutely nothing to do with it :):)
Then last night, it was off to the Phila. Museum of Art for a party to thank the donors that helped re-purchase a $68 million painting by Thomas Eakins. Therese's place of employment and the PMA led the campaign to keep it in Philadelphia, so we were there representin'. Michael came along to see the notables and to have an excuse to get suited up. Among the Philadelphia Phabulous in attendance: the Governor, Sen. Specter, and lots and lots of Philadelphia's best art supporters. It was a crowd 2,000 strong made up of anyone who gave a contribution of any size to the fund. As a development professional, it was a really exciting night. As an art-lover, it was absolutely thrilling and encouraging. Take that, NYC!
Finally, today, we took advantage of the fantastic Philly Funsavers offer to see Edward Scissorhands at the Academy of Music. Thank God for Philly Funsavers. If you haven't already, add yourself to their email list. They send you weekly half-price ticket offers for tons of things going on in the city. It is quite a deal (despite our obstructed view). (http://www.phillyfunguide.com/funsavers/)
So back to Ed...first of all, you should know that Therese has a mild obsession with Edward Scissorhands. Since she was 11-years-old, she has loved this movie. When she was little, she would watch it, rewind it, watch it again two to three times in a day. She knows every line. She owns the CD knows the soundtrack by heart. Johnny Depp was her first movie star crush. There is something extremely endearing about this story, bizarre as it is. So when we saw it on the Funsavers, we had to jump at it.
This production is from London and is a dance adaptation of the film. The original soundtrack is used with some additional new compositions. We really enjoyed it. Dance is not usually our performance art of choice, but this was too intriguing to pass up. The sets were unbelievable. They really captured the Burton-esque motif. The costumes were also exquisite. If you know the story, you know that the hair and clothes are integral parts of the storytelling.
The dancing was eh. I'm not a huge fan of modern dance. Sometimes it just looks like people flopping all over the place to me (kind of like Beyonce Knowles in the "Crazy In Love" video. Did she just fall down?! Nope, she's just "dancing.").
The thing that really annoyed me was that they changed the story. It was really an unnecessary change. It begins with some nincompoop boy named Edward who likes to dance around with scissors. Sadly, he gets struck by lightning one day, a la Ben Franklin, and dies. His father is distraught and makes a new son with scissorhands in homage to the dead Ed. Um, question, wouldn't you be worried that your new "son" would die the same way Ed #1 did? Note to self: Don't let kid play in massive thunderstorm in a field...with scissors. Further note to self: Don't let kid play with enormous scissors. In the movie, Edward's "dad" is simply a lonely inventor who had a robot of sorts on a big cookie/origami-making assembly machine that had scissorhands. Using some conveniently glossed-over voodoo magic (and presumably purloined corpses), the Inventor makes Ed. But he dies before he can get to replacing his hands with what looks like clay ones, but we assume will work like regular flesh and bone. The death scene in the movie is so tragic--Christmas, he dies while handing the new hands to Ed, Ed tries to catch them and winds up destroying them, because, hello, he has razor-sharp blades for fingers.
Anyway, other than this strange adaptation, the show was beautiful. At the end, they spray the audience with snow and play one of the most beautiful pieces of movie music ever written (Danny Elfman). The dancer who played Edward really captured the Johnny Depp walk, nervous twitches, etc. He was wonderful. And they incorporated some key elements from the film, like the Edward-Kim hug. All in all, it was a really interesting show.
Homework: Watch the film Edward Scissorhands. It's such a gorgeous fairtytale!
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