Diva Diva Do

Cos I been playing Verdi's "Macbeth" quite a bit recently (see Fry-ups and Nectarines post), I decided to see if I could get hold of a DVD of the film version that The Old Man and me saw ... back in the late 1980s.

And when I say we saw the film. What we actually saw was a preview screening. Back then, for a while, The Old Man was doing some review writing for a freebie magazine run by friends. No pay. Just the perks of the shows and stuff that he got to see and write about.

So off we went to a West End cinema on some rainy morning to see this version of "Macbeth"; a film by Claude d'Anna, and starring Leo Nucci as Macbeth and Shirley Verrett as the Lady herself.

We thought it was good.

It was dark and Gothic - with the Witches depicted as feral young girls. Set in a perpetually gloomy landscape with interiors filmed in a 10th century fortified castle. We lapped it up.

Naturally, it did not get a British release.

But the DVD is available. And it came in the post yesterday, courtesy of my online classical emporium of choice "Crotchet".

Loverly.

And I notice that in the booklet there is a promo picturefor a DVD of "La Traviata" - with Teresa Stratas and Domingo in a Zefirelli cinema production. Orchestra of the Met conducted by James Levine. Mmmmn. I'd like to see that. I used to like Teresa Stratas. I'd forgotten ....

Anyway. Gotta go now. Downstairs I can hear The Old Man joining in with Callas and Gobbi who are singing on a 1953 recording of "Lucia di Lammermoor". It's all very operatic here at the moment, you know. But I guess I gotta do something about supper.