Amadeus (1984)

F. Murray Abraham gives one of the best performances in all of film.

I didn't remember Cynthia Nixon was in it.

Great music...Thanks Wolfgang

Meg Tilly was supposed to be in it but she got hurt just before she was to start filing. IIRC, she said F. Murray was an asshole.

R2 She is the young maid F. Murray Abraham hires to spy on Mozart.

[quote] I didn't remember Cynthia Nixon was in it.

I never would've recognized her as the squealing maid.

Not a single bad performance.

Abraham, Hulce, Dotrice, Callow, Jones, Kay, Ebersole, etc. all pros

Don’t forget Nixon.

Why is Dotrice’s name in all-caps? When we read OP’s post are we supposed to read his name as being screamed?

Play Salieri...

[quote] the greatest film about classical music

No, this is the greatest film about classical music—

I saw the original London stage production, with Paul Scofield as Salieri, Simon Callow as Mozart and Felicity Kendal as Constanze. IMO Scofield was even better than Abraham, and Callow was brilliant both in his hideousness and his pathos.

[quote] IMO Scofield was even better than Abraham

I envy you.

I would think 90% of intelligent men would resolutely agree with you.

This circus of a movie was directed by someone with NIL interest in the English language. He would have been happier for the plot to be expounded using pantomime.

OMG. The actress who played his wife was amazing. Plus, her tits to her chin was helpful!

[quote] her tits to her chin was helpful!

Were they as helpful as the transgenderising woodwork instructor?

F Murray is great on white lotus season 2.

[quote] F Murray

He had skin like a rotting piece of fruit when this movie was made almost forty years ago.

He must look worse now.

What makes Amadeus great is that it's not truly -- or not primarily -- about classical music. The music, and the entire Mozart story line, is really used as a plot device to explore a much deeper question, Salieri's man-vs-god conflict.

That conflict is the underlying theme that runs through all Shaffer's work.

[quote] That conflict is the underlying theme that runs through all Shaffer's work.

Yes, Shaffer admitted that was his prime interest. He grafted that scenario onto Mozart and Salieri… and blackened Salieri's reputation and consigned him to posterity's dustbin.

F. Murray Abraham is the greatest actor of all time.

I think Hulce grew into a cute bear later on.

The play was infinitely better; a spectacular piece of writing. I sadly missed Scofield in London, but saw Ian McKellen on Broadway who gave one of the all-time great performances. A perfect piece of casting.

While the entire story is great indeed, it's completely made up. Salieri wasn't involved in Mozart's death - and there would've been no reason for him to off Mozart since he was the main composer at Austria's imperial court whereas Mozart was considered irrelevant.

Salieri's stuff isn't that bad, tbf. Not special or even genius as it's the case with Mozart's stuff, but really not that bad either. Some of his Salieri's operas are nowadays being considered pretty good work again.

I saw McKellen as Salieri and Tim Curry as Mozart in the New York production. I believe Jane Seymour was Constanze, but an understudy went on for her.

An amazing play, production and performances. I didn't know who McKellen was at the time - just some British actor - but his work has stayed with me for decades. And Curry was a revelation for me - I only knew him as Dr. Frank N. Furter.

R22 Yes. I cannot get over this misconstruction that gives Salieri a bad rap. On the plus side, it contributed to raising him from almost oblivion as a composer. His music is well above the average of his time, but not that of a genius. Anyway, I don't like music being used as a prop, people conducting who obviously cannot conduct, people lipsynching who don't sing (as in Farinelli) etc. It kills my enjoyment. I can absolutely see why people love Amadeus (or Farinelli, for that matter), but I just don't. To end on a lighter note: Here's some very enjoyable Salieri.

[quote] there would've been no reason for him to off Mozart since he was the main composer at Austria's imperial court whereas Mozart was considered irrelevant.

The play recognises that. The reason it gives for Salieri wishing Mozart's doom is that HE recognises the genius, when no-one else does, and his own mediocrity by comparison tortures him. Bring in the stuff about God rewarding the vulgar clown and not the sophisticate (a situation we've often seen replayed in our own dear entertainment circles) and it's unbearable even if the dumb King still thinks Salieri is without peer. Maybe it doesn't speak as well to the current generation, for whom status seems to matter far more than talent (cf the oxymoron "reality TV star").

All that said, Amadeus is a bit like The Crown. It has convinced generations that Salieri killed Mozart, whereas even in the play this is left ambiguous, and in history it's extremely unlikely indeedy.

For record Tom Hulce really does laugh way he did in film Amadeus.

Friend was on a plane and heard that laugh, spied around cabin and sure enough it was Tom Hulce.

I just started listening to classical music two weeks ago and I am loving Mozart's piano concertos. I have not seen Amadeus but it's on my list. I do think it's interesting that in the years since the film was released, Beethoven has increased in popularity to the point where he is now the most popular classical composer, pushing Mozart into second place.

As with so much else fiction both play and film Amadeus took great liberty with history.

One of my favourite Mozart pieces among so many....

Thank you film Amadeus for introducing Flute and Harp Concerto in C, K. 299 to one...

But it does get contemporary audiences interested in classical repertoire

R13 That was Elizabeth Berridge. She was a very good actress and helped elevate Tobe Hooper’s The Funhouse to a level beyond slasher. She took over the Constance Mozart role at the last minute when Meg Tilly needed to withdraw. She has been married to Kevin Corrigan, a wise guy type character actor, for many years. He is the kind of actor you recognize right away but don’t know his name. He has an interesting IG account with mostly his own drawings of mostly people he has worked with.

Too many notes.

Charles Kay as the Emperor's fussy advisor represents DL in this film

R22 - also didn't Mozart and Salieri get along with one another?

I believe Mozart & Constanze would occasionally go to the opera with Salieri.

R34, not R22 here, but I'm reading Jan Swafford's The Vintage Guide to Classical Music and he says they were rivals at one point but later they did become friends.

This movie was written by an obsessed homosexual Jewish Londoner.

It's all about a grumpy middle-aged man obsessed by a dynamic younger man.

I once had a blind date with Tom, many, many years ago. He seemed like a nice enough guy but not very interesting. And, well, he wasn't that interested in me either -- he was looking for someone much younger. Much younger.

[quote] written by an obsessed homosexual Jewish Londoner.

His other play is all about a grumpy middle-aged man obsessed by a dynamic younger man.

I was just going to ask WEHT (or WHET) Elizabeth Berridge so I was glad to read r31's response to see that, at least if she's not acting much, she's apparently happily married to Kevin Corrigan, an actor who works all the time.

She did a lot of downtown theatre in the 80s as a rather scrappy ingenue. I did a couple of plays with her and she was very sweet, if not the the most commanding stage actress. The first play was just before she must have filmed Amadeus and the second play was 10 or 12 years after Amadeus and she was fired just as we were about to begin previews. It was very sad and I'd never heard anything about her at all after that. Hopefully, she's happy and been doing well all these years.

Why is it called AMADEUS? I mean, I know it was Mozart's middle name, but does anyone ever call him Amadeus? It strikes me as very phony.

But then, I guess Shaffer couldn't have called the play WOLFGANG.

It was a tie in with the hit song Rock Me Amadeus.

[quote] It strikes me as very phony.

People in certain professions are permitted to ditch the truth and LIE.

News flash to all the bitches - films are not plays. No matter how beautiful the language, no one wants to watch someone perform soliloquies on film.

Wolfgang Amadeus Gottlieb Theophilus Mozart. Most of these names mean "loved by God".

My absolute favourite part of the movie, where one of the theatre director's cronies dares to laugh at one of Mozart's jabs..

Yes, R44. Shaffer's play is that Mozart's genius was god-like— despite Mozart's behaviour being foul-mouthed, atheist and ungodly.

Salieri, is that you??

Salieri should not be consigned to the trashbin of history.

Salieri versus Mozart.

Talent versus Genius.

The National Theatre production from six years ago, with Lucian Msamati & Adam Gillen, is very good.

The 'Confutatis' scene always strikes me as quite romantic, or at least a sort of atypical love connection scene.

Therein Mozart & Salieri find they have a very natural and close and responsive creative/intellectual bond, even though it takes tragic circumstances to bring them to this point of understanding.

Does anyone else remember a song about Amadeus that was out about the same time as the movie? I think the artist’s name was Taco. This post reminded me of it, so it must not have been too big of a hit.

The film has held up very well over time. The play less so.

It’s got that 70s technique of all the characters but one freezing so that character can break the fourth wall. About ten times. Also spends too much time on the Masonic stuff that the movie mostly cut. Plus, you don’t get the opera performances on stage like you do on film.

Thread^

Falco, r52

R55, just listened to this song at the gym. This song was massive.

Taco had a hit with Puttin' on the Ritz

*

When this movie came out, I was told on two separate occasions by complete strangers that I looked like Tom Hulce. At that moment I realized he was the most beautiful man in Hollywood. And now I'm jealous of r37.

Oh, was that you, R37?

Christine Ebersole didn't sing in this?

Pushkin's short play "Mozart and Salieri," written 5 years after Salieri died, was inspired by long-standing rumors of Mozart's having been poisoned.

Jeffrey Jones is a big ole chicken hawk. In particular young Asian boys if gossip is to be believed.

More...

This is not a good picture for Jeffrey Jones...

Still more..

R65, it screams "Yes, I'm a pedo, but I'm just disappointed I got caught".

R26, I love that laugh!

He actually looks not bad R16. Ugly men usually age better.

[quote] Some of his Salieri's operas are nowadays being considered pretty good work again.

Not really. His music is basic. His operas are never performed. Maybe a German company will mount something of his once every decade. He’s never performed in opera houses in America. No one is spending money on mounting subpar Mozart.

I didn’t get to see the original, but the revival that was brought to Broadway with the guy who plays Poirot on PBS as Salieri was really awful. He rushed through the script like he had a train to catch. Everyone else and the production was completely forgettable.

Schaffer's banal ruminations on great music and genius are an agony to listen to(has there ever been a more pretentious playwright? Equus is a doozy.) And Hulce has about as much ability to convey a brilliant musical composer as Alex Jones. Still it's a fun movie.

Dammit! Now, I want to see this movie!!

Well, smell you, r72!

Or has Thomas Adès taken to posting here?

[quote] Not a single bad performance.

I disagree. Elizabeth Berridge's performance was terrible and took me right out of the reality of the rest of the film. She sounded like a southern California teenager with her constant, "But Wolfy!!" But I imagine Meg Tilly with her voice would have been even worse.

Why do you suppose Forman used so many actors for the leads who were not big film stars of the time? And they certainly didn't need to be American. Surely, he could have gotten some high powered box office names for Salieri, Mozart and Constanza.

I'm not saying that different casting would have made for a better or more successful film, just wondering why the studio didn't go for more star power and thinking those roles would have been very desirable to some big names.

R76 I don't see anyone other than F. Murray Abraham or Paul Scofield as Salieri though

R72 How is Equus a bore? It has all the making to be a great film.

Directed by Sidney Lumet

Written by Peter Shaffer

The cast is seasoned: Richard Burton, Peter Finch, Harry Andrews, Colin Blakely, Eileen Atkins, and Dame Joan Plowright.

Two of the most coveted film roles of the decade - the parts of Mozart and Salieri in the screen version of Peter Shaffer's play 'Amadeus' - have gone to two actors who are barely familiar to most moviegoers.The film's director, Milos Forman, met with thousands of actors in auditions held over the course of a year, and when the winnowing process was over, he selected F. Murray Abraham to play Antonio Salieri and Tom Hulce to portray the object of his consuming envy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.Both Mr. Abraham and Mr. Hulce have some impressive stage credits and have appeared in a few movies as well, but both were startling choices to star in an $18-million movie based on one of the most acclaimed plays of recent years.

In explaining his casting choices, Mr. Forman said first of all that he felt major stars in the roles would work against credibility. On the other hand, he said, 'nonprofessional actors wouldn't do. I considered musicians for the role of Mozart, but the demands of the role were too great and I needed an experienced actor.' 'Tom's looks were right,' he said. 'The actor who played Mozart could not be a macho man. Mozart had an almost nondescript face, so you couldn't have a young Paul Newman or Robert Redford, and Tom conveyed the extreme opposites in Mozart's character.' 'The role of Salieri is possibly the most flashy stage role of the last decade,' Mr. Forman said. 'It offers great opportunities for broad, stylized, flowery acting. But that wouldn't do on screen. I felt in the movie all the intensity of Salieri's obsession had to be reflected in the actor's face. Murray had that quality from the very first reading.'

continued...

Mr. Abraham (the F stands for Fahrid - he is of Syrian and Italian ancestry) has played Cyrano and Richard III on stage, appeared in both the stage and film versions of 'The Ritz' and last year won good reviews for his supporting performance in 'Scarface.'But when he tested for the part of Salieri, he said, 'I felt I was just going through the paces. I was sure they would never cast an American actor, at least one who was a non- star. In this day and age of the bottom line, it seemed inconceivable. After all, I knew who wanted the part. Who didn't? I think it's the best role written in the last three decades. Even after I got the part and congratulatory calls started coming in, I still didn't believe it. I thought it would be snatched away from me at the last minute.'

For Mr. Hulce (pronounced Hulse) the auditioning process was just as arduous; he tested several times over a period of six months. But he had one advantage over Mr. Abraham in that he had understudied Peter Firth and later replaced him on Broadway in Mr. Shaffer's last play, 'Equus.' Mr. Hulce and Mr. Shaffer had met at that time. Later Mr. Hulce had a starring role in the hit comedy, 'National Lampoon's Animal House,' but that film had type cast him as a gawky teenager even when he was approaching 30, and so he dropped out of movies and returned to theater for the last few years. The release of 'Amadeus' gives him his second chance at movie stardom.

Although Salieri might be seen as the villain of the piece, Mr. Abraham came to admire him just as intensely as Mr. Hulce admired Mozart. 'Salieri is so human in his responses,' Mr. Abraham contended. 'And he's not a coward. What do you do when you're a mediocre composer confronted with genius? Many people would simply quit. But Salieri didn't destroy his work or kill himself. He said no to fate. There are two lines which were unfortunately cut from the movie, where the priest hearing his confession says to him, 'May God forgive you,' and Salieri replies, 'He may, but I shall never forgive Him.' I like that spirit. I think he was a courageous, crazy man.' Whatever the critical and public response to the movie, both actors look on the filming of 'Amadeus' as a peak of their careers. 'When I flew home from Prague, I stayed in bed for six weeks,' Mr. Hulce said. 'Making the movie was an intense, exhausting experience. But it took months before I would get rid of my blond hair. I just didn't want to let go of the role.'

[quote] Two of the most coveted film roles of the decade have gone to two actors who are barely familiar

This movie was directed by someone with NIL interest in the English language and music. He would have been happier for the plot to be expounded using pantomime.

This movie is a circus.

[quote] Equus … The cast is seasoned.

Which is a nice way to say the cast is old.

R74 you really think Schaffers speeches are any good? I think they're god awful and downright silly. There's more poetry in one line of Tennesse Williams than in an entire Schaffer play.

[quote] Schaffers speeches

He wrote a play for the theatre.

You're watching lousy movie version.

I did enjoy Lettice and Lovage on stage very much.

^ That was written as a comedy.

His earlier plays were "profound".

^ Dataloungers will complain that Maggie is 'over-acting'.

She is acting appropriately for a large proscenium theatre performance.

Whether overacted or not, it is the same performance she had given in proscenium theaters and on film screens for 20 years.

Maggie started in a Shaffer comedy sixty years ago.

Did Peter Shaffer write Black Comedy? That's a very funny one act play.

Twenty years R88? Multiple Oscar, Emmy, Tony winner DAME Maggie Smith has been working for seventy fucking years, and is one of the most beloved actresses on the planet, you cretinous ingrate.

Well, R91, I adore Dame Maggie as much as anyone.

But she admits too many of her poorly-directed performances are replicas of those made by that ghastly self-hating, deceased, queer person called Kenneth Williams.

R81/Thomas wasn't it you who called Mozart's work cliche upon cliche?

What is Tom Hulce doing these days? Is he even still alive??

R93 What I said was Mozart wrote 'cafe music'.

90% of it is very suitable to be heard and appreciated as we have our coffee and tortes at the local cafe.

Didn't Coward say it sounded like someone taking a tinkle on a keyboard?

[quote] 90% of it is very suitable to be heard and appreciated as we have our coffee and tortes at the local cafe.

Seems that 100 % of your posts are very suitable to be forgotten asap.

I just got the Salieri opera La Fiera di Venezia. It's very enjoyable. If you're an opera fanatic it's worth hearing.

Mozart admitted he did hack work for Prince Esterhazy or whatever.

R99 any mega popular musician ever who gets big gigs & commissions will have to sell out at least once or for a minute.

Bach was enslaved for years.

One of favourite agnostic composers was compelled to write sacred works.

Music, schmusic, I just want to be a Prince Archbishop.

R101 the sacral music of J.S. was as fucking dusty as his secular. He was a boring composer, and I think it's time we all admitted this.

Kenneth Williams may have been "queer" as in odd sort of person; but sexually he was neither here nor there. Widely presumed to be homosexual, Mr. Williams may have had leanings that way but nothing he ever acted upon. The man was asexual who lived with or adjacent to his mother for most of his life.

Maggie Smith and her playwright husband, Beverley Cross were close friends of Kenneth Williams. As also were the more infamous gay couple Joe Orton and Kenneth Halliwell of suicide murder fame.

Smith and Williams seemed very close then she seems to have very quickly turned on him when she became a huge success on her own. I wonder if this perhaps left him feeling very old and alone with just his mother and his lieder records.

I don't care about your speculation, R105, but it nags me that—

1. Maggie has opted for comedy and can't do the dramatic roles she did back in the 1960s.

2. Maggie too often slips into the persona of that person (whom I choose not to mention)

What is comedy a poor relation? Because I am such a dour heavy person it is something I envy. To create gossamer is the most precious of talents.

Maggie Smith did a one woman show just a couple of years ago at London's Bridge Theatre, a fascinating play and true story about a German woman during the 1930s and 40s, written by Christopher Hampton. I'd hardly call her lazy or accuse her of falling back on light comedies, r106. And, sadly or not, I doubt that she's being offered worthy dramatic roles in films at her age,

She did Hedda Gabler and Desdemona in the 60s but as you say, R108, her age means her career is sadly drawing to its close.

What long fingers they have!

Kenneth Williams was hilarious in Carry On Camping (1969), which was the UK's #1 movie that year.

Maggie Smith was wonderful with Tom Baker in "The Millionairess"

R112 That rather cheap production really stretched Dame Maggie's ability to keep her monotonous character interesting.

Shaw wrote a simplistic caricature of a character in order to push his socialistic ideas. And his plot meanders off to an unsatisfying conclusion.

It's easy to see why (homosexual) Anthony Asquith jettisoned 95% of the plot and script for his semi-successful film version.

R111

Grotesque and utterly cringe-making!

R114, you mean witty and cheeky! 🖕

R71

That would have been David Suchet.

The New York Times was very unkind...

Judge for yourselves...

Was that a modern dress production?

He wasn't using a microphone?

R113

Ah yes but what about Charles Grey?

Charles Gray runs the acting gamut from A to B.

I frequently ask people what was George Bernard Shaw trying to say with his plays? They always give an unsatisfying one-sentence answer.

That brief clip from Hay Fever from the famous British production of the mid 60s is pretty fabulous. How unfortunate the entire production wasn't filmed.

Yes, R116, and he was awful. The production was in period dress from what I recall.

R123

Couldn't have been more awful than David Suchet playing Lady Bracknell in "The Importance of Being Earnest".

Only DL could turn a thread about Amadeus into a Maggie Smith thread

Well I guess we prefer to talk about Maggie Smith.

I'm watching it now. Why did they cast Americans in these parts? Their accents are jarring

[quote] Why did they cast Americans … Their accents are jarring

R127 This movie was made by someone from Czechoslovakia who didn't know the English language and was contemptuous of the English language.

He would have been happier if the plot could have been told using pantomime and Modern Dance.

[quote] Only DL could turn a thread about Amadeus into a Maggie Smith.

This film's author wrote 3 plays for Maggie Smith. And his brother wrote some memorable lines for her.

[quote] she threw her legs higher … and wider.

The Killing Fields should have won the Best Picture Oscar that year!

[quote]OMG. The actress who played his wife was amazing. Plus, her tits to her chin was helpful!

I never understood what was so great about her, I found her boring. She was being touted as some up and coming star (she was on the cover of Rolling Stone or Vanity Fair or some such), then she kind of just disappeared.

I also remember her from Smooth Talk with Laura Dern.

This Is Spinal Tap should have won Best Picture, but it was too hilarious for dim Oscar.

Those were both made into films, r89. I saw The Public Eye but it looks like they've changed the name to Follow Me.

r89- The Private Ear became The Pad (and How to Use It)

Mia Farrow and Topol in one film?

Turning......

[quote] "The Pad (and How to Use It)

R134 I suppose that was another 'sex comedy' which never actually shows any sex.

It contained a young homosexual named Brian Bedford who promptly disappeared. (I wonder if the homosexual Shaffer hand-picked the homosexual Bedford?)

Excellent film. Why did Hulce not have a more successful career?

^ Because people didn't want to hire him.

He went to the wrong synagogue, perhaps.

Tom Hulce is left-handed?

Hulce is gay right ?

R136. I guess you've been dead since The Pad was made.

R37 What are you insinuating??

Hulce in Amadeus is a college aged autistic American kid with OCD. He seems about as much a 18th century eccentric musical genius as Jim Carry. And not cute enough to want to see him drop trous at the drop of a hat.

Brain Bedford did not "disappear", well not far as acting anyway. An RADA alumni he was and preferred being primarily being a stage actor though did do film and some television as well.

Lived to a grand old age of 80 with his partner and later husband actor Tim MacDonald.

More.....

From The Globe and Mail

R137

Tom Hulce had a successful enough acting career both on stage and screen (large and small).

R125

Dame Maggie Smith seems to command great admiration and respect on DL, but doesn't seem able to carry a thread very long. Last one started several months ago didn't go very far.

[quote]The film's director, Milos Forman, met with thousands of actors in auditions held over the course of a year

In his memoir Beginning, Kenneth Branagh talks about his experience auditioning for Mozart. He evidently came very close to getting it, and was still bitter years later about Forman's waffling and playing various actors against each other for months on end.

Elizabeth Berridge as Constanze - I agree her acting style is jarring compared to her co-stars, but I sort of think it works. We're meant to see that Constanze is gauche (his landlady's daughter) and someone a little out of step with his world, but she's still appealing and sweet and we understand what he sees in her. In any case, Meg Tilly would have been all wrong for it anyway. Never understood Forman's preoccupation with her.

I was absolutely disgusted when he farted right to the screen after doing a mocking version of Salieri's music!

And when that tarty wife stripped and showed her big misshapen tits to a virgin Salieri!

[quote]In explaining his casting choices, Mr. Forman said first of all that he felt major stars in the roles would work against credibility.

This doubtless came as a suprise to Scofield, Callow and Kendal.

Not to mention Ian McKellan, Jane Seymour and Tim Curry in their Broadway dressing rooms.

I'm not saying Hulce did not have a successful career. Just that casting him was a sop to the youth market of the time not that it was in any remote way suitable for the work. A very uninteresting bland actor. An American frat boy writing Don Giovanni.

Simon Callow was hot in this.

The man playing the Priest was hot

[quote] Brian Bedford who promptly disappeared

He went into Limbo in snowy Canada for forty years.

[quote] An American frat boy writing Don Giovanni.

'Don Giovanni' is particularly well-written.

Overlong scenes of suppressed drama. An inappropriate middle section of pastoral sex-comedy. A climax with too many things happening at the one time.

Not too many things happened at the climax?

Ghosts coming out of the floor is too many things happening at the climax.

Oh I didn't notice that, just the crazy laugh of Mozart

Elizabeth Berridge beat out Diane Franklin (the treacherous slut from The Last American Virgin) as Meg Tilly's replacement because Diane was deemed "too pretty" for the role.

Was it ever truthfully established why Meg Tilly left the film?

"Ghosts coming out of the floor is too many things happening at the climax."

Miss Girl please...

Drama and dramatics is what opera is about.

Commendatore's aria in final scene of Don Giovanni is meant to drive home several points whilst also wrapping things up.

Unrepentant until the end Don Giovanni is dragged down into hell without even dying first. Those "ghosts" and other creatures along with setting drive home two facts; DG is meeting his end and where his soul is going.

From the film...

[quote] Drama and dramatics is what opera is about.

My music comes first; the libretto and plot second.

One critique of Mozart's opera arias (and perhaps somewhat justified) is his heavy use of scales.

Though technically demanding and when done well brilliant, you often have several minutes at a pop of some singer running up and down scales.

[quote] too many things happening at the climax

Mozart made the same mistake in the first scene of Magic Flute.

That dragon is too much.

Aria in R166 is Martern aller Arten..

The best rendition of Martern Aler Arten is by of all people Maria Callas singing in Italian. One of the all time great Mozart performances.

The best Mozart is the late ones. The ones that sound like young Beethoven.

OP, I had anxiety all day but I listened to Brendel's version of Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466 Romance. It immediately cheered me the fuck up. And it reminds me that I still need to see Amadeus.

*

^ I can see why that "song" was not released as a single in the US. It doesn't have any lyrics nor meaning.

Besides, it belongs in that other thread—

[quote] It immediately cheered me the fuck up

R171 I guess Shaffer's scatological Mozart would appreciate that fornicatory reaction.

The Jupiter is the best— especially towards the climaxes.

It changed my life when I saw it in theaters

Are you pulling our leg, R176?

How are you living your life now since this 38 year old movie "changed" it?

Yes, the Jupiter is clean and clear and perfunctory. It's like 'Cafe Music' that can be appreciated with just one ear.

But around the 25th minute and the 28th minute it starts to swing! There’s a change of chord and it syncopates into a climax.

R155, i always imagine it is Schubert, as the actor resembles him closely

^ About whom are you speaking?

Did John Williams compose the score?

[Quote]How is Equus a bore? It has all the making to be a great film.

Too many soliloquies from Burton kill the film. At 2h17m it is tedious despite a few effective scenes. And the scene of the blinding of the horses is truly horrific

R162, is there really any doubt? I thought it was established that Meg was injured in Prague playing soccer just before filming was about to start.

Absolutely not R169. Callas was a limited Mozart singer, much better suited to Italian rep.

she just never sounded her best in mozart

Nope, despite not being a Mozart singer she's absolute spectacular. Nobody has sung that aria better. Pinza was not a Monteverdi singer but nobody has sung Arnalta's lullaby better. When I first heard that on a Pearl cd I was like holy shit I didn't know Monteverdi could sound like that. Academic concerns go right out the window and the music and drama take over from singers like these.

Leontyne Price sang Mozart too right?

Most :mozart” singers sound like they had their coaches tell them to clench their cheeks for the whole show. At least Christine ebersole looks like sh’es having fun

What happened to Christine Ebersole?

SNL, Amadeus, Richie Rich, and then .....

A life of love and luxury

Where can I obtain the delectable dessert "nipples of Venus" in this day and age?

R191 what?

Their relevance is mentioned here, R192.

(Though I have no memory of them in this Euro-pudding hodge-lodge circus of a film).

[quote] I'm not saying Hulce did not have a successful career. Just that casting him was a sop to the youth market of the time not that it was in any remote way suitable for the work.

Zeffirelli did the same.

R192, have you not seen the movie? They play a part in a scene featuring Salieri and Constanze Mozart.

[quote] have you not seen the movie?

R195, I said I saw the movie but they were overwhelmed by those other aspects of what I described as a 'Euro-pudding hodge-lodge circus of a film'.

In Mozart's day Capezzoli di Venere, such as they were, would have been brown. It was film Amadeus that switched things up to have them white with pink tips.

In any event the dessert like many other foods in Italy has many variations.

R189

Google is your friend. Ms. Ebersole has been quite busy since Amadeus...

More...

Great with Lupone in War Paint. A terrible musical(These guys wrote Grey Gardens?) but these two stars were dazzling.

Which two stars?

I always enjoy spotting actors from favorite movies in other favorite movies.

In the case of Amadeus, there are two actors also in the movie verssion of "1776" ( 1972).

Patrick Hines and Jonathan Moore.

Following the Nipples of Venue scene, Constanze shows her own nipples when she offers Salieri use of her muff if he promotes her husband. He reacts like any good male Dlounger and has the help throw her out on her arse

Never saw this one, I feel like I should.

Was Salieri gay?

R205 Salieri was impotent.

He couldn't get the blood into his penis and the sperm refused to spurt.

They didn't have impotence clinics in Salzburg and Vienna 300 years ago.

The spirit was willing but the flesh was weak.

I always thought that actress playing the wife wasn't the best, with lumpy tits, but the one playing her mother was awful.

No R186. Patently incorrect. But I’m not going to argue with insane Callas fans who know nothing about singing.

(r136) Bedford secured the role in "The Pad" by sleeping with the film's producer, Ross Hunter. Hunter was convinced he would become the next big thing.

I always think the capezzoli di Venere look absolutely delicious, but I find the decoration vulgar and slightly embarrassing and would leave it off. Yes, I am a prisspot, but I also don't like eating things that look like body parts of any sort. And imagine if they were billed as the Breasts of Saint Agatha!

No [R186]. Patently incorrect. But I’m not going to argue with insane Callas fans who know nothing about singing.

Clearly you're the one who knows nothing about singing. You probably love Renee Fleming. I am hardly an insane Callas fan though I like her enormously. But I was staggered when I heard the Callas Tutte le torture and thought this is the most exciting version I have heard. There are a number of great and spectacular versions of this aria but this bel canto/verismo artist cuts through it like a great samurai using his sword as a great weapon of revenge. I bet you don't think much of Pinza singing Mozart let alone Monteverdi either. I take back the slur on Fleming. You probably love the gulping for air Bartoli.

[quote] Bedford secured the role in "The Pad" by sleeping with the film's producer, Ross Hunter. Hunter was convinced he would become the next big thing.

R209 So you're saying the nubile Brian Bedford fornicated with the oily Martin Terry Fuss (aka Ross Hunter). But he was overlooked when Hunter chose James Fox — a Brian Bedford doppelgänger— for 'Thoroughly Modern Millie'.

It seems John Frankenheimer thought Brian Bedford might be a next big thing.

Elizabeth Berridge was great, She deserved an award (or at least a nomination) for supporting actress and a better future. Something must have happened to halt her career.

(R212) Exactly. Hunter was often fickle in his passing fancies and after "The Pad" flopped at the box-office, he turned his sights to Fox when casting "Millie".

"The Pad" was the biggest flop of Hunter's career, even more than "Lost Horizon" in 1973, so it was easy to cast Bedford aside in the hope of bedding Fox. From all reports, he was not successful in doing so.

Yes, R214 "Millie" was a much bigger investment. Julie was the biggest box-office draw of that decade. And perhaps Julie didn't want to star opposite a limp rag like Brian Bedford.

Elizabeth Berridge was awful. Every time she opened her mouth the movie ground to a halt. It was as if everyone else was a professional and she was a bad high school actor. Horrible! She ruined every scene she was in. I don't think Meg Tilly would have been good, either.

R213

[quote] Something must have happened to halt her career.

Her performance in Amadeus.

[quote] Elizabeth Berridge was awful

All the people on screen in this were awful. It was a farrago.

Uy val ya

Didn't somebody win an Oscar?

The Oscars have been rewarding trash since 1967.

They won the Grammy

R175 The Jupiter was revolutionary.

The climax used counterpoint — very similar to Gershwin etc— and FIVE different tunes!

R8 Roy Dotrice was a proper British actor who had been working for decades. Although unknown to international audiences, he would have been "the big name." He certainty had the most experience.

Leopold Mozart was a very intimidating and cold man. A violist, writer, and professor, Leopold wrote a textbook on the violin that is still studied today.

Leopold was also a musician in his own right. A transition between the Baroque and Classical era, particularly his toy and trumpet concerto.

R224 That person was affected.

The surname Dottress had to be pronounced as Do-Treece.

They had a habit of over-acting or 'mugging' as if they were appearing in a pantomime for simpletons.

Alastair Sim is understated compared to this annoying mugging prat.

ROCK ME AMADEUS!!!

R226 maybe, but he was good in Amadeus

Did Do-Treece have any lines in Amadeus?

Just this month, they did Amadeus in a limited run at the newly refurbished Sydney Opera House Concert Hall, with Michael Sheen as Salieri.

They took advantage of the size and acoustics of the auditorium to have a small orchestra and some singers, the latter also comprising any extras needed in the play, so that there WAS live music when it appears in the script. (There was plenty of music in the original production as well, but it was prerecorded.)

Sheen got massive raves and the production as a whole was highly acclaimed and sold very well. The mandatory standing ovation seems to have hit Australia at last, so that was going on too, though it might be argued that Australians were always prone to stand and cheer a visiting star.

I had some reservations, despite having so recently adored Sheen in Staged, but I thought the now 40-year-old play survives very well. It has a new relevance in a time when mediocrity and vulgarity are more applauded than ever thanks to social media, the Kardashians and reality TV -- and now that everyone gets a standing ovation. The problem, and the irony, is that I'm not sure people can discern any more the nature of the difference between Shaffer's best work and those other things.

[quote] Michael Sheen as Salieri.

Surprise casting for the arrogant Sheen playing a middle-aged failure.

And surprise costuming for the Mozarts. Glamadeus?

R230 So what did that small orchestra do while there was nothing to play and Mr Sheen did all his dramatic monologues?

^PS Because I'm imagining that Sheen would have insisted the orchestra be kept in darkness so as not to draw attention away from him

They didn't do anything. There was a scrim between the main action and the musicians which lighting made denser or lighter as required.

And actually, all the feedback on Sheen's personal behaviour was very positive, both from the cast/crew and from gossip columnists who watched his progress around town in his time off. No "star" behaviour noted whatever.

^ I am pleased to hear it.

R163

I love the music in that final scene of Don Giovanni. So moving and dramatic.

But looking at that clip tonight I had the sudden amusing thought it could easily fit Hugh Hefner.

R226 Mr DoTreece had an equally annoying daughter.

many thanks, sincerely

That unfortunate looking woman was married to the son of Wilfrid Hyde-White.

[quote]It has a new relevance in a time when mediocrity and vulgarity are more applauded than ever thanks to social media, the Kardashians and reality TV -- and now that everyone gets a standing ovation. The problem, and the irony, is that I'm not sure people can discern any more the nature of the difference between Shaffer's best work and those other things.

I recently re-watched the movie & it is still thought provoking about talent vs. genius. Salieri was popular in his day because the Emperor liked him even though even someone who knows nothing about musical can detect something special about Mozart. Today's entertainers who are all hype, popularity but basically forgettable (Bey, Taylor Swift, etc) seems obvious, but it made me think of anyone in my lifetime who is someone special (if not necessarily "genius"), but not considered commercially successful and selling out huge concerts, big box office movies, etc.

Is Tom Hulce a stage actor? Because his movie career never went anywhere after this movie and he's rarely seen these days.

Seattle based stage actor and director