A Master Passes
RIP Franco Zeffirelli, 96, a brilliant artist, master of adapting classics, including opera, to the silver screen. No one has given more life to Shakespeare than the Florentine auteur. He gave Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, perfectly cast, a chance to delight movie audiences in the raucous The Taming of the Shrew (1967). There is no better adaptation of the Bard than the vibrant Romeo and Juliet (1968). And he showed the world that Mel Gibson was more than a pretty boy action star in Hamlet (1990). And, through Robert Stephens’ electrifying performance, he blew away all previous New Testament interpretations in the mini-series Jesus of Nazareth (1977), casting his Juliet, Olivia Hussey, as Mary and having her howling with grief — screaming — upon the death of her son, as gut-wrenching a scene as there will ever be, one which gives me chills whenever I recall it. Along the way he received a boatload of nominations and awards. Bravissimo, Maestro. Grazie. Here are Dick and Liz as Petruchio and Kate:
And Hussey and Leonard Whiting as the star crossed lovers:
And Gibson as the melancholy Dane addressing Yorick:
And Hussey and Stephens as mother and son:
For the first time since the NY Post went to two bucks, I bought it today. Here’s some stuff gleaned from it, edited by yours truly: Banks’ lending to small businesses is in overdrive… The Weird But True column has two beauties: the most peaceful country in the world, least murders, is Iceland. At the bottom -Afghanistan… A physics prof in China had a fender bender. He provided cops with equations and diagrams showing speed and reaction time, proving the other driver was at fault. Video bared him out.
I received this message from Facebook regarding an ad for my ten books. “Post partially muted if you do not have permission to use this music. Your video will be muted during any segments that contain this music.” I used Sinatra’s dynamic version of the Cy Coleman/Carolyn Leigh standard The Best Is Yet to Come. I clicked on the ad to see what was what, and it was fine. I haven’t received a similar message from Twitter. I run the spot every ten days or so in rotation with other posts.
My thanks to the kind folks who bought, donated and swapped books. Here’s what sold: The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton, Fire and Fury by Michael Wolff, a novel in Russian, Dexter in the Dark by Jeff Lindsay, The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coelho; Sisters by Danielle Steel.
My Amazon Author page: https://www.amazon.com/Vic-Fortezza/e/B002M4NLJE
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