On the Bull Run/Occoquan Trail – At the theatre again – My Fair Lady – A new Trump trial approaches – Reinstatement of Justin Jones – Evening statistics
I was unable to go with the Wanderbirds on the Bull Run/Occoquan Trail on Sunday, on account of a theater performance I saw in the evening. It would have been impossible to meet with RK for dinner if I hiked all day and arrived at Vienna in the late afternoon. I was sorry for this, since normally on this hike, which occurs annually, I take the option of hiking the trail in its entirety from Fountainhead to Bull Run Regional Park, about 18½ miles in all. Happily, however, the Vigorous Hikers had set up a hike on the same trail today, beginning from the soccer field, going slightly over 10 miles to Bull Run Regional Park, and then returning to the soccer fields, so I cannot complain of getting short measure.
And what a hike it was! One might have supposed that the goddess Flora presided over it. The river banks were carpeted with bluebells, of course; that is normal for this time of year. But there were many other varieties of flower as well: bloodroot, bluets, rue anemone, cutleaf toothwort, white violets, blue violets, yellow violets. I have never seen spring beauties in such profusion before, nor more vividly pink-and-white; they were every bit as magnificent as the bluebells. And here and there a few spiderwort were blooming, and that is a flower that I never tire of contemplating: the violet hue of its petals is so deeply saturated as to make the flowers that we call violets look almost grayish in comparison. The day became warm but neither overly hot or humid, and the sky was clear, and in color somewhat deeper and more intense than the usual azure or cerulean that characterizes the clear spring days here.
The performance that I saw on Sunday with RK was that of My Fair Lady at the National Theater, the second stage performance I’ve seen since the pandemic began. The house was not very full. I don’t know whether that was on account of that particular Sunday being Easter or the fact that it was the last performance to be held in the city (it ran in Washington only from the 6th to the 9th, after which it was moved to Broadway) or that fear of COVID is still discouraging people from live performances. A combination of all three, in all probability. There were notices stating the facemasks were “strongly encouraged”; even so, the majority of audience members were not wearing them. The process of obtaining tickets was somewhat peculiar, at any rate to my old-fashioned notions: instead of being given paper slips, as was the case of theater tickets in the past, I received a text on my cell phone that contained a link which, when opened, displayed QR codes onscreen that the ushers scanned in order to admit us to our seats. I suppose that this method saves on expenses connected with printing tickets on colored paper, but what is done for theater patrons who do not possess cell phones? There are a few such benighted beings left, even in the 21st century.
It was extremely well mounted and staged, although RK and I were not altogether pleased with the performances of Madeline Powell (Eliza) and Jonathan Grunnert (Higgins). Powell has a good singing voice and a fine presence, but she appeared to be laboring under a speech impediment (even when she was no longer speaking Cockney in the later scenes) that at times made it difficult to understand what she was saying or singing. Grunnert was by no means deficient, but he lacked the sharp incisiveness that Rex Harrison had brought to the role when he originated it. On the other hand, some of the other roles were delightfully rendered by John Adkinson (Pickering), Nathan Haltiwanger (Freddy), and Michael Hegarty (Doolittle). The musical holds up remarkably well, nearly seventy years after its first appearance. Every song in it is as brilliant as ever.
The ending was left deliberately ambiguous as to whether Eliza actually returns to live with Higgins in his house, which pleased me. In George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, the play on which the libretto is based, it is fairly broadly hinted in the final scene that Eliza will not pair off with Higgins but will live independently. Shaw even went to the trouble of writing a prose epilogue in which he said explicitly that Eliza winds up marrying Freddy and eventually comes to run a successful florist and greengrocer shop after their marriage. In 1913, when the play first appeared, the idea of a clever managing woman who molds her own destiny and that of others no doubt seemed more unusual than it does now (although the concept was far from unknown then). By the 1950s plenty of women had entered the marketplace; there was no need for the reassurance, supplied by the original musical, that women have no further ambition than the marriage altar.
Speaking of Shaw’s epilogue, the following excerpt explaining why the prospect of a subordinate existence possesses no charms for the strong-minded Eliza has a good deal of relevance to today’s political scene:
“Eliza has no use for the foolish romantic tradition that all women love to be mastered. ’When you go to women,’ says Nietzsche, ‘take your whip with you.’ Sensible despots have never confined that precaution to women: they have taken their whips with them when they have dealt with men, and been slavishly idealized by the men over whom they have flourished the whip much more than women.”
I would not exactly describe Donald Trump as sensible, but a despot he incontestably is, and he has wielded the whip on numerous occasions, with no apparent resentment from the numerous associates and followers he has used and has afterwards flung aside.
His perplexities are increasing. After the first deposition he has been required to give last week he will be forced to deal with a second lawsuit on April 25th: the one instituted by E. Jean Carroll, accusing him both of rape and of defamation of character. Louis Kaplan, the judge who will preside over the case, addressed the defendant: “Mr. Trump, I hate to sound inquisitive, but would you kindly inform me whether you intend to be present at the trial?” Well, he didn’t put it in precisely those terms, but that was gist of it. If Trump were to attend the case physically, as he did for the deposition for the charges brought against him by Alvin Bragg, special security arrangements would have to be made – so Kaplan’s desire for clarification on that point is understandable. The judge has also pledged that the jurors will remain anonymous, in order to safeguard them after attacks from Trump’s supporters: a by no means unnecessary precaution, given that Trump’s calls for violence against Juan Merchan, the judge in the case at which he deposed last week, have led to death threats against the judge and against his family members as well.
Justin Jones has been reinstated in the Tennessee Assembly General, a mere three days after his expulsion. The city council of Nashville voted unanimously to restore him. Supporters are currently underway to reinstate Justin Pearson as well. The Republicans who ousted him have gained nothing from their maneuverings, except the enmity of the capital of the state they purport to represent.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 685,082,227; # of deaths worldwide: 6,838,374; # of cases U.S.: 106,385,356; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,157,194.