Re: Bye Bye, Life/Goodbye, Happiness/Hello Loneliness/I Think I'm Gonna Die

In article <foqgal$l3a$1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
Michael Alan Chary <mchary@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>Fredric March, "Death Takes a Holiday," Paramount, 1934.

Yes.  Based on the translation of a 1931 play, _La Morte in
Vacanze_, by one Alberto Casella, and if I had a time machine I'd
go back to 1931, buy up the rights, and persuade Ottorino
Respighi to turn it into an opera.

An interesting thing about the Italian original is that in
Italian _la morte_ is a feminine noun.  So when Death appears _in
propria persona_ in the first act and at the very end, she speaks
of herself using the feminine endings for all her adjectives.
But as Prince Serki he's masculine.  You could probably
double-cast Death with a soprano and a tenor (or whatever), but I
really like the idea of a bass who could sing countertenor....

Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djheydt@[EMAIL PROTECTED]