Art, Culture, & dare I say…TV??

July 15, 2008

You know it’s a hot day outside when both of us post on the same day. Right now it’s not so much the heat at 5:30pm as it that I’m working on my second glass of an incredibly good vino bianco, a gift from our neighbors. Massimo, the husband of Barbara and Dad of Eduardo, unloaded a few cases of this wine from his car last week (how do I know this? My busybody sposita knows all!), and we became the lucky beneficiaries of a bottle with a promise of more if we liked it. So drink we must- for good neighbors we want to remain!

Life is not all card games here in Alessandria. I felt that you needed to know that we are not complete Neanderthals. Last week we went to a free concert in the courtyard of the Palazzo Cuttica- an incongruous but fabulous setting for the blues- featuring Jerry Portnoy, harmonica player extraordinaire of Muddy Waters and Eric Clapton fame. He was surprisingly overshadowed by his (Italian) backup band, Guitar Ray and the Gamblers. “Guitar Ray” was unbelievably good and Jerry Portnoy was gracious enough to acknowledge Ray’s amazing talent, saying he is why he loves to play in Italy. The best part to us is that every Thursday night through mid August we will be singing- and hearing- the blues with a different band headlining each week. I have to say the Italians were remarkably staid- it wasn’t soccer after all- but we Americane were not. I LOVE the blues.

Then Torino on Saturday…
My favorite part was the Museum of Cinema with the China exhibit at the Museum of Antiquities a close second. Rachel may have liked the shroud but we spent hours in the other two places (I’m crossing myself now…) and “hours” were not enough. When Siegy comes next week we’ll go back to the Cinema Museum as it is right up her alley. To begin with the building is amazing in and of itself. In the 1860s it was the tallest brick-built building on earth, with its “steep conelike roof supporting several “layers” of classical temples stacked one on top of the other” and crowned by the Turin “needle” a spire that rises 552’ over the city (thank you Mr. Frommer). Originally it was built to be a synagogue but the costs during construction kept escalating, problems with the contractors mounted, and the city’s Jewish residents said “basta!” (enough of this already! NOT from Frommers) and eventually the city of Turin took over. We decided to get the grand lay of the land by first taking the glass elevator that goes up through the middle of this amazing building. We had no idea what a treat it would be- not just the view from the top (a la Seattle’s very own needle)- but what we saw inside the building. We floated past rooms where visitors were lying on individual red “fainting” chairs watching movies projected onto the walls; another room/set where a bar fight had just taken place and Westerns were shown; a small intimate room with a round red bed, where we later discovered you can lie down and watch Romeo and Juliet (and other “romantic” movies) projected onto the ceiling above the bed; another set from Dr. Frankenstein’s lab, and on and on. That was just one level of at least four. The museum chronicles the history of cinema from the early equipment of the 19th century, the shadowboxes and the kinescopes of even earlier, the earliest attempts at the filmmaking process, scripts and costumes from famous movies, old film clips, and more. I look forward to the floor we never got to!

The China exhibit was a very fortuitous find. After visiting the Shroud we saw what looked like Roman ruins right next door and a large sign with pictures of the Terracotta army soldiers announcing what turned out to be the second day of the China exhibit at the Museum of Antiquities. The ruins were not “looks like” ruins but real ones and the exhibit, outside of China, could not have been in a more perfect setting. The museum itself is constructed among the ruins, underground, and as you walk around you truly feel as if you’ve simply stumbled upon these amazing artifacts yourself. It’s not a huge space so there were only a few soldiers from the army on exhibit, a few incredible Buddha, and many, many artifacts but the overall effect was spectacular.

On Friday we head to Verona by bus for an outdoor opera (Carmen!!) in an amphitheatre built in the first century AD. Such culture, such buona fortuna!! How could one possibly stoop so low as to watch

TV!!

So you don’t think we’ve gone and gotten all high-brow on you… let me add that I was addicted this past month to a Italian game show- a cross between Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune (which are my mother’s two favorite shows in Flahhhrida which only proves that this apple didn’t fall too far from her “favorite” tree). Yesterday I was all excited to see it again after a few days off with “the other kind of entertainment” previously mentioned- and what did they do?? They replaced my favorite show with a Family Feud/Wheel of Fortune (sans Vanna White) show that I cannot understand at all. Mamma mia, I am so upset.

Rachel is still content watching “Rex” a show that is filmed in Vienna starring a German shepherd who helps his owner, a police detective (and idiot), solve crimes. There are two other “good guy” detectives with them- so this combo reminds me of a (bad) cross of the Mod Squad and Lassie (but no pretty Peggy Lipton). Rex is a real looker, though. My good friend Jean who lives in Vienna told us about this show years ago so we recognized it right away flipping through our 5 channels. She and her daughter watched it religiously and one time it was filmed in the little park right near where they live. So thank God for Rex or we would have nothing! News and soccer. And to further add to our pathetic status…we have tried downloading Grey’s Anatomy with little success. We’re only in the second season and the internet possibilities seemed tantalizing but downloading even a couple of episodes took a day at least. So far downloading “The Office’s” first season has taken most of today… but Rachel perseveres.

Yes, we KNOW we are in Italy. Shouldn’t we have something better to do?!

And finally, to add even further embarrassment, the scores:
Cribbage, 20-15; Hollywood, 34-35, Uzbekistan ahead in both games. Damn her!