Perhaps an equal partner with Christopher Wheeldon in the creation of Carnival of the Animals was John Lithgow, who not only narrated the piece in 2003 when it was premiered by New York City Ballet, but also wrote that narration. Pennsylvania Ballet hoped to sign Lithgow for Carnival of the Animals with the company late this season, and it did, but Lithgow had a clause in his contract allowing him to back out if other more compelling work presented itself before a certain date.
That date, March 1, has passed, and a Pennsylvania Ballet spokeswoman says Lithgow will at least be here to narrate opening night in June.
But what about the other performances?
"We have confirmation that John will definitely do opening night," said the spokeswoman. "We are still working with his agent to see if he will commit to any additional performances."
This Carnival of the Animals, by the way, uses the familiar Camille Saint-Saëns score, but tells the tale of Oliver Percy, a young boy who spends the night in New York's Museum of Natural History.
Addendum: Pennsylvania Ballet says Lithgow will do opening night, plus the two performances on June 7 (noon and 8 p.m.). For the other performances, Houston actor Paul Hope will narrate.
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Lithgow A Go
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Peter Dobrin has been writing about classical music and the arts for The Inquirer since 1989. He earned an undergraduate degree in performance from the University of Miami, and received a master's degree in music criticism from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University.
He’s grateful for news tips, willing to engage in a certain amount of back and forth with readers, but is unfortunately unable to remove old LPs from your basement or post photographs of your cat.
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Comments (1)
A sampling of the text about "Oliver Pendleton Percy the Third" is at this link, such as this (apologies for the one word that might not pass muster):
"Rodents raced in, like a pack of wet cats,
All snapping and nipping and nibbling.
The ferrets and badgers and weasels and rats
Were sticky-faced toddlers and snotty-nosed brats,
A species that always drove Oliver bats:
The Greater New York younger sibling."
I once heard Peter Schickele's take on Carnival of the Animals; anything to add to the Ogden Nash version is fine (as long as it's good, of course).
Posted by Geo. | March 18, 2008 1:17 PM
Posted on March 18, 2008 13:17