Powerful Personal

Ajter the publisher was unable to place Street Scene in European opera houses.

admin — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 02:56:58 +0000

I have some more interesting ideas for shows. One of them is to do a musical based on “It happened one night.” I am seeing Leland Hayward tomorrow to find out if he can get the rights for me. Also I havent given up my idea of an Oedipus opera for Robesoneven if Max doesnt write it. ”All at once” doesnt seem to go so as well as we hoped. I have a strong suspicion ? hollywood, palestine, hollywood: io Copyrighted material that some dirty game is going on at Chappells againand if I find that out it will be definitely the end of my relations with Max Dreyfus. Last night I went with the Revys to a performance of “Volpone,” mostly by Group theatre actors. It was very nice, terribly overplayed, but full of good ideas and very refreshing. And what a wonderful play! This weekend I go to see the Milhauds if I get a reservation. Just for one day. And next week Ill be on the train homehurray! Ill let you know as soon as I know exactly what day Im leaving. Did you ever see the Spring issue of a magazine called “Stage”? It has a very nice picturc of you. Ill bring it. Now I have to run. Byebye, my little Duchie and loads of love, Kurt . Possibly Richard Griffith $, who had worked with Frank Capra on the wartime documentary Why Wc Fight. He went on to become curator oj the New York Museum of Modern Art. . Frank Capras It Happened One Night starred Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert. Leland Hayward was a prominent agent aru l producer married to the actress Margaret Sullavan ; he went on to produce the Broadway productions of Mister Roberts, Gypsy, and The Sound of Music. . All at Once” was the ballad sung by FredMacMurray in the opening moments o”Where Do We Go from Here? Weill had long felt neglected by Chappells “standards” department. Ajter the publisher was unable to place Street Scene in European opera houses, Weill became more arul more dissatisfied, eventually giving Down in the Valley to Schirmcr. After Weills return to South Mountain Road in June , it was nearly two years before he left home again for any extended period of time; thus there is no correspondence with Lenya during a highly intense period of compositional activity. In the first half of the decade Weill had seemed to focus on establishing a successful career in both New York and Hollywood.

I am amazed how carefully they work.

admin — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 03:30:53 +0000

AUGUST Sunday, Aug. , Good morning, my honey chil. How are you today? I had worked so hard these last days that I was terribly tired yesterday and went early to bed, had a wonderful schleep until and feel fine and dandy now. We finished the Dukes entrance song yesterday which, I think, will rank next to any Offenbach or Guilbert Sullivan song of that type. We still havent got the right idea for the Duchess song. We got cold feet on the idea “Great men make bad lovers.” We started two songs for the garden scene: a madrigal for Angela and the girls with the title “The little naked boy” Cupid, you stupid, and a duet for the Duke and Angela where he always mixes up words like: Duke: Come with me to that nozy cook. Angela: My lord, you mean that cozy nook. I have straightened out some important story problems this week, but we are having troubles with Eddiethe same old playwright troubles. He is so confused, and I have to remind him all the time of things he forgot from one meeting to another. He is so used working for the movies that he always thinks in terms of lines instead of scenes. Ira, more than I, is worried that the comedy might be a little dated, but that probably comes more from Lee who doesnt like what she calls sex comedy probably because she hasnt got anything where other people have sex. Y esterday I spent hours at the studio. They were recording “It happened to happen to me” “All at Once” with Joan Leslie who will be lovely in the part, and then I saw a rehearsal of the opening number “Morale” and the Hessian Drinking Song “The Song of the Rhineland”. It looks terrific, real big production scenes, done with great taste and gusto, and the music comes out bcutifully. If it works out the way it ? new city, hollywood: Copyrighted material looks now, it will be a very important picture and a great thing for me. I am amazed how carefully they work. Every bar is worked out to the minutest detail. Yesterday they had a two hours debate about the interpretauon of one line, with an orchester of men waiting. Of course, they have no tryout and no two weeks out of town to straighten out things, so they have to do right then and there.

She is nice and quiet and doesnt bother me when I want to be alone.

admin — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 03:09:45 +0000

I will urge Max Gordon to sign him as soon as possible. I dont think we can do better for that part. I am feeling wonderful now that we actually working and things are going so well. Many times these last weeks I thought of packing my things and going home, but I always felt that this could become a very important piece, much more than “Lady” and “Venus.” Now I am glad that I stuck it out. Eddie is definitely finishing his job today so that the three of us can work together. It is a terrific job wc have to do and I am not quite sure if it really can be done for a Christmas opening, with orchestration and everything. The score will have the size of an opera. Max Gordon, at my request, wrote Ira a letter asking him to come to N.Y. with me and work there. Of cours, Ira refused flatly, and must say in all fairness, from his pointofview he is right. He can work much better here and he is afraid of the heat and his mother. But he is willing to come, as soon as we have definite production dates. So we decided to work hard for four weeks. By that time we will see if the show can be done around Christmas and accordingly make our plans for coming East. If I have to stay much longer after these four weeks you might make a little trip on the “Superchief.” On the other hand, if we decide to postpone the show Ill come home in September. I am lonesome for you too, many times. But those little separations have always proved to be very good. I am thinking of you all the time. You know how everything I am doing, thinking, working is closely connected with you, and I know its the same with you. I thought it was sweet of you to say you are jealous at Thomas. Its the same as if I would say I am jealous at Polly. You know how utterly disinterested in people I become when I am working. I dont want to see anybody and the great advantage of my house here is that it is so isolated and nobody really knows where I am. Some times, on my way to Ira, I am having lunch with Joe and about once a week we go to the beach. She is nice and quiet and doesnt bother me when I want to be alone.

William Perlberg , the erstwhile personal assistant to Harry Cohn at Columbia.

admin — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 04:42:52 +0000

Walter Hustons wife. She seemed in very ? new city, hollywood: Copyrighted material good condition and quite normal. We stayed together till , then I went schniepeln. Today Ill see Perlberg, then lunch with Joe Alma “Jo” Revy she is very busy because Thomas has the mumps, afternoon Ira, evening Eddie. Real busybody, but fig. dont worry, I take it easy. And how is my Tropfi? How is everything in the house? Did you get the chain on the door? Do you feel alright? How are the singing lessons? You and Pete did a first class packing job. When I unpacked the big valise, I thought: “Als sie aber ausgestattet waren .. .” The “Reporter” reports today that Ethel Merman has signed for “Rain,” but Lee tells me Rouben Mamoulian left only Monday for New York and wont be there until Thursday. I told the Gershwins that you had been offered the part, but they say it sounds like something to stay away from. Well, honeypie, Id better get dressed and get a taxi to the studio. Ill write again before the week is over. Take care of yourself and watch those curves on the road! Yours, for keeps! Knut P.S. The weather is awful here. Cloudy, no sun. Of course, thats all Roosevelts fault. If you find the belt that goes with the brown gabardine slacks please send it. . Weill is quoting the first line from “The Little Grey House,” a duet intended for Ulysses Africanus, the musical that Anderson and Weill left unfinished in . . Weill intended the role of the Duchess in The Firebrand for Ixnya, hut she was illsuited for it, thus prompting considerable resistance to her being cast. . William Perlberg , the erstwhile personal assistant to Harry Cohn at Columbia, went on to produce many successfulfilms, including Song of Bernaderte, State Fair, and Country Girl. He produced Where Do We Go from Here? for Twentieth CenturyFox. . “But after they had been properly fitted out” is a quotation from “Stol{” Pride in Die sieben Todsiinden. WEILL IN BEVERLY HILLS TO LENYA IN NEW CITY, I JULY Letterhead: Beverly Hills Hotel Saturday, July , Good morning, my darling. I had my second tennis lesson this morning not so good, then primi breakfast cranshaw melon, toasted rolls, milade marmelade and Bohnchen freshground coffee.

If they want me they have to get in touch with me.

admin — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 02:56:34 +0000

Copyrighted material WEILL IN NEW CITY TO LENYA IN LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS, APRIL Thursday, Apr. , Traubchen, Yesterday I had your letter from S. Antonio. The things that have arrived from New Orleans so far are lovely. The red lamp is a real beauty, the silver set is very sweet and so is the red water bottle and glass. Thats all that has arrived. I have paid . for the lamp, and there is a check of . from “French Quarter Shop” at the bank. I begin to see how you are planning our living room. I am sure it will be beautiful by the time you get through. I had lunch with Sam yesterday. He has finished rewriting and sent a script to the Lunts. Alfred called him up and said, he didnt think it was improved. Then Sam, for the first time, got furious and told them that is all he can do and they can take it or leave it. Half an hour later Alfred called back and said he had read it again and thinks now it is very good. They are absolutely awful, those two old fakers, and she is definitely the greatest bitch Ive ever seen. I had arranged the audition and explained to them who Belle Rosette was etc. Then she sang and Lynn kept saying: “What a charming costume!” Then Belle Rosette did a number which is a take off on an old woman gossiping a wonderful performance. Lynn said: “She would be very good as an old woman in the chorus.” When I explained again that this woman will be the star of “Sons oFun” next week, she didnt even listen, went over to Alfred and repeated: “Wouldnt she be good as an old woman in the chorus?” And so it went on. She was tired, soooo “overworked,” had to eat dinner early and lie down an hour before a radio rehearsal. And he is so dumb and so egocentric! He reminds me of Otto Klemperer all the timethe same fake voice and the same stupid chickeneyes. I have the feeling Ill save myself a lot of trouble if I stay out of this show. Life is too short to be bossed around by two old hamsand the results are too meager. Anyway, I wont make another move now. If they want me they have to get in touch with me. Thats the only way to deal with them. I talked to Cheryl.

He was much less likely to have been tainted by ils turbulence.

admin — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 03:01:27 +0000

The book on Embassies from which the above passage is extracted is dedicated lo Sir Philip Sidney, who about llie same time had Iwo books dedicated to him by Jordano Bruno, long protected in his house, which he left from a quarrel with Grcvillc. Our readers know that, many years after. Bruno was burnt alive at Home, “in order,” lo use the atrocious words of Caspar Scioppius, an applauding eyewitness, “thai he might tell in the other worlds which he had imagined, how llie Bomans treated blasphemers.” Il is natural to lind Sir Philip Sidney llie patron of learned exiles; bul il adds a new lustre to his fame, lhat he was the refuge even of extravagant and unintelligible sophists, for whose writings he could have no respect, when the sacred right of free enquiry was violated iu their persons.We do nol remember the argument againsl ihe modern llieory of ulililv ascribed by Mr. Stewart to Buchanan. Among modern moralists, utility always signifies the interest of all men. In Buchanan, and perhaps in all writers before the eighteenth century, it denotes the private utility of the individual, and requires an enlarging epithet to give it a different signification But the mention of Buchanan excites our regret lhat Mr. Stewart should have excluded from his plan the history of those questions respecting the principles and forms of government, which form one of the principal subjects of political philosophy properly so called. No writer could have more safely trusted himself in that stormy region. He was much less likely to have been tainted by ils turbulence, than to have composed it by the serenity of his philosophical character. Every history of the other parts of moral and political science is incomplete, unless it be combined with that of political opinion : the link which, however unobserved, always unites the most abstruse of ethical discussions with Ihe feelings and alTairs of men. The moral philosophy of Hobbcs was made for his political systemand that again arose from ho stale of his country in his time. Every part of the works of Locke have a certain reference, more or less palpable, to the cumstances of Ins age ; without perceiving wliich, it is not easy to seize Hie spirit, or to estimate the merit, of lhat excellent man.

The effect then which is produced on tho lower orders of society.

admin — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 03:12:53 +0000

For a lime, loo, this answers; and Ihe artisan shares in the conveniencies io which his labours have contributed lo give birth : but il is in the very nature of the manufacturing system to be liable to greatlluctuation, occasional check, and ossible destruction; and, at all events, it has a tendency lo produce a greater population lhan il can permanently support in comfort or prosperity. The average rate of wages, for the last forty years, has been insufficient lo maintain a labourer wilh a tolerably large family;and yet such have been the occasional fluctuations, and such the sanguine calculationsof persons incapable of taking a comprehensive view of the whole, thai the manufacturing population has been prodigiously increased in Ihe same period. It is Ihe interest of the manufacturer to keep ihis population in excess, as the only sure means of keeping wages low; and wherever the mean of subsistence are uncertain, and liable to variation, il se “ms lo be Ihe general law of our nalure, lhat Ihe population should he adapted lo Ihe highest, and not to the average rale of supply. In India, where a dry season used lo produce a failure of the crop, once in every ten or twelve years, the population was always up to the measure of the greatest abundance; and in manufacturing countries, the miscalculation is still more sanguine and erroneous. Such countries, therefore, arc always overpeopled; and it seems lo be the necessary effect of increasing talent and refinement, to convert all countries into this denomination. China, he oldest manufacturing nation in Ihe world, and by far Ihe greatest that ever existed with the use of little machinery, lias always suffered from a redundant population, and has always kept the largest part of ils inhabitants in a stale of the greatest poverty.The effect then which is produced on tho lower orders of society, by that increase of industry and refinement, and that multiplication of conveniences which are commonly looked upon as the surest tests of increasing prosperity, is to couvert the peasants into manufacturers, and the manufacturers into paupers.

Instead of being recognised by all persons who ihe sense lo w hich il is adapted.

admin — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 03:14:28 +0000

This is obviously implied, at all events, and, we rather think, is occasionally expressed, in all the theories that resolve beauty into combinations of curve linesinto relaxation of the fibresinto smoothnessproportionfragility, or any other physical qualities; Ihe authors of such speculations being generally satisfied wilh reducing all the various forms of beauty lo their ow n favoured elements, and assuming ilas a final principle and fixed law of our constitution, of which account could be rendered, lhat those elements produced a distinct operation upon sdme inward sense or faculty, tho result of which was the emotion or perception of beauty. How extremely inaccurate and unmeaning all this is, however, must he apparent to every one who will lake the trouble lo reflect upon it; and may be made evident, in a very few words, even lo fiiose who decline lhat trouble.If beauty be the object of a peculiar sense or faculty, then its nature must be as familiarly and certainly know n to all who possess thai sense, as Ihe nature of light or sound is to those who can see or hear. It must always he recognised by the same properties and effects. No two persons who possess Ihe sense, can ever differ as lo ils presence or absence any particular occasion ; and, when once admiltcd to exist in certain forms, colours, or proportions, must inevitably be discovered wherever the same forms aim proportions are presented. How notoriously the fact is otherwise, ilneedless for us lo say. Instead of consisting in one substance or element,like light, sound, or heat, it is supposed to reside entire and separate, in colours, forms, and motions; nay, iu proportions, sentiments, argumcnts.ano imitations; and to exist, conspicuous and distinct, in landscapes, building animals, verses, flowers, tunes, similes, demonstrations, anda thousand oilier shapes anomalous. Instead of being recognised by all persons who ihe sense lo w hich il is adapted, in every object in w hich it is plainly perceived by any one such person, it is notorious, lhat not only individuals, but whole nations, daily perceive the most exquisite beauty in objects where other individuals can see no traces of it; and, finally, the very same persons who have once rapturously admitted the beauty of certain forms, colours, or proportions, in one set of objects, daily confess that hey can discover no sort of beauty in the very same forms and proportions, when they happen lo occur in a different set of objects. Tho forms, colours, and proportions hat are respectively beautiful in a tree, a tiger, or a mountain, are not beautiful lo any eye in a temple or a woman.

In one circumstance, however, we differ from the transcendentalism We own the subjectivity of our perceptions.

admin — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 03:07:15 +0000

Against the more inviting system of sensualism, in which all knowledge is supposed to consist of original impressions from without, or of abstractions or new combinations of original impressions, which has spread so rapidly from the writings of the late French metaphysicians, and which charms us even while we deny it, by ils appearance of simple truth, a plain statement of the doctrine of anterior susceptibilities would perhaps have had lilllc effect. It required a bolder enunciation of ils force lo surprise into discussion; and discussion, excited as it has been, in one country at least, lo such enthusiasm ofenquiry, will terminate, we trust, in Ihe mutual correction of the errors of Condillac and of Kant.In examining the validity of the doctrines of transcendentalism we shall follow the order in which they were stated.The existence of a system which is neither dogmatical in ils first principles, nor altogether sceptical, it is impossible lo admit. We demonstrate only from something which we take for granted; and this first principle must be stated or understood dogmatically. The critical philosopher, it is said, goes along with the sceptic iu exposing the illusions of Ihe dogmatist; but if every principle assumed be dogmatism, with Ihe sceptic he must also rest. To go farther, and enquire into the source of each illusion, is to do nothing more than dogmatise in a new way ; for he must believe the illusion to have taken place, because a ccrlain source of illusion existed, which be must demonstrate from some principle acknowledged before, and therefore confessedly in need of support; or from another principle, which he assumes without proof. In what, then, does he differ from the theorists who have gone efore him? All, at least in modern times, have been critical, as all have professed to examine the faculties of the cognitive being. Of this examination there are various degrees of accuracy, and the theory of transcendentalism may therefore be a better dogmatism than others; but still it is not distinguished by any new character, so as to deserve a peculiarity of name. In Ihe mere belief of the subjectivity of perception, it ccrtainly is not original ; for it would be difficult to find a philosopher of the present age who retains the belief of the actual unmodified representation, by the sense, of the qualities of external matter. In one circumstance, however, we differ from the transcendentalism We own the subjectivity of our perceptions; but we are convinced of the impossibility of analysing them into objective and subjective elements.

The glory of producing an imperishable record of that great conflict seems to be reserved for Colonel Napier.

admin — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 02:57:10 +0000

The Laureat Odes, indeed, among which the Vision of Judgment must be classed, are, for Ihe most part, worse than Pye’s, and as bad as Cibber’s; nor do we think him generally happy in short pieces. But his longer poems, though full of faults, are nevertheless very extraordinary productions. We doubt greatly whether they will be read fifty years hence; but that if they are read they will be admired, we have no doubt whatever.But though, in general, we prefer Mr. Soutlioy’s poetry to his prose, we must make one exception. The life of Nelson is, beyond all doubt, the most perfect and the most delightful of his works. The fact is, as his poems most abundantly prove, that he is by no means so skilful in designing as in filling up. It was therefore an advantage lo him to be furnished wilh an outline of characters and events, and to have no other task to perform than lhat of touching the cold sketch into life. No writer, perhaps, ever lived whose talents so precisely qualified him to write Ihe history of the great navai warrior. There were no fine riddles of the human heart to readno theories to foundno hidden causes to developeno remote consequences lo predict. The character of the hero lay on Ihe surface. The exploits were brilliant and picturesque. The necessity of adhering to the real course of events saved Mr. Soulhey from those faults which deform the original plan of almost every one of his poems, and which even his innumerable beauties of detail scarcely redeem. The subject did not require the exercise of those reasoning powers the want of which is the blemish of his prose. It would not be easy to find, in all literary history, an instance of a more exact hit between wind and water. John Wesley, and the Peninsular War, were subjects of a very different kind,subjects which required all Ihe qualities of a philosophic historian. In Mr. Southey’s works oh these subjects, he has, on the whole, failed. Yet there are charming specimens of the art of narration in both of them. The Life of Wesley will probably live. Defective as it is, it contains the only popular account of a most remarkable moral ” revolution, and of a man, whoso eloquence and logical acuteness might have rendered him eminent in literature, whose genius for government was not inferior to lhat of Richelieu, and who, whatever his errors may have been, devoted all his powers, in defiance of obloquy and derision, lo what he sincerely considered as the highest good of his species. The History of the Peninsular War is already dead : indeed, Ihe second volume was deadborn. The glory of producing an imperishable record of that great conflict seems to be reserved for Colonel Napier.