beancounter parodies

La Trav for the Masses

BP guest parodist: Some editor at the Anchorage Daily News. (I can't locate his name now. Sorry, mister! Your employer shouldn't've made it so difficult for me to find you again!)

Anchorage Opera's upcoming production of Giuseppe Verdi's tragic romance, "La Traviata," will be sung in Italian with English translations projected above the stage. However, the translation will be in standard English, which might be unfamiliar to many Alaskans. Therefore, we provide this Alaskan English translation following the speech pattern found in the poetry of Robert Service.

The swells of Paree were dancing with glee

In sweet Violetta's salon,

Where rich married guys swilled champagne and made eyes

At mam'selles with virtue to pawn.

Sweet Vi, understand, was a French courtesan,

Who made money by pleasing admirers

With long pedigrees, dukes and counts and marquises,

Who funded her lavish desires.

Her whims, while emotional, were hardly devotional.

She'd tried being good but was through with it.

"Drink up and have fun!" she advised all and one,

And continued, "What's love got to do with it?"

Then she started to hack from a T.B. attack,

The disease that would soon be her doom.

The guests kindly turned, partied on, and adjourned

To a sumptuous adjoining room.

Thus Vi was alone and without chaperone

When in came Alfredo, a tenor.

With his mind on romance, he jumped at this chance,

And declared his intention to win her.

Violetta demurred, "Of sweet talk, I'm cured.

Affection's a marketing matter.

Though your song is divine, take a card, get in line,

And prepare for your young heart to splatter."

But Alfredo sang on till the first light of dawn

Sent the revelers home for the night.

As his song faded yonder, the courtesan pondered

Whether this guy might be Mr. Right.

Everything I ever needed to know, I learned from the opera Don Giovanni

Never consent to meet for an illicit tryst in an upstairs bedroom; choose a first-story room with a direct exit.

After accidentally killing the father of your lover, do not stay to wipe your sword or attempt to explain yourself (in song or otherwise); do flee the crime scene at once; do not continue to gad about Central Europe, using your real name in social situations.

Do not proposition a woman on her wedding day; her schedule will be too jumbled and you will just draw undue attention to yourself.

If you must change identities with your manservant in order to meet a new conquest, hire a 'self-starter' for the job, not one who continually has to ask you what to do next, thus threatening to blow your cover.

Do not write down the names of all your former lovers in one book - particularly not the Italian ones.

No lease is too inconvenient to break at a moment's notice, if there is a posse of mezzos and tenors on your tail.

Do not, under any circumstances, taunt the dead.

Name That Opera

Anthony: The game: take classical operas and make HBO-type pop revamps of them....

1. "Fat Farm": John Goodman plays the snarky, overweight PR agent to an obnoxious, LA-Perfect Fat Bigot Producer, who, unknown to JG, is having it off with JG's private-school educated daughter Gilda. When he discovers this, he hires a bunch of cheap, Quentin Tarantino like hitmen to off the Producer. During an earthquake, the daughter gets killed in the confusion and the Producer goes on to an affair with Michelle Pfeiffer.

2. "Menage au Trois": a wealthy bored Manhattan woman who is having a
hyperdecadent affair with her transvestite male friend comes to world-weary recognition when she stops the pending engagement of a much younger, innocent girl to a society boor and arranges for her transvestite friend to marry her instead.

3. "He Loves/She Loves": a sleazy New York millionaire, who looks a lot like Donald Trump, has the hots for his personal assistant’s wife. Meanwhile, the Donald’s wife is flirting with a young soldier about to go off to Afghanistan. She sets about reclaiming her husband's affections with the help of the personal assistant and his wife. They set her up as a thrill-seeking out-of-towner on the internet, and arrange for the Donald to fall for her and try to lure her to NY.

4. “A Boy’s Best Friend”: A young man (played by Johnny Depp) is controlled by his seductive, grasping mother (Angelica Houston). They are sleazy record producers. She is desperate to keep him from pursuing a relationship with the daughter of a business rival. So she seduces Johnny's best friend (oh, let's say ... Toby McGuire), and pays him to take him out to the bars, get him drunk and laid, and convince him to dump the girlfriend. Hearing a lot of stories about how all women are ho's, Johnny ultimately shuns his girlfriend and returns to the family business, heartbroken and bitter.

5. "The Pop Singer": An executive from Spanish language TV suspects his beautiful wife is having an affair with a Telemundo pop singer, who is in reality his half-brother from a disastrous mix-up years ago at an orphanage. The singer's foster mother, a Basque separatist activist and performance artist, is not entirely sure of his parentage either, since her mother, merely a Basque separatist, was condemned to death by the executive's father, a powerful and corrupt judge. She thinks she saved the right baby at the orphanage fire but isn't quite sure anymore since she suffers from ADD. It doesn't end happily.

"Wild Kingdom" explores the world of opera

Marlin Perkins: Welcome to Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom!

[Out-of-key theme music]

[Marlin, in his TV suit, stands in a library, in front of a small white screen upon which flash images of landscapes, famous buildings and statues.]

Italy. Beautiful and scenic. Rich in history. The birthplace of the Renaisance movement. It is in this cradle of modern civilization, that many exotic and dangerous creatures of the operatic realm live and die.

"Tristan" as an episode of "Cheers"

“Tristan” done in the style of “Cheers” --

(Setting: a boat moored off the Boston coast)

Isolde (Dianne Chambers) [sits gloomily] I hate that Tristan, I loathe him, he repulses me ever since he did in my fiance.
Brangane (Carla): He's outside, Blondie, you want me to hock a spitball at him?
Isolde: I want you to go fix up that potion you said you used on your husband, Nick ... No, wait, s’il vous plait ... Go fetch Tristan first.
Brangane: Sure thing, Paleface...(She goes)
Isolde: He would remind me of a character out of D.H. Lawrence, except he hasn't been born yet...

"Salome", coming to Fox

“Salome” done in the style of “Married With Children”:

Judea in the time of the Prophets (provided Judea was in Suburban Chicago)

The Captain of the Guard (Marcy Jefferson): How beautiful the Princess Salome looks tonight.
Nabarroth (Bud Bundy): Ease off there Sappho-lips. She may be stupid but she's not dumb enough to think you're a guy.
Captain: Damn. Shouldn't have divorced Steve so quickly. (laugh track)
Enter Herod (Al Bundy) and Herodias (Peg Bundy)
Herod: I hate argiung with Jews. Always gives me gas. (Belches)
Peg: Good thing they don't make you constipated as well. (lt)

"Carmen" as directed by Monty Python

“Carmen” as reworked by Monty Python:

Carmen: (throwing flower at Don Jose): Hey Soldier...
Don Jose: Don Jose.
Carmen: Que?
DJ: I'm a corporal in the Spanish army.
C: Well, sorry, but from behind you looked like a lovelorn soldier....
DJ: What I object to is that you automatically treat me like a witless sexual pawn.
C: Well, I am an amoral temptress after all...
DJ: And how'd you get that way? By failing to ever establish a lasting relationship...
C: Be quiet.
DJ: True love comes from a mature understanding of a partner's psychological and sexual essence, not from some farcical floral cermony.
C: Be quiet!
DJ: Look, if I went round saying I was in love just because some moistened bint lobbed a tulip at my head they 'd put me away!
C: BE QUIET!
DJ: Quick, come see the violence inherent in the opera! Help! Help! I'm being sexually harrassed!
C: Bloody Corporal...

- Anthony

"Marriage of Figaro" starring Gene Kelly

"Marriage of Figaro", remade as a Gene Kelly musical:

Figaro (Gene): With this Count mask, no one will suspect my true motives as I exact my revenge on the Count and reclaim my beautiful Susana!

Susana (Debbie Reynolds, dressed like the Countess, wearing a mask):[To Figaro] Count, darling, you've arrived!

Figaro: [unmasks] Ah haa! So you DO love the Count instead of me!

Susana: [unmasks] Figaro! You don't understand! I thought you were just Cherubino!

Figaro: Cherubino? He's over there, in the mask, pretending to be the Countess!

Countess (Syd Charise): Yes! [unmasks] And here I am, dressed as Susana the chambermaid!

Count (Donald O'Connor): [throws off his own mask] So lemme get this straight:

You were dressed like HER, HE was dressed like ME, I was dressed like HIM ... and then it was her with him with her with him with him with her with her ... [slaps both his own cheeks] oh my achin' head!

[sings]
You like Susana
And I like Susana
You like Contessa
And I like Contessa
Susana! Contessa!
Contessa! Susana!
Let's call the whole thing off!

[Company breaks into dance and song]

-Pam

"La Traviata" as an episode of "Melrose Place"

Aaron Spelling (“Melrose Place”, “Beverly Hills 90210”) blatantly steals from – er, is creatively influenced by the opera “La Traviata”.

Violetta (Courtney Thorne-Smith)
Alfredo (Andrew Shue)
Flora (Heather Locklear)
Baron Douphol (Parker Stevenson)
Germont (Stephen Collins, the minister/father in “Seventh Heaven”)

At Flora’s party:

Violetta: Thanks for the invite, Flora. I mean, life in the country has its moments, but really darling, it’s fantastically dull.

Flora (sarcastically): Oh I’m sure. You were probably just languishing, out there all alone with that hunky Alfredo all to yourself …Tell me darling – was it LOVE?

Violetta (hesitating, then lying gamely): Me? Fall in love? Love’s just a game for a couple of “working girls” like us, Flora. You know a leopardess can’t change her spots. (She turns away. Camera zooms clear up to her tear ducts to catch sight of her watering eyes.)

Flora: Did he mind about … your past?

Violetta (whispering almost to herself): No, he didn’t … but his father did. His father and I had a huge fight about it. And now I – I must think of Alfredo’s happiness, not my own.

Flora (flips hair back, spies Alfredo over Violetta’s shoulder): Don’t I know. (Goes off to flirt with Alfredo.) So. There you are. Ready to taste the delights of city life again?

Alfredo: Flora, you bitch, you’re to blame for Violetta throwing me over, and by God, I’ll see that you pay, if it’s the last thing I do!

(Flora slaps his face.)

“Faust” as an episode of the sitcom “Seinfeld”

An opening:

Jerry, doing his monologue on stage at a comedy club:
Why is it that so many people want to sell their souls to the devil? Does he offer better credit terms than God? Can you lease your soul instead of selling it outright? A thirty-day guarantee or your immortal soul back no questions asked? What gives? Perhaps God is going about it wrong? Let's look for a moment, OK? God wants eternal fealty and devotion to a life spent obeying God's commands or you go to hell. The Devil gives you youth and beauty and all the money you can spend and you end up in hell anyways. I think most people say 'hmm, with all that youth and beauty I bet I could live a godly life a lot easier than being picked last at Single's Bars.' So I think God maybe needs to look at his marketing department. Somebody's not earning their wings at that place.

Act I: - a singles bar
Faust: (George Costanza) [Sitting desolately alone, after several beautiful women have brushed him off disdainfully.] I've had it! That’s it! I'm going to end it all and move back with my parents.
Seinfelopheles, or The Devil (Jerry Seinfeld): Hold on old friend. I know what you want.
Faust: What's that?
Seinfelopheles: Youth. Beauty. Money. To be master of your Domain. King of your castle.
Faust: Don't tell me. You want my soul? How 'bout my parents' souls. God knows they don't need them.
Seinfelopheles: No my friend. YOUR soul. [He pulls out out a credit card slip.] Sign here. Or...[he shows Faust a vision of his parents]...this is your life my friend.
Faust: Gimme that. [Signs].
Seinfelopheles: OK, Here's your youth and beauty and a bank check for a million bucks. Spend it well.

Act II - a different singles bar
[Faust and Seinfeldstopheles see Marguerite (Elaine) dancing with soldiers.]
Faust: She's so beautiful. But she dances like a spastic explosion. [Goes to Marguerite.] Hello. If you go out with me, you'd need never dance for soldiers again. I can get you work at a company designing catalogs for upscale safari wear.
Valentine [Kramer]: Hey, back off buddy, that's my sister dancing.
Faust: She's mine! [Stabs Valentine.]
Valentine: These pretzels are making me thirsty. [Dies.]
Marguerite: Now what will I do for comfort?
Faust: Come with me.
[In the background you can hear Seinfeldstopheles laughing phonily.]

Act III – Faust’s apartment
Faust: I love you Marguerite. Why are you so resistant?
Marguerite: I don't know. Maybe it's that we can never have a private moment without your "friend" hanging around laughing that phoney laugh of his. Say, you're not ... are you?
Faust: No!!! … Not that there's anything wrong with it. [To Seinfeldstopheles] Go away.
Marguerite: I feel so much better. Now I can easlly talk to you. Do you know what really turns me on, Faust?
Faust: Me, I hope.
Marguerite: You're OK. But what really makes me tingle are middle-aged guys who are broke and live with their parents.I really put out for guys like that. [She dies in a state of grace.]
Faust [screaming]: Serenity forever!
[Curtain goes down to phoney laughter out of hell.]

- Anthony