Calling all rapscallions and scapegraces! This week on “Picture Perfect,” get ready to revel in some freewheeling lack of judgment, with an hour of films based on picaresque novels.
For those of you who weren’t English majors, the picaresque novel is a literary genre often characterized by the presence of rogues or anti-heroes as protagonists, episodic, wayward structures, and, not infrequently, low humor.
We’ll hear music from “The Reivers,” after William Faulkner’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, a coming-of-age story about a boy swept into automobile theft and illicit horseracing in the American South. Mark Rydell directed the 1969 film, which stars Steve McQueen as the rakish Boon Hogganbeck and features narration by Burgess Meredith. John Williams wrote the breezy Americana score.
Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” is frequently categorized as an American picaresque. It’s certainly one of the funniest of “serious” books. A middling film adaptation was made in 1960, directed by Michael Curtiz, with Tony Randall given top billing, shifting the focus of the story to the con artistry of the King and the Duke. It features an evocative score by Jerome Moross.
If Hervey Allen’s “Anthony Adverse” had any humor to begin with, it was definitely lost in translation. (Too bad the novel was written in English.) However, the 1936 screen adaptation certainly does sprawl. One could say it’s picaresque in the worst way. It just doesn’t go anywhere. It does, however, feature a top-notch cast (Frederic March, Olivia De Havilland, Claude Rains, etc.) and an Academy Award-winning score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold.
While the modern picaresque novel has its roots in the Renaissance, the genre really seemed to hit its stride in the 18th century, with comic novelists such as Henry Fielding. Fielding’s “Tom Jones,” perhaps the quintessential picaresque, was made into a film in 1963. It went on to win Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director (Tony Richardson), Best Adapted Screenplay (John Osborne), and Best Original Score (John Addison). Addison’s music suits Richardson’s quirky virtuosity like an off-kilter powdered wig.
We’re up to no good, with an hour of picaresque adventures, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX Classical Oregon!
———
Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:
PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT
SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT
THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT
Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!
https://kwax.uoregon.edu
Picaresque Adventures on “Picture Perfect”
by
7 responses
Comments
7 responses to “Picaresque Adventures on “Picture Perfect””
-
Albert Finney has the time of his life in this role! Looking forward to hearing the music again!
-
Claire Pula A wonderful, endearingly quirky adaptation that used to be shown on television all the time (at least out of New York in the days before cable). Now once in a while the film turns up on TCM, but otherwise I’ll bet it is basically unknown to the young (i.e. anyone younger than me). I started “Picture Perfect” in 2010. It’s amazing how much the whole perspective has shifted since then, when people my age would remember seeing a lot of these films, if not at the movies, then on TV. I think my interests always skewed older to begin with. The direction of, and score in, “Tom Jones” are so ingenious. And Finney is absolutely charming, if Hugh Griffith is so entirely inappropriate in these more sensitive times. The fox hunt brings an unexpected interlude of revulsion in this otherwise delightful film. However, details like the stirrups digging into the horses’ flanks underscore the obliviousness and decadence of the aristocracy. It’s a great movie. I’ve got it on home video. I should make it a point to rewatch it in the near future.
-
All true! You’ve inspired me to re-watch it as well! Btw, my first date with my future husband was a locally produced play of the novel, clearly inspired by the film. I’ve never looked at grapes the same way since lol
-
-
-
Just watched Tom Jones a month ago. More than the sum of its parts, a considered film that didn’t shy away from its history. Great to have you select the score.
I appreciate your studied selections rather than the “trivially pursued” pop summaries that are always around.-
Eliza Wall Thank you. I really do my best to curate and put together representative selections from each score, which is why I generally don’t cover more than four in a program. I approach the music as if I’m creating little concert suites, as composers do in the classical realm. I pick the most interesting material and try to arrange it for contrast. And I try to offer just a little context. So many film music shows seem as if the hosts play the main title music or a three or four-minute selection and just wing it with their commentary. I’m not the most relaxed script-reader, and I’m not always fond of my own voice (I can hear the tension in my voice when I record, in contrast to when I am just extemporizing during a live air shift), but I do try to do the best that I can under the circumstances, with the time that I’ve got, and ample editing. For any recorded show, it’s always a lot more work than it seems!
-
-
I have to thank you for featuring the Wlliams work. Many years ago I heard the recording of “The Reivers” with Burgess Meredith. His narration was one of the finest examples of the art I have ever heard. You felt every bump in the road, laughed at naughty situations, and prayed no one would get caught. I’ve looked all over for the recording, but can only find ones without Meredith. Is this available on the market?
-
Brian M Davis This is the Reivers recording with Burgess Meredith. I agree, it’s a real gem, and I’ve played it on the radio many times. Highly recommended.
-
Tag Cloud
Aaron Copland (93) Beethoven (95) Composer (114) Film Music (141) Film Score (143) Film Scores (255) Halloween (94) John Williams (195) KWAX (229) Leonard Bernstein (103) Marlboro Music Festival (125) Movie Music (156) Mozart (89) Opera (212) Philadelphia Orchestra (89) Picture Perfect (174) Princeton Symphony Orchestra (108) Radio (88) Ross Amico (244) Roy's Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner (290) The Classical Network (101) The Lost Chord (269) Vaughan Williams (103) WPRB (397) WWFM (881)
Leave a Reply