MTSU Opera
When I moved to Murfreesboro, I was very excited to be so close to a college campus because I had every intention of checking out as much student theater as possible! Wellll...much like my intentions of going to State Parks, this one kinda fell through the cracks, too...until recently!
I met up with a friend at The Boulevard, a little bar and grill type restaurant right at the corner of the campus. I had the pickle chips and a salad. The salad was excellent...the pickle chips, sadly, were too spicy. YES!! You read that right- too SPICY! I have a very low tolerance for anything remotely coming close to "peppery" and I had to drown my chips in a LOT of dressing to get them eaten. Also, true confessions...I like the fried spears much better than the chips. It is a constant battle between my sister and myself, but there you have it. I fell in love with fried pickles at a county fair and the spears just embody that spirit much better!
So, after dinner, we were off to the opera. The students did two performances. The first was called The Old Maid and the Thief. As an old maid, I found it highly offensive. We aren't all horned up old spinsters willing to do anything for love! Just...some of us...anyway. The students did a wonderful job and the show was darkly humorous and cute in its quaintness. The second performance was a Gilbert and Sullivan musical called Trial by Jury. BTW- am I the only one who had no idea they wrote something besides the Pirates of Penzance?? The story was ludicrous- definitely a product of its time. Basically, a woman is suing her ex-fiancé for breach of contract and the resolution is that she marries the judge. Yes, as a night of storytelling, it was not a good one for female protagonists, but as cheap entertainment by some very talented young people, it was A+!
We ended the night having dessert with the director- who was a friend of my friend- at Applebee's. And really- musical theater followed by a warm blondie makes for a pretty nice night out! I would recommend it to anyone!