There is so much more to New York City than what any one view can portray. Throughout the semester we have read plays and watched various movies that have attempted to shed light on what New York City is all about. Each director or playwright highlighted the images that they found most spectacular about the city, whether this was a positive image or one full of greed and disgust. The only problem is that there is no one correct view of New York City. Just like every other city there are wealthy people and neighborhoods, and there are dangerous areas where you should be wary. Depending on what time period, location, and people you find yourself surrounded by will give you a totally different perspective of New York City.

The very first movie we watched this semester, Wall Street, brought to light the greed and corruption that is present in the financial district of New York City. In wealthy communities as seen in this movie people often find themselves overwhelmed with the need to just keep gaining more money no matter how rich they already are. The flashy life appeals to Bud, and he lets Gordon Gekko become his mentor; this leads Bud to making all kinds of immoral decision. In the end, he does not let himself sell out to Gekko’s obscene morals; he is punished for his actions and appears to be a changed man. Yasmina Reza’s God of Carnage then continued to illustrate the lack of morals that New Yorkers have. The plot is full of ex-convicts, alcoholics, and drug addicts. Despite their out of ordinary ways of going about it, they are all full of dreams and aspire to get somewhere. Most of the works we studied this semester portrayed New York City in more than one light, and we as an audience had the ability to choose what stuck out to us.

From all the works we saw this semester, Craig Wright’s Recent Tragic Events stood out to me. It was not the most descriptive in showing New York City as a whole because it focused on one event and how specific people felt during it; despite this, it was a very effective work of literature. There was something off about Andrew’s character from the beginning of the play, and when the plot revealed his connection to Waverly’s sister, I was completely immersed in it. Wright displayed the confusion that was occurring with all the 9/11 events in a very realistic way. There was so much confusion and denial on everyone’s part that no one knew how he should behave.

Deciding which of all the works is the most truthful to what New York City is all about is extremely challenging. They all highlight certain things that are very instrumental to what New York is. With how current events are turning out, I am sad to say that a movie like Do the Right Thing is a part of an image of New York that still is evident. The tragic events that occur in it continue to be a part of our society; yet, this movie is still not exactly what New York City is, at least not today. If I would have to pick one work that illustrates New York City in the most truthful way, it would be Wall Street. Most that are in New York are in search of that dream and accomplishing the impossible. On our way to trying to achieve this, we start to question our ideals. If all our true, hard work is getting us nowhere and when people like Gekko on Wall Street cheat and make it so big, why shouldn’t we be doing the same thing? Being successful and having everything makes it really complicated in standing by your morals. This was something that Wall Street demonstrated very well. It appears that it only shows the greed and corruption, but that’s not where the point lies; there are the wealthy, and there is the middle class, and so on, and we all struggle to survive one way or another, going about things in either honest or dishonest ways. That is something that occurs everywhere. In all of these works it is important to note that New York City serves as a symbol, a symbol that stands for hope and the ability to make something of yourself.

When does a piece of art cross from passion into business? That is a question that many artists ask themselves at some point during their lives. When starting to pursue their passion they create works that have meaning, at least to themselves, and have a message that they want to convey. Those that start to be successful begin to question why they started doing what they do. They begin making more money, and soon the money starts to drive their work. This is not the case for all artists, many will refuse to create and take part in work that goes against their personal morals.

Artists can always produce successful work with social and political value. For example, the purpose of the The Muppets Take Manhattan is to entertain children, yet throughout the movie there are constant lessons to be learned. We see the troubles that Kermit faces in trying to get his play on Broadway, and we learn of the concept of the American Dream and making it big. The messages can be hidden in a creative way so that the audience will not necessarily make the connection. In this way they will not think that they are, in fact, watching something that is politically or socially based and will still allow the work to become commercially successful.

When is “selling out” selling out? When you no longer create what speaks to you, and only to you, you sell yourself out. When artists start to create things that they have seen are popular and will make them successful and wealthy they sell themselves out. All their dignity is thrown away when they stop producing art that they are passionate about. It is often hard to distinguish when this happens. Artists themselves get confused as to what the purpose is behind what they make and if it is solely their own views that are driving them. The problem is that the art that often has the most political and social value is not necessarily the most popular. Therefore, it may not prove to be the most successful, at least in financial terms. By those that value certain political ideas and movements these works will be very successful, but pop culture is very peculiar in how it chooses what is deemed as popular.

The Producers is one of the most blatant examples of selling out. Mr. Bialystock focuses his entire pursuits in trying to gain money while producing his plays. Money consumes him so much that he decides to create a flop and keep all the money that he would raise for it. He does not care about the meaning or idea that his play will give to the public. This is the case for much of the art that is commercially successful because making profits drives a huge portion of our society; we have seen this throughout the semester in class, where greed was shown to be one of the biggest motivators for many characters in the movies we watched.  What has to be considered, though, is that although the people in the movies we have seen may have had corrupt and blurry morals, the artists that created them did not; they had very specific messages to convey about society and their movies all became successful.

Thinking of an opera made me picture a bunch of old people in tuxedos and gowns watching some lady in a fancy dress with a piercing voice singing along to music. Not anymore. This production of Carmen created a captivating portrayal of a love triangle and all the turmoil that one is composed of. After watching Carmen, my perception of opera has completely changed. It is no longer something I believe is neither only for a certain age group, nor for a certain socioeconomic class. I am not affluent, and barely eighteen, and I was thoroughly captivated by the entire performance. Another thing I was concerned with was how I would be able to understand the plot while not understanding a single word they spoke, but even that dilemma was resolved with the subtitles being timed very well with the performance.

One of the most intriguing features of the performance of Carmen was that it seemed as if you were watching a movie. The way that the lighting, the scenery, and the people looked gave the feeling of watching a motion picture. This is one of the strongest reasons why the set was so incredible. The façade of the broken down building looked so realistic that I would not be surprised if it was composed of real stone. The lighting, in some spectacular way, made you feel like you were in that time period, which is why I felt like it was a movie; I have never experienced that            with lighting in a live performance.

The clothing was the next part that also changed my view of how a stereotypical opera should look. For example, Carmen was not wearing the typical gown I had in mind when thinking of an opera. Of course she is a gypsy and, therefore, her costume had to match her character. Her clothing was very impressing because of the flow they gave to all her movements. The clothing reflected her charmingly smooth personality.

The director made really great use of the stage he had and of all the actors. There were moments that there must have been fifty actors on stage and they all simultaneously had a task to accomplish. All of their parts have no actual dialogue, and I presume they also did not have very detailed stage directions. I am not sure if they were given mini dialogues to actually carry out, or it was based on improvisation off of a certain topic, but even for improvisation, so much detailed work has to go into directing them so that they can all work together cohesively. Therefore, the director’s use of the stage and the placement of the actors were carried out very effectively.

As the name of the opera hints, the main character is Carmen and she is truly the star of the show. From the moment she comes out from under the stage, until she is stabbed by Don José, not a glance is taken away from her. Her talent is impeccable from the obvious singing to the dancing to the acting. Her empowering character comes out with every movement she makes. A really significant aspect of her opera singing, as Professor Healey pointed out, was that she was able to sing as she bent over to wash her legs. Compressing your diaphragm in that way makes hard to sing, yet when listening to her vocals there was not a falter in how she sang a single note. After watching this performance and being taken on a journey to a different time and place, I gladly await my next trip to the opera!