I'm reminded of a Metropolitan Opera production of TOSCA a while back. Tosca was being sung by Zinka Milanov. In the last act where after Tosca has found that Cavarodosi is really dead and the guards are approaching, she hurls herself off the parapet of the Castle Gandolfo into the Tiber (which she can't, because the Castle Gandolfo doesn't overlook the Tiber, but whatever--this is show biz), she bounced back into view, still holding her final note.
@JonCarter You're dredging up a memory from a tour I was with. We had several automated floor tracks and one pneumatic lift about 30" square. Sometimes the lift rose
level with the show
deck and was locked to support traffic. Sometimes the lift was down in the
trap room being pre-loaded with whatever it was to raise in the next scene. Sometimes the lift was loaded with a phone booth, the
flat top of which was painted to match the fancily painted surface of our show
deck. One time the lift was to rise comparatively slowly in a
blackout carrying a tiny petite lady who I was to spot out of black with a half body shot as she began to sing the U.S. national anthem. As the lift was pneumatically powered, and as its loads were so varied, the automation operator had to
preset the lifts air pressure to suit the load of the moment. One night, the operator had forgotten to reduce the lifts pressure, the music played, I snapped open my
douser on
cue to find my half body shot illuminating the petite songstress's navel as she was on her way back down after having been fired up from the basement just as she opened her mouth to sing "Oh say can you see". All I know is she was on her way down on the downbeat and certainly sounded startled. The automation operator never made that mistake again for the remainder of our run, she was tiny but she told him off "real good". Some things are memorable and stick in your mind. I can almost remember her name. It was a Canada / U.S. co-pro and the little lady was one of our Americans. This would've been 1990 in Broadway's Shubert.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.