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November, 1999, LOS ANGELES - Thanks to "Star Trek," a show with its sight set steadfastly on the future, I have come to appreciate the richness and the complexity of the past. Recently I did two Star Trek events that literally transported me into a deeper appreciation of the vast history of human civilization. One was a Star Trek cruise from Los Angeles down the coast of Mexico, sailing through the Panama Canal and across the Caribbean to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The other was a gigantic Star Trek convention in Berlin, Germany.
A cruise may not immediately seem like a journey into times gone by. It's fun, feasting and frolicking as one sails to exotic ports. And a Star Trek cruise is indeed all that. But this one, arranged by Cruise Trek of Agoura Hills, California, was also like a time machine that took me to three different centuries in our past.
One of our ports of call was a sleepy Guatemalan harbor called Puerto Quetzal. A 90-minute jet plane ride away, hidden deep in the dense jungle growth of centuries, is the ruins of the great Mayan civilization of Tikal. I wanted to visit it. But when we boarded our ship, the S.S. Veendam, in Los Angeles, we discovered that this off-ship tour was sold out! It was such a popular tour that the eager beavers had faxed in their reservation requests early and completely bought up all available seats on the jet to the jungle airport. At the welcome reception on board, actor Cecily Adams made an impassioned plea for more people to request the tour so that another plane might be chartered. I was already on the waiting list.
Happily, there were many others who wanted to view the ruins of Tikal and we got the required number to hire another plane. But this one was not a jet. To be charitable, it was a plane that amply qualified to be in a Guatemalan antique museum. But we aren't in Puerto Quetzal every other weekend and if this was our only way to get to Tikal, so be it. We wanted to experience the great Mayan ruins.
We boarded the old plane, our desire to go to Tikal greater than our confidence in the aged aircraft to get us there. As we climbed to cruising altitude, we wondered if there might be an omen in the music that wafted softly from the sound system. It was the theme from "Titanic." After a two-hour test of our nerves, we landed at the jungle airport a bit frazzled but intact and grateful.
Tikal blew away all apprehensions over that flight. It was astounding. Built some 2,500 years ago, central Tikal covers about 6 miles. We were told that there are over 3,000 structures --- temples, palaces, shrines, plazas both large and small, terraces, residences and ball courts all surrounded by a network of causeways. With our limited time, we would be able to see only the highlights.
Looming up out of the tangle of dense jungle growth, awe inspiring in its majesty, stood the ruins of four temple structures. Their bases were not pyramids but steeply slanted stepped shafts that soared up to a terrace in the sky. Imposingly ensconced on top were the ornately carved stone temples of the Mayan high priests. Climbing to the top was, literally, a breath-taking work out. Many in our group didn't even attempt it. Cecily Adams, fit athlete that she is, made it to the top. The view from that spectacular vantage was as breathtaking as the climb. Below was the great central plaza where the ritual ceremonies were held. Across the way were the other temple structures. And surrounding us all was the jungle that had claimed these awesome edifices when the Mayan nation mysteriously vanished long before the coming of the conquistadores. It boggled the mind to realize that this amazing civilization was built without the use of the wheel.
A delicious native lunch was prepared for us at a jungle compound. We could have roamed among the ruins for the rest of the day. But our guide rushed us on. We had to return to the plane, he told us, so that we could take off by three o'clock in order to land at the Puerto Quetzal landing strip while there still was daylight. The reason for the urgency being that the Puerto Quetzal airstrip had no lights for night landings.
We arrived back at the plane with time to spare. But once we were strapped into our seats, the pilot and co-pilot began inspecting the bottom of the ancient instrument panel with flashlights. Then a parade of people in sweat-stained work clothes began shambling up to the cockpit. They peered and tinkered and whispered cryptically among themselves. After a tense half-hour sitting in the tropical heat of an unventilated old plane, we were asked to return to the terminal building. I've never liked the word "terminal" associated with anything to do with flying, but now it was more unnerving than ever.
Riddled with apprehension, we filed back. Some headed straight for the bar and some good Guatemalan beer. Cecily, I discovered, is a woman with a remarkably low threshold of hysteria. She immediately placed a long distance call to her husband Jim back in Los Angeles and began a tear choked "I've always loved you and always will - forever and ever -- " farewell call. I felt more for the poor, hapless man than for Cecily.
Another suspenseful half hour later, a sweaty man came out to tell us that our plane cannot fly but that three small replacement planes were flying out from Guatemala City to take us back to Puerto Quetzal. If Cecily had an ounce of control left, that announcement blew it away. With panic flashing in her eyes, she began pounding on the glass wall of the waiting room. The terminal manager came out and rushed her into his office where she remained for the rest of our tension filled wait. The rest of us merely sat on pins and needles and waited. We had already lost more than an hour of precious daylight. The beer flowed freely as the Guatemalan sun slowly sank toward the jungle tree line.
It was twilight when the first plane arrived. Immediately, a semblance of a queue formed at the door. Through the plate glass window, we saw Cecily being hustled on board the first plane. The door was opened and people began to be let through, slowly and not too methodically, one after the other. Just three people before me, the first plane reached capacity. I didn't make it on to that plane. In a sense, I was kind of glad. When the passengers of one plane get divided up into three small planes, the risks are tripled. And I had an uneasy premonition about the one carrying Cecily.
The second plane landed just as the first was taxiing away. It was old and smaller but it didn't look as decrepit as the big one that brought us here. We boarded quickly and strapped ourselves in as rapidly as we could. But it was already dark as we began our taxi down the primitive runway. Everyone sat silently. But in the tense stillness, I sensed the one question screaming in everyone's mind. How is this plane going to land on an airstrip that has no lights?
The plane strained and heaved trying to lift itself off the runway. It coughed and gasped. I pulled up on my armrest hoping it would help. Just as the plane reached the end of the cracked concrete strip, it lifted off. It continued pulling and flexing, strenuously trying to avoid the treetops. It shuddered, recovered, then trembled wildly. Finally and thankfully, it reached its allowed flying altitude. The plane continued trembling as it droned into the darkened night sky.
Among the many activities on the cruise ship, I had been taking the yoga exercise class. The idea was to achieve inner peace by bringing one's mind and body into harmony with one's environment. If ever I needed peace and harmony with my surrounding, now was it. I closed my eyes and slowly began breathing in and out. I relaxed my mind and tried to become one with the droning, shivering world surrounding me. All of a sudden, that world turned electric white! Everything became a blinding, shocking, blazing whiteness. Was this it? Is this the way it happens? Was this the end? I was petrified. Then just as shockingly, everything turned back to as it had been. I saw the dark outlines of the passengers' heads ahead of me. The heads turned to each other in startled puzzlement. I realized then, that we had just experienced a silent lightening. Suddenly, it happened again. Another flash. An instantaneous splash of blue-white electricity that was gone as quickly as it came. We were flying through a tropical-lightening storm. A few more silent flashes and we were again flying through the ominously unchanging black sky.
After about an hour, I noticed a sprinkle of lights down in the blackness of the landscape below. Then, I noticed a river of moving lights snaking in the darkness. It looked like a road with automobiles. That must be Guatemala City, I thought. It was supposed to be the biggest city in the country and the capital. But it looked merely like a few dots and a squiggle of light. A few moments later, the landscape returned to black again.
The tension began to intensify as we sensed the plane beginning the descent into the darkness below. How is the pilot going to manage the landing without any lights to guide him? Our imaginations went wild as we girded ourselves for a rough landing. Our breaths held tight as the plane descended lower and lower. It was all blackness below. Then, far off in the distance, we saw something mystifying. We could make out what looked like a double row of lights. What was this? We were told that Puerto Quetzal had no landing lights. As we descended lower, we could surely see two distinct rows of lights beckoning us in the dark. Our pilot headed straight for it. Thank god, they had lights after all, we thought. It wasn't until we were almost about to touch down that we noticed that the lights were, in fact, a row of flickering flames. Standing next to the flaming lights, we saw the silhouettes of men carrying arms. With a hard, bone snapping bump, we touched down. We bounced and jounced down a potholed landing strip between the rows of flaming pots. When we finally came to a stop, we saw that the last part of the row of lights was made up of a line up of trucks and jeeps all parked with their headlights on. The Guatemalan authorities had risen to the challenge in a most creative way. They had improvised a primitive landing system by marshalling the Guatemalan armed forces to light fires in coconut shells lined up in a row together with the headlights of military vehicles. Necessity combined with human ingenuity had brought us back to earth, drained and weary but safe.
And dear Cecily. When we got back to the ship, we learned that the first thing she did when she got back on board was to place an international call to her anxiety-riddled husband back in Los Angeles. Their devotion to each other is genuinely touching. Such a contrast to the frazzled woman seated in front of me on the bus back to the ship. "When I get back to our cabin onboard," she groused, "my husband better not be asleep."
It was a nightmare trip back. But Tikal was worth it. In fact, the flight back seemed to underscore what we had seen at Tikal. The same original thinking and resourcefulness that produced the flaming night landing lights, had raised those amazing architectural splendors of Tikal without the use of the wheel. The power of human creativity and inventiveness is the one constant that defines civilizations through the ages. We would soon be experiencing another example of that from another age and another people --Americans with the Panama Canal.
The French tried for twenty years and failed to build a canal across the Isthmus of Panama connecting the Caribbean with the Pacific. Despite their success with the Suez Canal in Egypt, they could not overcome two great adversaries in Panama -- a devastating tropical disease and an awesome mountain range. The disease decimated whole armies of their workers and the earth from the towering mountainside kept caving down into their excavation.
With characteristic bravado, United States President Teddy Roosevelt took over when the French finally gave up. The first task for the Americans was to overcome the killer disease, which they found to be malaria. When they discovered that the carrier was mosquitoes, a massive eradication program was launched. All bodies of water were either drained or disinfected. Then a new, sanitary village was built to house the workers.
The great challenge then became to conquer the formidable barrier mountain range of the Continental Divide. The solution the engineers came up with was ingenious. Rather than digging a cut into the daunting obstacle, their idea instead was to create a lake rising above the mountain range, then lifting the ships up and over the mountain. The solution was as brilliant as the engineering job would be formidable. First, a lake in the sky had to be constructed. Then, a series of locks had to be built to raise the ships up to the man-made lake. Then another set of locks on the opposite side would lower the ships back down to sea level. It was a mind-boggling project. But the Americans did it. The Panama Canal took ten grueling years to build but in August of 1914, the first ship made the virgin crossing. Since then, over 800,000 ships have gone through the waterway. Our passage in October of 1999 was to be one of the last transits under American administration. At midnight, December 31, 1999, the canal is to be handed over to the Panamanian government. President Jimmy Carter, who signed the treaty in 1977, will represent the U.S. at the ceremony. There was a sense of history for all of us on board the S.S. Veendam as we sailed toward our crossing.
We got up bright and early in the morning and crowded onto the decks and other good vantage points. I found a comfortable seat by a panoramic picture window in the Crow's Nest, the topmost cocktail lounge in the ship. In the pale light of dawn, I could see the metropolitan skyline of Panama City in the distant northeastern horizon. We were munching on a breakfast of Panama rolls and coffee by the time we sailed under the massive steel girders of the Bridge of the Americas guarding the entrance to the canal.
Promptly at 7:30 a.m., we entered the first of a series of locks, this one called Miraflore Locks. The water came churning in with massive force as the ship slowly rose up. I marveled at the colossal power of water. Forty-five minutes later, we were sailing out and onto the first of the stepped lakes, Miraflore Lake. Soon we entered the next series of locks, the Pedro Miguel Locks. These locks raised our vessel up to the top level of the system and a great waterway called the Gaillard Cut. This was the part that was the greatest challenge to the builders of the canal - the cut through the rugged mountain range of the Continental Divide. About 8 miles long, it was carved through rock and shale. It was here that the principal excavation was required and here that those devastating slides occurred during construction.
I stepped outside to the deck and gazed out at the semi jungle landscape on each side of the great waterway. The dense tropical air instantly wrapped around me in a sultry embrace. It was awe inspiring to imagine men just a century ago, struggling against this brutal heat, disease and the savagery of the jungle to carve out this massive system of waterways. I marveled at the sheer ingenuity of the engineers. The Panama Canal is a triumph of human will, creativity and determination. It is as incredible an achievement as that of the Mayans centuries ago.
It was lunchtime when we sailed out onto the huge man-made body of water, Gatun Lake, and I was hungry. We had a few hours to go before we would be entering the downhill set of locks. I decided to go down for lunch. The view of the lake from the air-conditioned comfort of the ship's dining room was superb. As I dined on an exquisite lunch of poached sole with baby asparagus, I couldn't help but appreciate the almost surreal world that we inhabited. Certainly, it would have been science fiction to those who had struggled so valiantly to make this fantastical existence so comfortably real for us. Ah, the wondrous rewards of man's ingenuity.
Promptly at 2 p.m., we entered the Gatun Locks, the system lowering our ship down to sea level on the Caribbean side. By sunset, we were again out on the high seas. Our historic 9-hour transit across the Panama Canal was over. On our way back to Ft. Lauderdale, we enjoyed an all-too-brief stop at the charmingly preserved colonial city, Cartagena in Colombia. Like a dream, our two-week floating Star Trek convention was over. But the rich lessons from the past, experienced on this ocean trek, will remain with me for a long time.
Two days after returning from the cruise, I flew off to another Star Trek event -- this one, a land based convention. It, too, was a rich experience in a city dense with history -- the former, and once again, capital of Germany -- Berlin.
The convention, "Galileo 7-III," was gigantic. Over 2,500 fans gathered from throughout Europe and even a few from the U.S. Berlin was the place to be for Star Trek fans that weekend. The huge attendance, however, seemed to overwhelm the management of the convention. There were program delays, interminable lines and confusion. Yet, bless their hearts, the fans' enthusiasm remained unabated. The applause at each program event was thunderous. They reveled in the joy of sharing a weekend with kindred souls. And the convention raised 30 thousand German marks for charity as well.
But what truly impressed me was the city of Berlin itself. Here was a city, mindful of its history, vigorously building a future of unity. At a point in time when Europe is struggling to join eleven nations in an economic union, and when Germany is heroically working to bring together its two parts brutally separated for decades by a political wall, Berlin was building a world city. To accomplish this, the city had gathered some of the best architects from throughout the world. There were dazzling buildings designed by architects from the United States, Italy, Japan, Holland and, of course, Germany. Berlin was the shining symbol of a people confidant of their destiny and building for the next millenium. I sensed it in the spirit of the people. I felt it in the dynamism of the city. I saw it in the architecture of the new buildings.
The most intriguing building was the Jewish Museum by American architect David Leibeskind. The museum was to open in 2000 but I was privileged to tour the completed but empty building. The shape of the zinc-clad, zigzag structure could be seen as a bolt of lightning, a deconstructed Star of David or a sharp, metallic prison. The windows cut into this structure look like slashes, shards or fragments of shattered glass -- jagged reminders from history. The building is entered from an underground tunnel. The sense one gets on entering the slate paved entrance corridor is one of chilly disorientation. The walls are canted. The floor slightly ramped. Other corridors intersect at sharp angles. Nothing is parallel and regular. There are unexpected spatial voids suggesting the absence of a part of the community that once made up the people of Berlin. The design is at once sobering and stunning. But I couldn't help wondering how the building would work as an exhibition space for a museum. How do you hang things on these canted walls? How do you arrange artifact display cases in these oddly formed galleries? How do you keep the architecture from upstaging the exhibits themselves? My questions on the practicality, however, were overwhelmed by my awe of the virtuosity of the architect. The building alone makes the most unforgettable statement on the history of the Jewish people in Berlin. The new Jewish Museum is an eloquent architectural sculpture.
The most exhilarating new symbol in Berlin, for me, is the restored German parliament building, the Reichstag. The architect is Sir Norman Foster. His British citizenship is as symbolic, it seems to me, as his architectural brilliance is world renown. He took the bold, stony Baroque edifice of the Reichstag with all its turbulent history and sensitively restored the shell. In it, he designed a starkly contemporary legislative chamber and offices. The reminder of the past containing the vigor of a modern nation. His most inspired piece of the design however, is the glass dome that he placed right over the legislative chamber. The transparency of government could not have been more clearly communicated. Even more significantly, he designed a bank of elevators that whisk the public - with no admission charge - up to the roof of the building. The view of Berlin from this rooftop terrace is spectacular. From this terrace, Foster designed a spiral ramp in the dome allowing the people to traverse up to the top of the glass structure. From there, the people, not only of Germany but of the world, can look down directly on the lawmakers at work in the legislative chamber below. It is a potent statement about a people's democracy. As I was walking away from this inspiring building, I looked back again to get another perspective on it. Even from a distance, the Reichstag was alive with movement. There was the constant motion of people going up and down on the ramp in the glass dome over the heads of the politicians. What a powerful symbol for the future of democracy.
The gift of Star Trek's incredible popularity has provided me with these undreamed of opportunities to know this world. These experiences have given me a keen appreciation of the inseparable link between our past and our future. The barbarism of man's inhumanity to man reminds us of our terrible fallibility. The extraordinary achievements of our antecedents, their determination against sometimes awesome adversity, their great organizational competence and their creative genius inspires us to face the many challenges that we confront today. The solid launching pad of our future is the confidence we gain from the glorious attainments from history.
September, 2001, LOS ANGELES - People say that Los Angeles has no seasons - that there are no markings of the passage of time as the pages of the calendar turn. Although it's true that we don't have snow in winter and much changing of foliage in autumn, we have a delightful reminder of the arrival of summer. That's when the Hollywood Bowl season begins.
What could be a more enchanting announcement of the start of summertime than an evening outdoor concert at the Bowl. As the day's heat begins to cool down, we settle down in our seats, open up the picnic basket and uncork the wine bottles. As the sky darkens and stars begin sparkling against its dark velvet backdrop, the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra strikes up the overture and the hills of Hollywood resound with glorious music. That's when we know that summer has definitely arrived in Los Angeles.
Two weeks ago, a banker friend and fellow trustee of the Japanese American National Museum, Tom Decker and his charming wife Denise invited me as their guest to their box for an evening of Leonard Bernstein and Johannes Brahms at the Bowl. The soloist was a gifted young violinist, Joshua Bell.
The conductor was the vivacious stylist, Keri-Lynn Wilson. The program began with Bernstein's "Candide" and moved on to his popular, "West Side Story." Joshua Bell's violin rendition of "Maria" was as mellow and rich as the California pinot noir that I was sipping. The second half of the evening was Brahms who took us on a musical journey a century back to classical old Germany. His "Symphony No. 2 in D Major" began as softly, as lyrically as fine chardonnay and ended as bubbly as the effervescence of champagne. It was an intoxicating evening under the stars, musically as well as by the fine produce of California's legendary Napa Valley. I was not driving that evening.
The boxes at the Hollywood Bowl are enormously difficult to get. They have literally become family heirlooms passed in wills from one generation to the next. Fortunately, I have a friend whose family has a box that they do not use for every concert. So, at the beginning of a season, I look over the schedule and buy through him, certain nights in his family box. I donate some of my nights to a few of my favorite charities as fund-raising auction items. In a couple of weeks I have my guests from the East West Players fund raiser for an evening of music from Broadway and Hollywood with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra conducted by John Mauceri. This night always ends spectacularly with fireworks lighting up the summer night sky.
I remember when my parents first took me as a kid to the Hollywood Bowl. It was a pageant of California history. As darkness descended, we heard a trumpet call from a distant hill and Spanish conquistadors on horseback appeared over the hill with their troops carrying multi-colored flags. Then, spotlights suddenly shone on the opposite hill picking out a tribe of Indians. They came down the hills and met on stage to sign a peace pact. This was followed by the arrival of Father Serra and the Jesuit missionaries and a California mission magically rose up before us. Spectacular battle scenes between the Mexicans and Americanos, as well as a panorama of a devastating earthquake, were staged right before our enthralled eyes. The spectacle was brought to the point of the introduction of movies to the then rustic farm town called Hollywood. It was a thrilling and unforgettable introduction to the magic of a summer evening at the Hollywood Bowl.
As a teenager, I used to go on dates in the upper tiers of the Bowl. We took our sandwiches, fruits and soda pops huffing and puffing up the hillside to our lofty perches and looked down on the miniature orchestra playing in the tiny bowl in the distance below. It was a cheap date but the music was the same fabulous sound as that heard down in the pricey and remote boxes in the distance. As a matter of fact, I know that some of my friends sneaked in from the street above the Bowl, hid up in the trees and enjoyed the concerts for free.
Now I enjoy the concerts from the comfort and opulence of the very boxes I used to peer down on so wistfully. When Walt Disney's animated feature film, "Mulan," in which I was the voice of the Great Ancestor, had its gala premiere, it was there at the Hollywood Bowl. The opening was an extravagant affair. A gourmet picnic buffet was followed by a spectacular stage review of popular Disney animated films with a cast of a hundred dancers and singers. Then a gigantic screen appeared on stage and the premiere screening of "Mulan" began. Very appropriately for the Great Ancestor, I was ensconced in a great box smack dab in the center of the prime section down by the stage. The premiere finished with a dazzling fireworks display that had us arching our heads back to see the explosive spectacle. At the Hollywood Bowl, as we succeed in life, we don't go up, we go downward. We go down to our boxes right near the orchestra for gourmet food, fine wine and glorious music under the summer night sky. The Hollywood Bowl not only marks the passage of our seasons, it's our southern Californian summer rites of passage.
November, 2001, LOS ANGELES - As if some atavistic urge compels me, I always seem to have a need to go to London near the end of the year. I love the crisp, bracing air; the holiday hubbub; the sound of English spoken as in Merchant-Ivory movies. This year, the urge was even more compelling. The trip to London became symbolic. It was an assertion of defiance against the terrorists. I wasn't going to be intimidated. Vigilant - yes. Careful - surely. Anxious - perhaps. I wasn't going to let the terrorists change my plans. Besides, the British people and government have been our strongest allies in the effort against terrorism. Prime Minister Tony Blair has been a true stalwart.
We got to the airport three hours before departure. As I had anticipated, the security was tedious and time-consuming. But, I was glad. The hassle was reassuring. We felt exceptionally well examined and very secure. The trip was gratefully uneventful.
The reward for my determination was a trip filled with lucky, out of the blue experiences - like a joy ride up to a spectacular view of London on our first afternoon. Last year, when we tried to take a ride on the Millennium Eye, the giant Ferris wheel on the south bank of the River Thames, it was closed because of wind conditions. And all tickets for future opportunities during our stay were sold out. This year, we just walked up to the ticket booth, bought our tickets, and got in the glass capsule that leisurely lifted us up to the highest vantage point in all London. The air was crystalline and the vista was sharp and clear. The sky churned with dramatic clouds, just like a Gainsborough painting. And all of London lay before us from the office towers of Canary Wharf off in the distance, to stately Tower Bridge rising up across the Thames, to the classic dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, all the way down to familiar old Big Ben just below us. It was a sensational experience.
I had old English five pound and ten pound notes that had gone out of circulation from some previous trip. Banks all over London wouldn't exchange them. I had to go to the Bank of England itself in the financial district of the city known simply as the City. We got there before it opened so we decided to roam about the area admiring the imposing, gray architecture of the City. Serendipitously, we chanced upon a new men's shirt shop that had just opened its doors for the first time. It was an exclusive shop that catered to the financial people of the district. As a celebration special, they were throwing in a selection of handsome ties for the price of a shirt. What a bargain! I stepped in and they promptly made a sale. Now I own a shirt and tie just like the ones worn by those British bankers.
The Bank of England should be open by now. We crossed the street and walked past the now open bronze doors of the building where British banking began three centuries ago. A stern looking security guard stood blocking entry at a second set of doors. As I approached, his eyes narrowed. They seemed to penetrate right through me. Why is he scrutinizing me like that, I wondered. I'm not going to rob his bank. He stared intently at me until I stepped up to him. Then he demanded, "You're on Star Trek, aren't you?" I was completely thrown off balance. That phrase has been like "open sesame" for me. "I love your show," he stated. Star Trek has magically opened doors for me into some of the most inaccessible places in the world. The stern guard, still unsmiling, said, "Follow me, sir." He courteously escorted into an imposing marble domed banking hall. My outdated bills were graciously exchanged for me. Then my stern friend asked, "Would you like to visit our Museum of Banking, sir?" Would I? Door after unanticipated doors opened for me into a museum of the history, not only of the Bank of England, but of banking itself in England. That was a fascinating and educational afternoon - and totally unexpected.
London, for me, is theater land. My main mission, when I'm in London, is to immerse myself in some of the best theater in the English language. I spent every night in a theater. And every night was rich and engaging. There was a perfect production of Noel Coward's "Private Lives," starring Alan Rickman, who, you might recall, played the character based on Mr. Spock in "Galaxy Quest." At the National Theater complex, I saw a big and brilliant production of John Osborne's "Luther" in the Olivier Theater and in the Lyttleton, a sensational new play, "Mother Clapp's Molley House" about commerce and prostitution in the 18th century and today. There were revivals galore - a wonderful production of "Joe Egg," a hilarious production of "The Royal Family" starring Judi Dench, and a powerful production of Lillian Hellman's "Little Foxes" with a commanding performance by an actor named Penelope Wilton. British actors seem to have a gift for playing characters of the American south. But, the serendipity for me, was in the sold out hit, Lerner and Lowe's "My Fair Lady" with Jonathan Pryce playing Professor Henry Higgins. I didn't recognize the names of the actors playing Eliza, a Martine McCutcheon, and Doolittle, played by a Dennis Waterman. The reviews that were on display outside the Drury Lane Theater gave their performances glowing raves. You can imagine my disappointment when we arrived at the theater to learn that understudies were going on that performance for Eliza and Doolittle. Thank goodness, Jonathan Pryce was there to play Henry Higgins. We settled down in our seats not without some grumbling.
The overture started up and the Cockney denizens of Covent Garden sauntered out to set the stage to perform a delightfully choreographed dance prelude. It seemed to be getting off to a good start. Eliza entered. Her first sounds of Cockney seemed "spot on" as the British say. Through her smudge-smeared make-up, one could see that she had a beautiful face. Her first exchange with Higgins went perfectly. Her first song number, "Wouldn't It Be Loverly?" revealed a gorgeous voice. She was wonderful!
When the character of her father, Doolittle, entered, we knew immediately that he was a fun-loving, conniving witted, energetic, Cockney low-life. He had the cockiness of a bantam rooster on coke. Then he exploded on stage with his first production number, "With a Little Bit of Luck." He brought the house down! Both understudies were extraordinary! I couldn't imagine the regular actors topping their performances. My bravo, bravo, bravos go to Kerry Ellis as a brilliant Eliza and to David Shaw-Parker as the best Doolittle I have ever seen. "My Fair Lady" was an unforgettable experience. And yes, as we expected, Jonathan Pryce was good as well. But the understudies, Ellis and Shaw-Parker, were our serendipitous, unexpected good fortune.
London is a place of magic that passes too quickly. All too soon, we were in a London taxi headed back to Heathrow Airport for the trip home. The driver seemed eager to chat. He talked about current events. He firmly believed that the Taliban would fall soon enough. He lamented the absence of tourists in London. He told us that the English like to take their holidays in Spain. He nattered on and on. When he said "holiday in Spain," I suddenly realized. His accent was perfect Cockney! As a matter of fact, we had Doolittle himself driving us to the airport! As we neared our terminal, he said, "with a little bit o' luck, your flight will take off on time." I almost expected him to break out in song. He was the perfect driver to see us off back to Los Angeles, California. Ah, I shall look forward to the next serendipitous return to London.