While shaking off the jet lag, I haven’t posted much, in hopes of making sense when I do, but here’s an item that’s just irresistible. Last week New Orleans hosted the annual Tennessee Williams festival, as usual, which includes a competition. According to the story in Variety by Richard Ouzounian (safely locked away behind a firewall):
The specter of Katrina stayed in the background until the festival’s finale, the Stanley and Stella shouting contest, in which two dozen contestants stand under a balcony in Jackson Square and bellow "Stellllaaaa!" in imitation of Brando’s performance in "A Streetcar Named Desire." (Females are allowed to shout "Staaaaaaanley!")
However, this year’s winner, Rick Legoretta from New Orleans, scored his success instead by bellowing "FEMAAAA!," the acronym for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, broadly attacked for its handling of the post-Katrina crisis.
The deafening response from the crowd indicated New Orleans had lost neither its sense of humor nor its capacity for defiance, two qualities Williams cherished.
The playwright’s spirit was definitely in evidence this year. After all, he was the man who once wrote, "High station in life is earned by the gallantry with which appalling experiences are survived with grace."
Few cities have survived more appalling experiences than New Orleans did this past year, or done so with more grace. Thomas Lanier Williams would have been proud.
Kit Stolz 