A Performance of “Kurt Weill: De Berlin Á Broadway”

Our “new” landlords, Nathalie and Stepháne, are a delightful couple with two charming teenage girls, Lucie and Fanny.  They have actually been our landlords for three years now, and we have enjoyed meals at their home and in “our” apartment and also enjoyed jazz performances with Stepháne both in the audience with us and performing.  So, we were quite pleased when Nathalie invited us to a show Lucie and Fanny were in.  (Quite the talented family!)  The show was an adaptation of the musical, Kurt Weill:  Berlin to Broadway, a short musical synopsis of Weill’s journey from Nazi Germany to Paris to New York.

Originally, we were to take the train and have Nathalie pick us up.  But, since the train workers are en grêve and train service is a bit sketchy right now, we rented a car and drove to their home.  The girls were at the theater getting ready for the show, and Stepháne was still at work, so Nathalie prepared a “simple” repast for the three of us – a tart of tuna, fresh tomatoes, and cheese accompanied by green salad, fresh baguette, and a desert of sliced strawberries and kiwi. Delicious!   Our contribution was the rosé to go with dinner.  Then we hopped into our cars and were off. 

Theater in Villefontaine

We followed Nathalie to Villefontaine and the theater, La Salle Daniel Balavoine, and soon found ourselves at a row of seats where Stepháne’s parents and a few family friends were already seated.  La Salle Balavoine is a small, intimate theater, and the rows of seats are graduated so there are no “bad seats” in the house.  The show itself was quite impressive!  There was quite a large troop of performers (all teenagers) accompanied by a four-piece band.  The band leader would occasionally cue a song, but for the most part, the performers sang, danced, moved, and spoke without direction.  Each of the performers had a least one speaking part, and a few had multiple, lengthy speeches.  These kids were great! 

The transformation of the teenage girls, in particular, was stunning.  For the most part, their costumes for consisted simply of shorts, tops, fishnet stockings, and heels.  (Nathalie told us about buying her girls their first pairs of heels so they could wear them in the performance.)  Add in the heavy stage makeup, and suddenly they seemed to have morphed into young women.  Stepháne nodded towards Lucie after the performance and told David, “You can imagine how I feel.”

Both Lucie and Fanny were excited after the show and greeted us and the rest of their ‘personal audience’ enthusiastically.  They had both performed beautifully and had already told Nathalie they were looking forward to next year’s production (tba).  Hopefully, we’ll be in Lyon and able to be in the audience for that one, too.  It’s a pleasure to watch those two charming girls grow and thrive!

Back in Lyon - April 18, 2018

We are back in Lyon, and the weather is lovely.  Blue skies, sunshine, slight breeze – ahhh!

Our trip got off to an interesting start, though.  Because the train workers are on strike (not every day, and not every train, but ours on the day we arrived), we were unable to catch our normal TGV which takes us from the airport to Lyon in ~ 2 hours.  Our other choices were (a) going into Paris and catching a different train for Lyon (hoping that one would be operating), (b) finding a bus going to Lyon, or, (c) as Nathalie, our landlady suggested, renting a car.  David checked into all the options and found renting a car to be the way to go.  We were relieved to find how easy it was to find the car rental office and the very pleasant agent who also gave us directions, and soon we were on our way. 

The agent’s directions sounded super easy – just two well-marked highways to the A6 and off to Lyon.  BUT, we found that it’s very important to turn the correct way onto the second highway.  After a scenic detour of about 1 ½ hours that had us touring several of the charming suburbs of Paris, we were on the A6 and on our way to Lyon and the apartment at 154 rue Moncey. 

Lovely Lyon!

David dropped Anna and our luggage off at the apartment and was off to buy gas and return the car.  Little did he know his adventure was not over!  Not only is there no signage to direct people trying to return cars, but the street name changed.  After circling the block a number of times, he somehow found the right building/car park, and a kind Security Guard directed him to the return area.  A nice walk back to the apartment, and he was “home.”  At this point he had been up for about 24 hours.

Time to bring up a few boxes of things stored in the basement, have a glass of wine, and collapse.