Some things are just wrong

Last summer the son and I were traveling on the streetcar and I saw a billboard advertising Lord of the Rings – The Musical. I turned to son and asked him what he thought. He looked me in the eye and said, “Some things are just wrong.” And that was before we learned that the government of Ontario had turned theater promoter and floated a loan for $2.5 million to help stage the musical.

I utterly fail to comprehend why the McGirlieman government thought that loaning taxpayer dollars to a speculative artistic venture was prudent use of the public purse. If the musical bombs will the government legislate mandatory attendance? Now that the provincial government has gone down this path with the public purse where does the largess end? All those waiting for an MRI or hip replacement would love to know. Really this makes me speculate that a change of the provincial motto is now in order. From now on McGirlieman’s Ontario is no longer yours to discover but yours to plunder.

I have no idea how one takes a complex story like Lord of the Rings and effectively stage the play in the small confines of one stage or abridge the story down to fit in a 2-3 hour time slot suitable for a theatre but apparently the McGirlieman government thinks it can be done effectively. The idea of singing Orcs or Gollum does not particularly appeal to me – but each to his own. The advantage of living two score plus 3 is that one has a personal history to draw on. I first read Lord of the Rings in the seventies and I have seen at least 2 movie versions of the books that failed beyond miserably. If musical bombs McGirlieman can always make up the revenue by increasing the health care tax – oops my bad, the health care premium.