{"id":3479,"date":"2017-02-28T06:03:53","date_gmt":"2017-02-28T14:03:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/?p=3479"},"modified":"2017-02-28T18:32:16","modified_gmt":"2017-03-01T02:32:16","slug":"guest-columnist-a-real-life-maria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/2017\/02\/guest-columnist-a-real-life-maria.html","title":{"rendered":"Guest Columnist: A Real-Life Maria"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>[contextly_auto_sidebar]<\/p>\n

This week I offer our latest\u00a0column from guest Lawrence Christon, a former Los Angeles Times staff writer on theater and comedy, and a longtime culture freelancer in Southern California. This one needs no further ado.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>A GIRL NAMED MARIA<\/span><\/p>\n

By Lawrence Christon<\/p>\n

I\u2019m standing in the deserted home furnishings section of a department<\/span><\/p>\n

store late at night, shopping for a mattress. It is the dark season,<\/span><\/p>\n

in more ways than one. The Cheetos-colored Borscht Belt clown with the<\/span><\/p>\n

funny hair and floppy suit has bullied his way through the long<\/span><\/p>\n

primary and election run right into The White House, and now, as the<\/span><\/p>\n

march of the Trumpkins gains volume, the joke is on us.<\/span><\/p>\n

A young woman in a black business suit approaches.<\/span><\/p>\n

I know what you may be thinking \u2014 a man and a woman alone in a room full<\/span><\/p>\n

of mattresses \u2014 particularly given the conditions for despair that form<\/span><\/p>\n

the classic background for abandon. But an indiscretion would be<\/span><\/p>\n

wholly fantastical; the real condition, however, is not: political<\/span><\/p>\n

free fall. A Democratic party that has abandoned its Rooseveltian<\/span><\/p>\n

principles. A skewed economy in which the rich get richer and the rest<\/span><\/p>\n

of us scrap for what\u2019s left on the landfill of diminishing returns. A<\/span><\/p>\n

culture so rife with capitalist values and attendant<\/span><\/p>\n

corporate-academic jargon that, as mentioned in a recent issue of the<\/span><\/p>\n

Atlantic, the \u201860s utopian sentiment of free love has now become, for<\/span><\/p>\n

eligible women, the search for \u201can empowered version of uninhibited<\/span><\/p>\n

sexuality\u201d in a dating scene where \u201csexual interactions\u2026are explicitly<\/span><\/p>\n

commercial.\u201d And the question arises, \u201cshould marriage be downgraded<\/span><\/p>\n

to a joint custodial arrangement for raising kids?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Hannah Arendt wondered aloud if the totalitarian horrors of Stalinism<\/span><\/p>\n

and Nazism, in an echo of Pound\u2019s line, \u201chelpless against the<\/span><\/p>\n

systems,\u201d would fundamentally alter human nature in the 20th century.<\/span><\/p>\n

That alteration was rooted in fear. Now we have one rooted in the<\/span><\/p>\n

actual invasion of consciousness, by digitized media, by the popular<\/span><\/p>\n

fusion of politics and entertainment, by every manipulative sound and<\/span><\/p>\n

image that erupts in ubiquitous screens, big and small, to crowd our<\/span><\/p>\n

private and communal spaces. The sports screen commandeers our<\/span><\/p>\n

restaurant conversation. The laugh track attends our pumping gas<\/span><\/p>\n

outdoors. Continual celebrity updates. News you can use, dumped in<\/span><\/p>\n

every social media silo we scroll through hourly. Even the chubby<\/span><\/p>\n

fingers of little kids are swift at working screens. It\u2019s inescapable.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m standing in the deserted home furnishings section of a department<\/span><\/p>\n

store late at night, shopping for a mattress. It is the dark season,<\/span><\/p>\n

in more ways than one. A young woman in a black business suit<\/span><\/p>\n

approaches. She\u2019s the salesgirl, or woman, or person, however it\u2019s<\/span><\/p>\n

phrased in our linguistically fraught time. Her skin is pale, but her<\/span><\/p>\n

accent suggests Latin America. She\u2019s helpful, patient, knowledgeable about<\/span><\/p>\n

deals that look good but go bad too soon. She\u2019s professionally<\/span><\/p>\n

pleasant.<\/span><\/p>\n

We settle on a high end but not exorbitant purchase. At the<\/span><\/p>\n

register we discuss delivery options, bonus points, warranty, return<\/span><\/p>\n

policy, etc. I press a wrong button, and the lengthy process of<\/span><\/p>\n

printing out a comically yard-long receipt has to be repeated. She<\/span><\/p>\n

remains patient, laughing gently over how long this wrap-up is taking.<\/span><\/p>\n

I observe her at greater length: tall and slender, attractive but not<\/span><\/p>\n

pretty, with an intelligent, somewhat narrow face. Finally the<\/span><\/p>\n

transaction is done. I look at the printout and see her name: Maria.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a nice name,\u201d I say. \u201cMade forever famous in \u2018West Side Story.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Her face looks blank.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve never seen \u2018West Side Story\u2019?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNo.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSurely you\u2019ve heard the song \u2018Maria.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNo.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I try to sing the first few lines, but the tattered result is hopeless.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cGot a cell phone? Dial up YouTube.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She produces a worn pink-framed mobile device, taps in the trail to<\/span><\/p>\n

the original 1957 Broadway cast recording. The ardent tenor of Larry<\/span><\/p>\n

Kert issues thinly from the little phone, but it\u2019s enough:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026\u201dThe most beautiful sounds in the world in a single word\u2026Say it loud<\/span><\/p>\n

and there\u2019s music playing\/ Say it soft and it\u2019s almost like<\/span><\/p>\n

praying\u2026I\u2019ll never stop loving Maria\u2026 \u201c<\/span><\/p>\n

Department store Maria is hooked. She stares at the little screen,<\/span><\/p>\n

transfixed, unmoving, her lips parted in wonder.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026Suddenly that name\/ will never be the same\/ to me\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

As I observe her, the rush of remembering that production comes back<\/span><\/p>\n

to me. A New York City councilman named Vito Marcantonio had opened<\/span><\/p>\n

the floodgates of Puerto Rican immigration to the Big Apple in the<\/span><\/p>\n

late 1940s. Almost overnight a black-and-white city \u2014 a European<\/span><\/p>\n

city \u2014 began brightening with Latino colors, music, cuisine and<\/span><\/p>\n

exuberant street life. Within a decade, \u201cWest Side Story\u201d exploded on<\/span><\/p>\n

the scene. No one had seen anything like it. It changed New York. It<\/span><\/p>\n

changed the American theater. The film version won Best Picture. The<\/span><\/p>\n

only show I could afford that year, I couldn\u2019t get it out of my bones.<\/span><\/p>\n

I danced crazily down the street like young unschooled Billy Elliott<\/span><\/p>\n

leaping and spinning his way to the sea in North Durham.<\/span><\/p>\n

Maria explains to me that her parents moved her back to rural Mexico<\/span><\/p>\n

when she was four. She\u2019s only been in the U.S. for a few years, hence<\/span><\/p>\n

her ignorance of American culture and lore.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI bet you\u2019ll be playing that song after I leave,\u201d I say.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI will,\u201d she says, in a confessional tone. \u201cThank you.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I thought of her on the way home, and many times since. A young woman<\/span><\/p>\n

who\u2019s discovered magic in an ordinary name, her name, which will never<\/span><\/p>\n

be ordinary again but instead will echo with the fervor of young love<\/span><\/p>\n

and the most beautiful sounds in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Innocence is still possible. Joy is still possible. You just never<\/span><\/p>\n

know when you\u2019ll come across the seemingly unremarkable moment you\u2019ll<\/span><\/p>\n

wind up cherishing for as long as you live.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[contextly_auto_sidebar] This week I offer our latest\u00a0column from guest Lawrence Christon, a former Los Angeles Times staff writer on theater and comedy, and a longtime culture freelancer in Southern California. This one needs no further ado. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 A GIRL NAMED MARIA By Lawrence Christon I\u2019m standing in the deserted home furnishings section of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[30,1],"tags":[719],"class_list":{"0":"post-3479","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-los-angeles","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-theater","9":"entry","10":"has-post-thumbnail"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3479"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3485,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3479\/revisions\/3485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}