The carnival is on, all Vienna is taken with Strauss's music but, as the many audiences often throw you flowers and forget you are human," hardly anyone seems to understand a celebrity. The 'idol' of the crowds also has the right to his private life. This episode, unlike many of the previous ones, makes this notion clearly remarkable. Schani, after the disappointing experience with Olga, listens to the call of his heart and is taken with a sophisticated influential woman, Hetti (Margaret Whiting) much to the dismay of his mother (Anne Stallybrass). It is she who shaped his future and who finds it really hard to accept things as they are. The haunt of the past co-exists with the reality of the present.
Dramatised by David Butler, the episode primarily concentrates on Hetti (Margaret Whiting), Schani's first wife. When they get to know each other, he utters a memorable line: I never knew what it meant to be alive before I met you." Although I personally prefer Cherie Lunghi in STRAUSS DYNASTY (1991), Ms Whiting highlights her aristocratic high airs and her older age (10 years older than Schani). "A woman like that..." referred to by Schani's mother, she encourages Schani to play more and more with his brothers, Josef (Nicholas Simmonds), weak and rather indecisive whom we got to know in the previous episode and Edward (Tony Anhalt), more ambitious, more lasting. Three brothers together! Schani's mother strongly opposes but when she realizes that she cannot insist on her ways to her grown up son, she retires and moves to oblivion. It is no concern of hers anymore...
Schani's fascination towards Hetti is nicely compared to his father's fascination towards Emily Trampusch (Barbarra Ferris). She has her scene in the episode as an old woman living the haunt of the past, cherishing a few years worth living for, forgotten and abandoned within the dust of long ago. Quite a drama to depict Schani offering help, financial help to the woman who ruined the marriage of his parents... The reason for understanding his father is his love to Hetti.
One of the most touching scenes of the episode and of the entire series is Anna Strauss' death scene. Holding the waltz composed by Schani at the age of three, she passes away in disappointment, sorrow, loneliness while all Strauss family are having fun at the ball. What is more tragic a fact, which Marvin J Chomsky in his later version does not dare depict so cruelly, is that Schani refuses to take part in his mother's funeral. In the 1991 version, Hetti gets the telegram to Paris after the premiere of Blue Danube waltz and hides the sad information from Schani because they are going for the tour nee in America. Later, as Schani finds out his mother is dead, he mourns her and yells on Hetti in despair. Here, he says "Nothing will have changed" and accepts the fact with an emotionless reaction. Soon, however, his brother Josef dies too. Edi (Tony Anhalt), the only brother left anticipates more a jealous than a modest attitude...
This episode also includes the premiere of the famous waltz by Schani Strauss titled 'The Blue Danube.' Here, the title character Hetti also has her word of advice. Initially thought to be a choral waltz with rather ridiculous lines to sing: In Vienna be gay" (unlike "In Vienna be glad in the later version) Schani takes Hetti's advice and plays it without any words. Taking into account the rather sad context within the family when two of its members are gone, the atmosphere is not that gay and jubilant as in STRAUSS DYNASTY where he premieres the waltz in Paris with standing ovation. Here, he plays the waltz in a small casino, small but meaningful for Strauss family. However, it is not Hetti's husband's night...as she would suspect but another woman stands in the way, another source of fascination and inspiration...
The Blue Danube waltz, perhaps the most famous waltz that people associate Johann Strauss with, and Hetti absorbed by bitterness and jealousy mark the final credits of the episode.
Dramatised by David Butler, the episode primarily concentrates on Hetti (Margaret Whiting), Schani's first wife. When they get to know each other, he utters a memorable line: I never knew what it meant to be alive before I met you." Although I personally prefer Cherie Lunghi in STRAUSS DYNASTY (1991), Ms Whiting highlights her aristocratic high airs and her older age (10 years older than Schani). "A woman like that..." referred to by Schani's mother, she encourages Schani to play more and more with his brothers, Josef (Nicholas Simmonds), weak and rather indecisive whom we got to know in the previous episode and Edward (Tony Anhalt), more ambitious, more lasting. Three brothers together! Schani's mother strongly opposes but when she realizes that she cannot insist on her ways to her grown up son, she retires and moves to oblivion. It is no concern of hers anymore...
Schani's fascination towards Hetti is nicely compared to his father's fascination towards Emily Trampusch (Barbarra Ferris). She has her scene in the episode as an old woman living the haunt of the past, cherishing a few years worth living for, forgotten and abandoned within the dust of long ago. Quite a drama to depict Schani offering help, financial help to the woman who ruined the marriage of his parents... The reason for understanding his father is his love to Hetti.
One of the most touching scenes of the episode and of the entire series is Anna Strauss' death scene. Holding the waltz composed by Schani at the age of three, she passes away in disappointment, sorrow, loneliness while all Strauss family are having fun at the ball. What is more tragic a fact, which Marvin J Chomsky in his later version does not dare depict so cruelly, is that Schani refuses to take part in his mother's funeral. In the 1991 version, Hetti gets the telegram to Paris after the premiere of Blue Danube waltz and hides the sad information from Schani because they are going for the tour nee in America. Later, as Schani finds out his mother is dead, he mourns her and yells on Hetti in despair. Here, he says "Nothing will have changed" and accepts the fact with an emotionless reaction. Soon, however, his brother Josef dies too. Edi (Tony Anhalt), the only brother left anticipates more a jealous than a modest attitude...
This episode also includes the premiere of the famous waltz by Schani Strauss titled 'The Blue Danube.' Here, the title character Hetti also has her word of advice. Initially thought to be a choral waltz with rather ridiculous lines to sing: In Vienna be gay" (unlike "In Vienna be glad in the later version) Schani takes Hetti's advice and plays it without any words. Taking into account the rather sad context within the family when two of its members are gone, the atmosphere is not that gay and jubilant as in STRAUSS DYNASTY where he premieres the waltz in Paris with standing ovation. Here, he plays the waltz in a small casino, small but meaningful for Strauss family. However, it is not Hetti's husband's night...as she would suspect but another woman stands in the way, another source of fascination and inspiration...
The Blue Danube waltz, perhaps the most famous waltz that people associate Johann Strauss with, and Hetti absorbed by bitterness and jealousy mark the final credits of the episode.