12
Daily Nebraskan
Monday, April 25, 1933
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By trio Peterson
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is the
thing you listen tor in "The Orchestra
Conductor," a Polish film by Andrse.
Wajda. The characters live in it or they
use it - this familiar composition proves
to be a harrowing thing.
There are two orchestra conductors
in the film. John Gielgud plays a great
old man. Jan Lasocki. who comes back
to his native Poland to explain himself
Film Review
to his love, as he puts it - or really, to
explain his love to himself, because the
woman he once loved has died. And
there is the Polish conductor Adam,
whose jealousy of the great conductor
causes the disintegration of his illusions
about his life and music.
The figure of desire here is a blonde
Polish actress who played a documentarian
in "Man of Marble" - Marta has many
of the same qualities in her: unswerving
honesty, a willfuilness that seems almost
overdone and capricious.
We hear Beethoven's Fifth playing as
she rushes through New York, over the
Brooklyn Bridge, standing up through the
sunroof of a car to take it all in. Seeing a
poster for a Lasocki concert, she deter
mines to see it for a very personal reason:
the great conductor was once in love with
her mother. In spite of obnoxious and
intrusive cameramen and a crowd that
mobs him after the concert, Marta manages
to get Lasocki s attention by her refusal
to intrude; he sees her framed by the
auitated crowd, looking at him very calmly
a little further down the hall.
It's clear that the conductor hates all
the notoriety, the pushy concert groupies;
he seems physically sick of it all. The
impression gets stronger with seeing an
advertising light board on which a finite
of the silent film actor Charlie Chaplin
capers, jerking back and forth like a
puppet.
Marta can't stay in New York to meet
with Lasocki again, but flies back to
Poland to a warm family scene which
quickly becomes quite tense. In spite of
her assurances that she feels good to be
back in Poland, her husband Adam won't
be convinced, asking her in the middle
of the night, "Do you love me? Do you
love me?"
Gielgud s contempt is very nice - he
has the air of a reserved ar.d courtly
British gentleman who has rudeness forced
on him by predatory photographers, who
liang around literally waiting for his death.
To escape them, he has decided to take a
trip somewhere, his destination secret;
he chuckles riclily . . . and we next see
him in Poland, where he has come to his
native city, returned to conduct a concert
which he fled from doing years ago.
Adam's orchestra is working on of
course - Beethoven's Fifth Symphony,
and everyone seems ecstatic to have a
great conductor to work with.
We see shot after shot of Adam working
with the orchestra - if it could be des
cribed that way - he seems more to be
working against them, raging and sweating
as if he were working over a wild horse.
Lasocki on the other hand seems almost
beatific as he conducts the orchestra.
There is an exalted half-smile on his lips.
Marta puts the difference before Adam
plainly when she says of Lasocki, "When
lie conducts, it's a dialogue." Playing
under Adam (she herself is second violin,
significantly), the orchestra musicians
only listen and take orders.
There is a very good scene in which
the couple undress as they argue about
Lasocki and his merits - for Adam's
jealousy is opening out - it seems to be
kind of a habit for then, bed at this time
of the day, after a rehearsal; both try to
politely restrain their bad feeling as Adam
says Lasocki ran away from Poland and
pushed his way to the top; they stop;
they are dressing again, coldly.
There is another kind of marriage
pictured in the next scene, in which
Lasocki calls his wife, talks to her tender
ly, asks her to listen for his pulse and
heart as he puts the receiver over his
wrist and chest.
"The gallant shock troopers," as
Adam calls the state bureaucrats, step
in to bring out the contrast between the
two orchestra conductors in sharper
tone; they have decided that Lasocki's
concert has to take place in a newly
built factory as an "acoustic experiment,"
and broadcast worldwide; and since it's
going to be an international event, the
present musicians will have to be pushed
back for better ones from Warsaw. At
first, Adam protests strongly at all this,
but caves in, especially when he finds
out it is going to be a big career step up
for him. Lasocki's reaction is simple -he
refuses to conduct under the shoddy
arrangement, and leaves.
Adam becomes extremely jealous of
his wife and Lasocki - who finds that
Marta looks exactly like her mother
Anna. He tells of a moment of despair:
"I was helpless, hanging there in space,
unable to move ..." when the sound
of her mother's voice had revived him.
At a restaurant table lit with candles,
Lasocki takes off her glasses and speaks
to her as Anna, her mother, talks of his
regret at not returning sooner. She pro
tests that she is not her mother, and
Lasocki gently says, "I know," then
goes back to speaking to her in the same
reminiscent voice.
It becomes clear that this trip is simply
a fulfillment of memory for Lasocki;
when Marta comes to his hotel room and
begins to cry and cry, he orders breakfast
for them, obviously discomfited, and
doesn't offer any other help. She leaves
with her face looking ghastly and gray,
while he goes to stand austere against
the w liite w indows. He has come to Poland
to die, and nothing will be allowed to
intrude on his wrapping up of things.
By the end, Adam has lost his orchestra,
lost his wife's respect and love - but it's
not clear that she will leave him. Like her
mother, she will choose the man who
needs her over the man who is stronger.
She fixes Adam's attention, and rips
away all his illusions; he wasn't jealous
of Lasocki because of her, or because
of the orchestra. He was jealous because
Lasocki loved music, while for Adam
Beethoven was as a job.
Pete's CEiidsem) ;N a SEdllefi'raotEioogfainicyj'yst good!'
By Ward W, Triplet t III
Ham W. Pet m son has done a lot for the city of
Lincoln, ranging from his 11 years as a policeman to
tutoring senior citizens on passing the driver's test, to serv
ing on the Lincoln City Council.
He also was a division manager w ith King's Food Hosts
for 1 7 years and spent four years as the state's director of
motor vehicles.
"But with a new governor, you have changes." Peter
son, said, "I suddenly found out that a man who is over 60
years old does not have a high hireability. despite his ex
perience and background."
Peterson, who insists on being called just "Pete," is
now in yet another form of business. Pete's Chicken 'N a
Skillet opened three weeks ago last Thursday at 14th and
0 Streets.
Chick 'N a Skillet denies the Kentucky Fried Chicken
motto of doing one thing right. Pete's offers chicken by
the piece and chicken dinner combinations, as well as
steakburgers, spaghetti, hot dogs, chefs salads, three
soups and a King's carryover, the cheese frenchee.
Chick 'N a Skillet also serves breakfast, which in
cludes pancakes and muffins made from a mix prepared
by Royal American Foods, for whom Peterson works as a
distributor.
"Our motto here is nothing fancy, just good," Peterson
said. "We don't plan to have any salad bars and so on."
Chicken had been the one food item that was not
readily available in the downtown area. While there are
four shops that cater to sandwich lovers, three fast-food
hamburger joints and three taco places. Pete's is the first
chicken speciality shop to open downtown.
"We are the closest chicken place to the campus,"
Peterson said. "Popeye's is a little more than three miles
away on West 0, and you have to go way out to find a
KFC. As far as downtown is concerned, we are the only
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"Pete" Peterson, owner of Chicken 'N a Skillet
place where you can get chicken like this. Other people
serve it, but not in this setting."
Ant concert canceled; FRED goes to college
refunds available now
The Adam Ant concert, originally scheduled for March
13 but later postponed until May 5, has been canceled
completely, officials at Pershing Auditorium have
announced.
The singer injured his ankle during a performance,
which caused the delay of a major portion of the tour.
There was no reason given for the cancellation.
Refunds are available immediately at outlets where
tickets were purchased.
Refunds will be issued for a two-week period beginning
last Thursday.
Pete's chicken is somewhere between what Popeye's
and Kentucky Fried offer. Peterson said he and son Jerry
toyed around with the chicken for some time, trying to
get consistent color and taste.
"We are not a franchise," Peterson said. "I've had
people tell me they thought I had bought into a franchise.
But we don't have professional cookers. My son is our
chicken man."
Since opening, Peterson has served mainly businessmen
and w'omen from downtown, he said. Ironically, students
don't seem to be aware of the business yet.
"I was a policeman for 1 1 years in this town, and a lot
of my customers are the teen-agers of that era," Peterson
said. "They're all over 40 to 45 years old now, and they
remember me. I've had people I've given tickets to or
arrested come in.
"I've been involved in a lot of things in this town, and
I've w orked with thousands, not hundreds."
Peterson said the business was doing better than he had
anticipated. The revenue generated from three weeks of
business was equal to his projected revenue for the month.
"It is really nice when people tell you they appreciate
your business and your service," Peterson said. "We treat
every customer like he is the boss, because we want them
to come back."
Peterson added that his restaurant stands a better
chance of sticking around downtown because of its
unique business.
"I think a lot of the food businesses in downtown
have gone under because they had a lot of the same bus
iness," Peterson said. "Two businesses in this very spot
have gone under in the past year or so with the same food
service and video games. With our style of business, we
won't run into that same problem.
"1 have never put the word failure in my vocabulary,"
he said. "If you fail, you have just a seback."
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