Tongues are still wagging about the dog who went to the opera last week at UNCW's Kenan Auditorium.
He was smallish, wearing a suitably formal black fur coat. His behavior was described as ``boorish'' or ``adorable'' depending on whom you asked.
You might wonder why a dog would go to the opera. I did. My neighbors' dogs go into hound dog hysterics for at least 30 minutes every time they hear a police siren, so I can only imagine the panic that might ensue after a high-pitched aria or two.
The dog arrived in the arms of its owner, a well-dressed woman who had a seat down front for the San Francisco Western Opera Theater's performance of The Barber of Seville.
Things were going OK until the first of what I'd call an ``operatic outburst'' occurred, causing the pooch to begin barking nervously at the singers on stage.
(Maybe he was feeling left out; the opera was sung in Italian with English supertitles, but there was no attempt at translating Rossini's comedy into Fido-speak. Maybe he was pouting because he'd had his heart set on going to see Ransom instead of some doggone opera.)
When the dog howled, said audience member Elaine LaVaute, ``the performers on the stage actually faltered.'' At least one singer turned to stare down the dog.
After a few minutes of this, the woman took her dog to the lobby, where barking could be heard sporadically until, finally, they left.
At least one opera patron wasn't upset by the occasional barking.
``I thought the little dog was cute,'' said Mary Stewart Hood. ``He didn't bother me.''
Don Hawley, manager of Kenan Auditorium, said he never saw or heard the dog but was told that the woman who brought him to the theater said she was hearing-impaired and the dog was a ``hearing-ear dog.''
This explanation was good enough for the theater staff, who admitted woman and pooch.
In retrospect, said Mr. Hawley, ``That was silly.''
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Opera dog'' is not so crazy when you think about some of the two-legged offenders who surround us in theaters these days.
And while members of the Western Opera Theater may not have experienced a dog in the audience before, they've probably had their share of distractions.
Loutish opera fans were blasted in an article just this week in the Western Opera's hometown newspaper, the San Francisco Examiner. Stephanie Salter, calling opera ``one of the last pockets of civilized behavior,'' wrote that lately she's noticed talking during overtures ``as if this music were incidental or just some settle-down-kids number before the real show starts.''
``Then there's the ferocious digging through handbags for tissues, cough drops or glasses. In a quiet house of musical worship, this is as rude as letting fly with a loud belch.''
Ms. Salter wrote that she's even seen families eating snacks while watching Carmen.
Back in Wilmington, Don Hawley agrees that today's audiences aren't always considerate.
Latecomers are often a problem.
``The people who come late are amazing to me,'' he said, ``and what is even more amazing are the ones who are coming to a performance to get credit for a class; they have no idea how to behave.''
This shouldn't come as a huge surprise to anyone who has been to a play or a movie in the past few years. The problem isn't new, but it's getting worse: Folks who are used to watching movies at home on the VCR talk throughout the whole movie, not even bothering to whisper.
There's also been a depressing increase in the number of people who, for reasons unknown, kick the back of your seat over and over throughout a performance or a movie. To all of them I say, cut it out!
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A postscript: It would be easy for me to let the increasingly silly North/South debate die a natural death this week. Easy, but not terribly fair. There is more to be said. Simply: I was wrong to, as many readers complained, ``fuel the fire'' and dead wrong to help perpetuate the notion, even in jest, that one group of people is superior to another.
Many readers took me to task for that, and they should have. The truth is, people are the same everywhere. There are nice ones and there are jerks. That doesn't make for exciting copy - the kind that keeps the phones ringing and the letters churning - but it's how I really feel.
Stan Westhead's letter to the editor this week said it better than I: ``This is a pleasant town with pleasant people, for the most part, and the only result of giving space to such trivia is a little needless irritation, a little more erosion of the civility between us.''
I contributed to that erosion, and I am sorry. Let's all relax, treasure the new friends we've made and chalk this one up to one person (the original letter writer) having a lousy day and another (me) getting far too worked up over it.
Celia Rivenbark is a columnist for the Morning Star and Sunday Star-News. Call her at 343-2382 or (800) 272-1277, Ext. 2382.