The Vampirization of America An era of fear and uncertainty has helped fuel a sex-and-death wave in pop culture.

From the LA Times

In times of political rot and confusion and pain, one needs something like cosmic silliness, not to make sense of things, but for those who don't expect a life after death, we need an experience, in this life, of the dream of heaven. Tossed into fear, like children, we need a childish vision to restore faith in life. The worse things get, the more we need greater art. Since Pina Bausch wasn't in town, there was Mozart's "Magic Flute" at the L.A. Opera not long after 9/11. We needed Mozart because the country was Wagner, pinned to false mythologies of necessary doom.

The genius of that 2001 production was that it felt like it had been put on by a high school with the best singers in the world. It was adolescent joy, with one image that stayed with me. Rodney Gilfry as Papageno the bird catcher, wearing a fool's cap and bells in a costume with more colors than Joseph's coat, was singing on stage while a rowboat on wires sailed overhead, carrying three boys dressed like Harry Potter, with his glasses. Young magicians, "Magic Flute," makes sense.

Who would they put in the boat a decade later? A Harry Potter reference now would seem like product placement, not a little wink.

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