Jet-Engine Effect

Walter Midgley, English tenor, has always recognized the hazards of stage mustaches: "They're a lot of trouble. They come off and make you look silly. I usually wear a painted one." But for publicity photos one day last week, he tried on a two-pronged affair on a nylon gauze mounting. It fitted so well ("You didn't know it was there") that he decided to wear it in Rigoletto at Covent Garden that night.

Midgley launched into the Duke of Mantua's first big aria. "I felt fine. Every word was a joy." "La costanza tiranna del core detestiamo qual morbo crudele,"* he sang--and sucked in a deep breath to go on. In the same instant, off came the left wing of his mustache. Carried on the air stream, it disappeared down the tenor's throat.

"It must have been a jet-engine effect," he said later. "I was terrified." Quickly he turned his back and coughed up the mustache. He finished the performance, but even a dose of soothing honey did not reduce the tickling in his larynx. Next day a doctor probed, extracted a half-inch piece of gauze which Tenor Midgley identified as his mustache mounting.

* Translation: "Constancy, tyrant of the heart, we detest as a cruel disease."

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