The 1874
Die Fledermaus of Johann Strauss II is traditionally performed on New Year's Eve...though it really hasn't anything to do with New Year's Eve! Could the connection perhaps be the "countdown" of clock chimes that occurs during the operetta?
The work actually contains two separate takings of time, aside from the fact that, during much of the entire performance, Rosalinde's tenor suitor, Alfred, is "
doing time" for her husband Gabriel Eisenstein's minor crime! The first reference concerns the philandering Gabriel's watch, which he brings out at social events -- when Rosalinde is not around -- to charm the ladies...it's sort of a timepiece equivalent to asking, "Would you like to see my etchings?" At Prince Orlofsky's ball, he of course has no idea that he is presenting it to his own wife, disguised as a mysterious Hungarian beauty...who, in many English translations, later archly informs him, "I know
exactly vot time it is!" Gabriel's technique with this watch is quite interesting: he allows his prey to take his pulse -- a surefire invitation for an attractive woman to hold him in her arms while they count the seconds together! When he tries it with Rosalinde, she deliberately passes over the number eight to confuse him into allowing her to trade places with him, presumably to ensure greater accuracy. She invites
him to take
her pulse, a very daring proposition! The counting quickly zooms out of control:
"Fünfzig, sechzig, achtzig, hundert!" -- "Fifty, sixty, eighty, one hundred!" exclaims Rosalinde, as her clearly excited husband picks up the thread and declares the count to be galloping along at half a million. At this point, she recognizes that she has sufficiently diverted him, and makes off with the watch that he has foolishly allowed her to hold for herself -- no more party games for him!
That was the count up. The countdown occurs soon after, when the party guests pause to listen to the striking of a clock, presumably from some church tower. "Eins! Zwei! Drei! Vier! Fünf! Sechs!" - "One! Two! Three! Four! Five! Six!" count Eisenstein and the prison warden, Frank, together. Frank believes he had personally escorted Eisenstein to jail before the ball began (he had never met the man before; this is where Alfred comes into the picture, to save Rosalinde's reputation when he is discovered alone with her in Gabriel's absence, he goes with Frank in Gabriel's place), and he is now all business, in a hurry to get to work; Eisenstein meanwhile has no idea he has already been "arrested" and, having enjoyed the prince's party, he is now eager to begin his sentence at the prison. So, although Act II ends with their hasty departure, the striking of the clock sets us up for the "morning after" of Act III, when the two men discover their true identities at the jail...and Rosalinde presents her husband with concrete evidence of his attempted seduction of "another woman."
