Callas in Tosca I

This snippet purports to show Callas as Tosca at the Metropolitan Opera in 1965—at her entrance, following which she freezes as the audience erupts into applause.

“A fine picture, Signorina; whatever it represents, it’s a pretty thing and should be treated carefully.” Then he turned to the relics: seventy-four of them, they completely covered the two walls on each side of the altar. Each was enclosed in a frame which also contained a card with information about it and a number referring to the documents of authentication. These documents themselves, often voluminous and hung with seals, were locked in a damask-covered chest in a corner of the chapel. There were frames of worked and smooth silver, frames of bronze and coral, frames of tortoiseshell; in filigree, in rare woods, in boxwood, in red and blue velvet; large, tiny, square, octagonal, round, oval; frames worth a fortune and frames bought at the Bocconi stores: all collected by those devoted souls in their religious exaltation as custodians of supernatural treasures.
Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard