During a two-hour performance, the accommodating audience, adults included, heckled, hissed the villain, joined in a countdown and a contest, and, on command, stood up to dance in place.
Or did they rediscover their vital role of providing context, perspective and truth in a contest that is not a countdown-clock-worthy sporting event or reality show, but a competition for the presidency of the United States in fraught and dangerous times?
HAMPTON, N.H., Nov. 25 — As the presidential campaigns ratcheted up for the post-Thanksgiving countdown to the first nominating contests, Rudolph W. Giuliani found himself under increasingly fierce attacks on Sunday from two of his rivals.
Razorfish, part of the Microsoft Corporation, has produced innovative Internet initiatives for Coors Light that include a "happy hour countdown" clock; a user-generated content contest to win Super Bowl tickets; and "code blue" alerts that friends send one another on Facebook.
Luckily, we didn't have to judge the contest, because right as I started the final countdown, Ron announced that he decided to throw in the towel because Jon was too good of an artist.
Before the release, Scholastic also released a trailer for the book, launched a Facebook page that gained over 22,000 fans in 10 days, and held a contest for booksellers to win a visit from Collins and an online countdown clock to the release date.
Perhaps still high off the fumes of last year's presidential contest, the news media covered the elections as if they were prize fights -- with extra coverage and countdown clocks to poll closings on cable channels.
In a gruelling contest which was decided when the replacement prop Alex Waller claimed a try from under a pile of bodies after the countdown clock had reached zero, the Saints were first among equals.
