Boston Symphony Orchestra's "Suor Angelica": Bonjour Tristesse

Kristine Opolais as "Suor Angelica"
(photo: Winslow Townson)

Hello darkness, my old friend....

With apologies to Simon and Garfunkel, one was reminded of this lyric during the Boston Symphony's program last night (to be repeated tomorrow evening), as it consisted of a triplet of compositions: Lili Boulanger's D'un Soir triste, Claude Debussy's Nocturnes, and Giacomo Puccini's opera Suor Angelica, (usually performed as the middle third work in another triplet, along with Il Tabarro and Gianni Schicchi, beloved as Il Trittico). While it may strike some as an evening with too much sadness, the overall beauty of the three musical pieces more than compensated for their downbeat themes, not to mention that it was obvious that no one in the hall wanted the evening to end, instantly rising to a well-earned standing ovation. While on paper it portended sadness, in performance it rose to the sublime.

Boulanger's D'un Soir triste (“Of a Sad Evening”), is a twelve-minute work written at the same time as Puccini's opera (1918) and echoes its morose nature. It's essentially a mysterious mood piece that sets the tone for the evening. Claude Debussy's Nocturnes, entitled Nuages (“Clouds”), Fetes (“Festivals”) and Sirines (“Sirens”) were rewritten by the composer over the years, finally published posthumously in 1939, based in part on the paintings of James Whistler (especially his Arrangement in Black and Gray (popularly known as “Whistler's Mother”) and the poems of either Henri de Regnier (L'Homme et la sirene) or Swinburne (Nocturne) both dealing with mermaids and their influence on the love expressed by mortals. This last piece included a women's wordless chorus performed by the Lorelei Ensemble (Beth Willer, Artistic Director), who later provided exquisite depth in the opera.

After intermission, the orchestra was joined not only by soloists but also by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus (James Burton, Conductor) and the BSO Children's Choir for the haunting tale of Suor Angelica. The story of the titular nun (soprano Kristine Opolais) living with the tragic secret of her child born out of wedlock is a brief but potent one, running just under an hour in this concert performance that demonstrated why it has become a perennial favorite. This production also featured mesmerizing mezzo-soprano Violeta Urmana (as the Princess, a character one loves to hate), soprano Fatma Said (as Sister Genovieffa), mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller (as The Abbess) mezzo-soprano MaryAnn McCormick (as the Monitress), as well as members of the Lorelei Ensemble including Emily Marvosh, Katherine Growdon, Sarah Brailey, Christina English, Sophie Michaux, Meg Dudley, Claire McNamara and Sonia Tengblad. Each was dressed in black and white, though more glamorous than what might be habitual, and they all provided proof that, while this opera deals with loss and shame, it finds redemption in the end.

 

Kristine Opolais as "Suor Angelica"
(photo: Winslow Townson)

 

Words fail. The performance soared to the heights with this opera's lovely (and, yes, sad) aria, “Senza mamma”, in which Sister Angelica prays for her son (“without your mother, o baby, you die”). Opolais sang and acted absolutely full-throttle, turning a night that was infused with melancholy into a magnificent triumph. Conductor Andris Nelsons and his orchestra, in all the pieces played, showed an appreciation for nuance the likes of which one rarely hears. The Puccini work has been criticized in the past for being overly sentimental, but no such view was tenable given the simultaneous beauty and ferocity provided by Opolais. It was undeniably the finest BSO performance in eons, indeed a night to treasure.

This week also brought the long-awaited announcement of the Boston Pops' Spring schedule at Symphony Hall. As was the case with last year's programming, there will be some standout guest artists joining the anticipated roster, leading off with Bernadette Peters as the season opener, followed by Leslie Odom Jr. of Hamilton fame (who had to cancel his appearance last year due to a scheduling conflict), Jane Lynch (from Glee), Arlo Guthrie and television travel host Rick Steves. Stay tuned for more specifics on the Pops' 2019 Spring season.

Odyssey Opera's "Paride ed Elena": The Farce That Lunched a Thousand Chips?

The Cast of "Paride ed Elena"
(photo: Kathy Wittman)

Paride ed Elena, Odyssey Opera's production of the 1770 opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck, with libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi, was performed over this past weekend, in its Boston premiere. The third of his “reform” operas, after Alceste and Orfeo ed Euridice, rarely performed (in part due to the requirement of a trio of superb sopranos), is the composer's attempt to replace the overly complex music and abstruse plots of opera seria with what was referred to as “noble simplicity” in both drama and music. Once again, this adventurous company presented an overlooked work by an acknowledged master composer. In the case of such operas, one should bear in mind the possible reasons for their relative obscurity.

Meghan Lindsay as Paris in "Paride ed Elena"
(photo: Kathy Wittman)

This is a relatively short opera with a familiar backstory, as Christopher Marlowe described Helen as the “face that launched a thousand ships”. It's an easy work to detail in a synopsis, because very little actually happens. The opera takes us from the first meeting of the two titular lovers, to their eventual flight, five acts later, taking place on an ancient Spartan shore. The other venues are the palace of Elena (Mireille Asselin), an arena, her bedroom, and the shore once again. The Scenic Design by Lindsay Fuori was (one should excuse the expression) appropriately Spartan, as were the Costume Design by Brooke Stanton, Lighting Design by Russell Champa and Direction by Crystal Manich,

Mireille Asselin as Helen in "Paride ed Elena"
(photo: Kathy Wittman)

We first learn that the heroic Paride (Meghan Lindsay) has chosen Aphrodite over Hera and Athena and, with encouragement from Erasto (Erica Schuller), seeks the love of the famous Helen of Troy. Paris and Helen meet at her royal palace and instantly are taken with one another's beauty. She asks him to be the judge of an athletic contest, where, when asked to sing, he does so about her beauty, admitting that the reason he has come is to win her love. She first dismisses him, but as he persists in despair she begins to give in to his entreaties. Eventually, through the intervention of Erasto (who admits he is really Cupid or Amore), they are on the same wave length, though Pallas Athene (Dana Lynne Varga) warns them of sorrow to come. In the final scene, the lovers prepare for their journey to Troy.




Erica Schuller as Amore, Meghan Lindsay as Paris
 & Mireille Asselin as Helen in "Paride ed Elena"
(photo: Kathy Wittman)

The opera was a mixed bag. It soared where it mattered, namely in the exquisite vocal contributions of Lindsay, Asselin and Schuller, as well as a brief appearance by Varga. Fortunately, each was in fine voice, especially in the very demanding role of Paris which Lindsay tossed off seemingly effortlessly. It was such a lovely score that it seemed a shame to burden it with the all too frequent (and all too lengthy) dance sections that were intrusive, repetitive and endless. Would that this had been a concert rather than fully staged, with the more significant arias, recitatives and choruses (the last under the direction of Mariah Wilson) intact. The extremely stylized Choreography by Melinda Sullivan may have been historically accurate (and very well rehearsed), but this sort of thing went out with the tongue-in-cheek depictions in such treatments as that found in the musical The Music Man (think “one Grecian urn, two Grecian urns...”), providing farcical elements more suited to later opera comique. At intermission, audience members appeared divided between those in favor of this staged version and those who pined for it in concert form. One wag even complained there had been ample time to finish an entire jumbo bag of potato chips during the first three acts (out of five).

As always, the production was Conducted by Gil Rose, with his usual effectiveness, if a bit lugubrious at times, finally ending on an upbeat note (despite Athene's dire prophecy). It was an afternoon for true lovers of early music, especially the works of Gluck (too long interred) to treasure.

 

"Spamilton": In the Room Where It Harpoons

The Company of "Spamilton"
(photo: Roger Mastroianni)

 

One went last night to “Spamilton”

a parody of “Hamilton”
an eighty minute laugh-a-minute
bunch of jokes, a lot of fun!

Created written and directed

by Gerard Alessandrini
native Needham wunderkind
(Forbidden Broadway's gentle meanie)

Its satire skewers Broadway

just as Ahab did to Moby Dick
the hippest-hoppist live stage show
(Lin-Manuel first did the trick)

 

Chuckie Benson, Ani Djirdjirian & Datus Puryear in "Spamilton"
(photo: Roger Mastroianni)

It's multi-racial through and through

With no regard for blacks or whites
And multi-role'd, not one or two,
But that's just how Miranda Writes

Chuckie Benson is Ben Franklin

As well as several others,
Ani Djirdjirian's all the ladies
(And some of them are muthas!)

Brandon Kinley's George the Third, a hoot

Adrian Lopez, Lin-Manu-el,
Daveed Diggs by Dominic Pecikonis,
And Datus Puryear's Burr- all swell 

Dominic Pecikonis in "Spamilton"
(photo: Roger Mastroianni)

Gerry McIntyre's Choreography's
The current best in Boston Beanery,
As is Dustin Cross' Costuming
And Morgan Large's red brick Scenery

Michael Gilliam's Lights illuminate

Fred Barton music-supervised
Curtis Reynolds directed music
All creative choices very wise

Rest assured you needn't see it

In the form of Broadway's “Hamilton”
To appreciate the references
As presented now by Huntington
 

 

The Company of "Spamilton"
(photo: Roger Mastroianni)

 

For the targets of this parody
Include more shows as parity
Though some references are hidden
There is much here re-Forbidden

Get thee quick by April 7^th,

While the Calderwood's still hot
Where the cast is still revolting
So you won't throw away...

...your shot.

Bedlam's "Pygmalion": Silent Music Starts to Play

Vaishnavi Sharma, Eric Tucker, James Patrick Nelson, Grace Bernardo
 & Edmund Lewis in Bedlam's "Pygmalion"
(photo: Nile Scott Studios)



Ever since George Bernard Shaw's 1913 comedy Pygmalion (now being performed at Cambridge's Central Square Theater by the New York company known as Bedlam, presented by Underground Railway Theater) was transformed by the team of Lerner and Loewe into their 1956 musical megahit My Fair Lady (successfully transformed yet again in the 1964 film version), it has become challenging to attend any staged performance of Shaw's original work without “hearing” a cue for a song. The story and the musical score are forever bound up in our collective memory, as is the romanticized happy ending (at least for the male lead) that was the musical's most significant alteration from Shaw. In this riotous production from Bedlam (who graced the local stage scene in recent seasons with their presentations of Saint Joan and Sense and Sensibility), all of the Shavian wit and wisdom remain intact.

Vaishnavi Sharma & Eric Tucker in Bedlam's "Pygmalion"
(photo: Nile Scott Studios)

Yet with a few changes, and the choice to cast the role of Eliza Doolittle as a young woman from Delhi (Vaishnavi Sharma), Bedlam has introduced new levels of conflict and interest. There remains the issue of the bullying and misogynistic condescension and petulance of phoneticist Henry Higgins (Eric Tucker, also the wondrous and versatile Director and Sound Designer of this production), but Higgins is what he is, a snob unwilling to admit his affection for his “creation”. Shaw's play is indebted to the Cinderella fable on the one hand, and the realism of Ibsen's treatments of middle-class life on the other. As Eliza, Sharma is a comic gem, and the perfectly pompous Tucker is her perfectly imperfect foil, whereas Colonel Pickering (James Patrick Nelson, also playing Mrs. Eynsford-Hill) conveys his avuncular championship of Eliza, and her father Alfred P. Dolittle (Michael Dwan Singh) bemoans middle class morality. Also in the cast, in multiple roles, are housekeeper Mrs. Pearce (Grace Bernardo, who also plays Clara Eynsford-Hill, and a parlor maid), and Freddy Eynsford-Hill (Edmund Lewis, also hysterically portraying Mrs. Higgins). They are all at their funniest when rapidly switching roles and hats. The creative contributions include Costumes by Charlotte Palmer-Lane, Lighting by Les Dickert, and Scenic Design by Joseph Stallone and Elizabeth Rocha.

Whereas the film version of the musical portrayed Eliza's roots as being exposed in the Ascot scene (“Come on Dover, move yer bloomin' arse!”), Pygmalion does so at a garden party where, when asked if she's going to walk, she declaims, in pluperfectly elegant diction: “Not bloody likely! I am going in a taxi!”. If Shaw were to attend the current Broadway production of the musical version (at Lincoln Center), he would doubtless be pleased to hear how his female lead has regained the upper hand as, rather than fetch his slippers, she throws them at him and storms triumphantly out of the theater, faithful to Shaw's original intent. In the final scene of the 1956 staged My Fair Lady, Higgins bellows “Eliza? Where the devil are my slippers!”, after which she is described in the script: “with tears in her eyes, she understands”. In Pygmalion, on the other hand, rather than restoring her role as slipper-fetcher, she is the one to bellow “what you are to do without me I cannot imagine” and then “she sweeps out”. In microcosm, Shaw here demonstrates whose story this is, who has become confident, determined and independent. It is Eliza who understands that it is Pickering who proves to be the true gentleman of class, having treated her as a lady long before she became one. As Shaw once wrote, art can never be anything but didactic; this play is more about class distinctions than speech. Bravo, Bedlam, you've done it yet again.

And would Shaw take umbrage with the minor little changes to the script, given our modern day issues of immigration and wall-obsessed hysteria? 

 

Not bloody likely.

Symphonic Superbowl: Haydn, Mendelssohn & Janacek

Juanjo Mena conducts Julian Rachlin & the BSO
(photo: Hilary Scott)

Attending a performance by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in midwinter is often a truly welcome antidote to the external elements assaulting one outside Symphony Hall. This was never truer than the orchestra's most recent, memorably balanced program, with selections spanning three centuries and several mood swings. The program got off to a self-reflective start with Haydn's Symphony No. 44 in E minor (“Trauersinfone” or “Mourning Symphony”) but lightened with Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor Opus 64 especially towards its more spirited end. After the intermission, the program turned the other Czech, as it were, with two pieces composed by Leos Janacek, his operatic suite from Cunning Little Vixen and his Sinfonietta. It was a full buffet under the direction of Spanish conductor Juanjo Mena, with Lithuanian violin soloist Julian Rachlin impressively delivering the Mendelssohn, and the orchestra itself increasing in size with each piece as the afternoon program built to an extraordinary climax in the final piece by Janacek, with something for everyone.

The Haydn symphony betrayed its Sturm und Drang contemporary influences (first heard around 1771) offsetting the era's somewhat cool rationality with more expressively subjective contrasting elements, usually, as in this case, in minor key. Its contrapuntal orchestration calls for a classical treatment with its relatively modest-sized assembly of strings, two oboes, two horns and a bassoon, with a lovely solo by the principal oboist. Haydn is said to have wanted the penultimate Adagio movement to be played at his own funeral, which led to its commonly known unofficial title as his “Mourning Symphony”, though, as the program notes put it, it was really more wistful than mournful. However one sees it, its themes are fundamentally natural with considerable wit and charm, as evidenced in the contributions of both conductor and orchestra throughout this first piece of the afternoon.

Juanjo Mena conducts the Boston Symphony Orchestra
(photo: Hilary Scott)

The Mendelssohn concerto for violin (first heard in 1845) demands an enhanced orchestral presence, with two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets and timpani and strings. It's generally considered one of the finest, as well as most original and pleasing concertos ever written. The composer solved some of the problems inherent in the form by first intertwining in the opening movement both orchestra and soloist, employing the composer's own cadenza, and allowing for virtually no pause for applause between movements. Rachlin was in superb form, intensely moving without the excessive gestures some violin soloists often employ; he confidently confirmed in performance the astonishing promise of his biography.

But it was in the Janacek pieces that the program delivered the goods. After the brief but pleasant suite based on his Cunning Little Vixen opera, an enjoyable if slightly bizarre hint of things to come, conductor and orchestra really came into their own with the composer's 1924 Sinfonietta. It was bombast at its most overwhelming and challenging to execute especially for the four trombones, joined by no fewer than four flutes and piccolos, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, E-flat and bass clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, fourteen trumpets, three tubas, timpani, bells, cymbals, harp and strings (and, not to worry, there won't be a quiz). The piece has roots in folk and dance music, but the size and scope of its orchestration is undeniably stirring and unforgettably moving.

There was ample impetus for a well-deserved standing ovation (too common and often undeserved these days) that continued longer than is typical, as the enraptured audience confirmed that this concert qualified as the Superbowl of the present symphonic season.

 

Huntington's "A Doll's House, Part 2": Knock Knock Who's There?

Nancy E. Carroll & Mary Beth Fisher in "A Doll's House, Part 2"
(photo: Kevin Berne) 

At one point in Huntington Theatre Company's current production of A Doll's House, Part 2, the character of Anne Marie (Nancy E. Carroll) barks at her former employer Nora (Mary Beth Fisher): “There's the door...I know you know how to use it”. She's of course referencing the potent final scene in Ibsen's A Doll's House when Nora slammed that door and left her husband and children behind. Huntington presented its version of Ibsen's original work, albeit with a slight change of punctuation in its title (Doll House), just two seasons ago. In 2017, playwright Lucas Hnath created a sequel that takes place some fifteen years after Nora's dramatic departure in Ibsen's storytelling. It inexplicably earned eight Tony Award nominations including Best Play and has become the most produced play to be performed throughout the country this season. This version, a co-production with Berkeley Repertory Theatre, directed by Les Waters, attempts to be as much a commentary on our times and how things haven't changed as it is on the issues dealt with by Ibsen himself. Not unlike Bruce Norris' 2010 Pulitzer Prize winning Clybourne Park sequel to Lorraine Hansbery's 1959 A Raisin in the Sun, this play serves as an epilogue to the original source, or at least tries to do so.

John Judd & Mary Beth Fisher in "A Doll's House, Part 2"
(photo: Kevin Berne)

Now a successful independent writer, Nora has come knocking on that proverbial door, seeking for various reasons to finalize her divorce from her husband Torvald (John Judd), but there are complications, most of them implausible, that must first be aired with him and their daughter Emmy (Nicki Massoud). If Ibsen's play was about the suffocating issues of the time, this work aims to expose the sublimated underbelly of society, then and now. By juxtaposing contemporary dialog with period costumes, the concept is neither fish nor fowl, raising the question of the intention behind this schizoid effort. With this play's placement just a decade and a half after Nora's departure, what is the point of illustrating that nothing much has changed in society within this brief period? If this supposedly matured Nora is truly a woman of the world, how is it that she is so incredibly naive? That said, there are some apt comic lines, anachronisms though they may be; less apt are a number of totally out-of-character f-bombs and expletives, jarring in this supposedly historic context. Crucially, the basic premise is what lacks interest or development, merely a statement of what Nora's limited “options” are.

Nicki Massoud in "A Doll's House, Part 2"
(photo: Kevin Berne)

Under the Direction by Waters, the compact ensemble of four actors all (save Carroll) end up declaiming rather than portraying characters. Even the minimalist Scenic Design by Andrew Boyce is strange, consisting of no furniture except a table, two chairs and a clothes rack; we are told that all of Nora's possessions were tossed out (and never replaced in a decade and a half?). The stark Lighting Design by Yi Zhao and Sound Design by J. Jumbelic are effective, as is the period Costume Design by Annie Smart, though it too seems incongruous given the colloquial dialog Hnath employs.

This company's previous production of Doll House also suffered from curiously “updated” writing that required a massive suspension of disbelief. It didn't work then and it doesn't work now. This time Nora's exit “line” isn't a slammed door, but her exclamation that she thought the world would have changed in the intervening fifteen years but didn't, and that she hopes to live to see it. We're all still waiting.

SpeakEasy's "Small Mouth Sounds": Speaking Volumes

The Cast of "Small Mouth Sounds"
(photo: Nile Scott Studios)

One can't say enough about SpeakEasy Stage's current production of Small Mouth Sounds, the 2015 play by Harvard grad Bess Wohl. While seemingly simple and direct, in reality this is a profoundly complex treatment with much more to offer than first meets the ear. There is virtually no dialog (in the traditional sense, at least) in what transpires, though as the title suggests there are quite a few sighs, grunts and other non-verbal means of communication. Directed by M. Bevin O'Gara, who correctly states that “silence is everything in this play”, it's a brilliantly warped approach to much of the tribal conflict spanning the nation and the world in this age of doublespeak and “fake news”. 

 

As the work begins, six strangers (whom we will come to know as broken) are seeking refuge and healing through a silent wellness retreat. They are informed by the disembodied voice of “The Teacher” (Marianna Bassham) that they are to embrace the silence, and open their hearts and minds to it. The group consists of a lesbian couple Joan (Kerry A. Dowling) and Judy (Celeste Oliva), the ultra-quiet Jan (Barlow Adamson), the disorganized Alicia (Gigi Watson), the you-tube yoga mentor Rodney (Sam Simahk) and the intensely serious and seriously intense Ned (Nael Nacer). Each harbors secrets that will gradually be revealed as the retreat progresses (or regresses). At one point the teacher and students even reverse roles, as she becomes progressively more unhinged, though in typical yoga classes students are at the mercy of the teacher and are her or his disciples. The play devolves into a parody of wellness movements, both the valuable and the invalid, skewering much of the modern fascination with fashionable trends.

 

Nael Nacer & Sam Simahk in "Small Mouth Sounds"
(photo: Nile Scott Studios)

The playwright has spoken of how we constantly project fantasy on each other, the question of (and quest for) inner peace, and how her play is so much about pain and how we deal with it. She also posits just how temporary and fragile everything is, and how difficult, especially in our times, it is for us to be quiet. In successful retreats, she also observes, finding your inner landscape can teach greater stress tolerance and emotional balance that lasts long after the retreat is over. And all is not sobriety, as there is much humor (such as The Teacher's discovery that the key to enlightenment might just be over-the-counter cold meds). Her frequent response to a crisis is a world-weary “oh, well”. There are numerous hints as to the backstories of these half dozen characters, not to be revealed here, that gradually expose their individual crises. Attention must be paid to SpeakEasy's production which makes up in its formidable actors (all of whom will be familiar to local audiences) and creative contributors what it lacks in verbosity. Each of the cast members, including the never-seen Bassham, are as good as it gets in the acting department, though only Nacer's Ned gets a relatively lengthy monologue when all are asked to write down their “intention”; Ned states his is to breathe and find peace with all of the others. The creative work on hand includes the simple but evocative Scenic Design by Cristina Todesco, Costume Design by Mary Lauve, Lighting Design by Annie Wiegand and Sound Design by Elizabeth Cahill.

The Cast of "Small Mouth Sounds"
(photo: Nile Scott Studios)

At the end of the play, one participant references The Teacher's earlier story of how a frog from a small well encounters the vast ocean: “when you see the ocean... you may not be able to return to the well.” After all the others have left, this sole remaining character sits silently waiting for the next lecture to begin. An Australian study concluded that resistance to silence is learned behavior. At one hour and forty minutes without intermission, this play proves this, as well as its own somewhat tongue-in-cheek maxim, “you are not alone”. In the face of such thunderous talent, on page and stage, one can only remain speechless.