Danielle de Niese, Kyle Ketelsen/Photo: Dan Rest

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Sir Peter Hall’s stellar production of Mozart’s “The Marriage of Figaro” has been a regular visitor here since Lyric first premiered it back in 1987. For the first time, however, Hall himself did not make the trip to direct, and so Herbert Kellner took over the reigns, adding much freshness in the process. British conductor and English National Opera music director Edward Gardner was to have made his Lyric debut conducting these performances, but withdrew to be with his wife in England for the birth of their first child. Luckily, Sir Andrew Davis, who made his own Lyric debut with this original production twenty-three years ago, was on hand, and knows this score inside and out. Even the original choreographer, Kenneth von Heidecke, was brought in to stage the infamous wedding-dance scene that, as fans of “Amadeus” may recall, caused a stir with the emperor’s court because dance in opera had been banned. Of course, that was the least of the emperor’s problems with a work that was revolutionary in every sense, from its subject matter of servants besting aristocrats to Mozart’s musical treatment, which set in place a new musical-theater template that has lasted into our own day. Read the rest of this entry »

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You would think that Mozart’s “La clemenza di Tito” (“the clemency of Titus”)—a work overflowing with the mature Mozart at his very best, completed and premiered less than three months before his death at the height of his creative genius—would be one of the most performed operas in the repertoire, much like his soon to follow “The Magic Flute.”  Like the “Requiem” that would also soon follow but which he left incomplete due to his sudden death at the age of 35, “clemenza” is not 100 percent Mozart, but for a very different reason: Mozart took the work as a commission and farmed out the recitative sections to a student.  This, taken with the fact that the form of the work is the older, more serious and sterile opera seria—which Mozart had not explored since “Idomeneo” and which lacked the wit and ensembling of his popular stage works—critics widely assumed that he didn’t care for the form or the work.  The glorious music itself, however, makes it clear that a real gem was carelessly tossed aside. Read the rest of this entry »

Ashley Brown, Katherine Leigh Doherty, Alexander Scheitinger and Gavin Lee/Photo: Joan Marcus.

With the economy going to hell in a handbasket, how could any of us resist a show that suggests that, rather than invest your money, you might as well throw it to the birds and go fly a kite?  What could be interpreted as subversive back when the 1964 Disney movie first came out sounds like virtually sage advice today.  It’s worth noting that when British author P. L. Travers wrote the first of her “Mary Poppins” books back in 1934, the Great Depression was going on across both sides of the pond.

The stage production of “Mary Poppins,” the national tour of which just opened in Chicago, is a curiously potent mix of Travers plus Disney meets Cameron Mackintosh.  Read the rest of this entry »

Matthew Polenzani and Erin Wall/Photo: Dan Rest

Once upon a time, the principal responsibility of the director of an operatic production was to make sure that the singers didn’t bump into one another or the scenery on stage.  Then, came the idea of the “concept” director where a novel idea—whether inspired or not, whether logical or not—ruled the day.  It became increasingly commonplace for stage directors to add operas to their resumes, even if said director was not particularly musical and even if the staging had nothing whatsoever to do with the music.  Oh well, at least the drama of the piece would be served, or so it was reasoned.  Very, very rarely, you end up with operatic direction that somehow misses the point of both the music and the drama, no small feat, given the odds of some aspect of one or the other working out even with a clueless director.  Such is the case with Lyric Opera’s new production of Mozart’s “The Abduction from the Seraglio.” Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the press release from Lyric Opera:

Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 55th season
begins Saturday, September 26, 2009, at 6:00 p.m.
with Sir Andrew Davis conducting Giacomo Puccini’s immortal
TOSCA
starring Deborah Voigt, Vladimir Galouzine, and James Morris

Faust, Ernani, Katya Kabanova, The Merry Widow, The Elixir of Love,
The Damnation of Faust, and The Marriage of Figaro
also to be presented this season, including three new Lyric productions
– one a Lyric Opera premiere – and one new-to-Chicago production Read the rest of this entry »

What makes Chicago’s theater world special? We picked up the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly for clues. In the cover story, “CSI” star William Petersen explains his decision to leave his role as one of the top paid actors in television, earning a rumored $600,000 an episode, to move back to Chicago and Chicago theater: “It was too safe for me at this point. So I needed to try and break that, and the way to do that, for me, is the theater.” EW went on to credit Petersen for much of the show’s success, notably bringing a theatrical ensemble philosophy to play in its production. Or consider the runaway success of Steppenwolf’s “August: Osage County,” which transferred to Broadway,  receiving critical acclaim and multiple Tony Awards, not by shaking it up with Broadway “names” but instead by virtually transferring the Steppenwolf production intact, with the addition of lead producer and fellow Chicagoan Steve Traxler. What makes Chicago theater—or for that matter, Chicago dance or any other form of performance practiced on our stages—special? We’d contend it’s the power of the ensemble, the spirit of collaboration that champions artistic risk-taking and subordinates the commercial. And so, in that spirit, the critical ensemble responsible for Newcity’s ongoing stage coverage presents our take on the most influential people on and offstage in Chicago. Read the rest of this entry »

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“You say you want a Revolution, well you know,” there are pieces that talk about it and then again, there are pieces that actually start one. Napoleon considered Beaumarchais’ “The Marriage of Figaro” the straw that broke the camel’s back that ushered in the French Revolution and, even today, France’s leading newspaper Le Figaro is named after the fictional servant who outwits his aristocratic master. How badly did the French public want to see “Figaro” when it finally was staged in 1784 after having been officially banned for six years? So badly that that play had to be moved to a larger theater before opening night and even so, people were actually crushed to death trying to get in. Fast forward almost two-and-a-half centuries, and what comes to mind now for most of us is Mozart’s opera adaptation, still universally performed and far less explicitly political, versus the Beaumarchais original, which is today mostly done merely as a curiosity. Even Remy Bumppo’s ads trumpet, “A risqué look at what’s behind the music.”

Those Mozart and opera lovers who will doubtless inevitably catch this production will be immediately struck by the fact that this production weighs in at less than two hours, including a single intermission, whereas an uncut version of the opera can take up to four hours. Much has been edited and altered—sometimes entire scenes and characters are missing while contemporary slang referring to male anatomy is added—in this free adaptation and translation by Ranjit Bolt. Yes, you do miss Mozart’s music when situations arise that seem to demand hearing it, so much so that Remy Bumppo has added other music, much of it in a post-World War II Euro-pop style associated with contemporary French farce which further underlines the comedy rather than the serious issues behind the comedy. A particularly fun moment is when the maids all set aside their dust mops and end up picking up their skirts and aprons to do an impromptu “Can-Can,” complete with Offenbach’s music.

What often remains ambiguous, however, are the class distinctions that need to be drawn to make the action credible. Yes, Figaro is given a provincial Robin Leach-like British accent but he comes off as if he owns the place, whereas the Count is initially monotone and timid and only slightly better-dressed and could well pass as the same age as Figaro. (The comedy depends on the fact that the Count is old, rotund and decrepit, making his interest in fulfilling his “rights” as master of the house with his much younger and more handsome valet’s girlish fiancé all the more outrageous.)

But there are aspects of this production aside from the fact of how rarely such an historically important play is performed that make it worthwhile, particularly the sight gags and comic timing, which are superbly done and fun. And the timely discussions about what politics, if anything, has to do with intelligence and the notion that truths are lies that are repeated often enough to be believed got the biggest laughs in these waning days of a vocabulary-challenged administration that likes preemptive strikes and sees hallucinatory WMDs. “If things keep up as they are,” muses the Count, “the next thing you know, the lower classes will be running the whole show.” (Dennis Polkow)

“The Marriage of Figaro” plays through January 4, 2009 at the Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln, $40-$55, (773)404-7336.

Most DVD film commentaries are snoozefests, but on the original “Amadeus” commentary that was made for the laserdisc version in the mid-1990s, a fascinating and spirited argument takes place between “Amadeus” playwright Peter Shaffer and filmmaker Milos Forman, who directed the film version. Shaffer is thinking out loud that he never should have allowed Forman to talk him into having the lead character of the play, composer Antonio Salieri, tell his story to a priest rather than directly to the audience, as he does in the play. “No, no!” Forman scolds. “Peter, in the play, the people are THERE! This is a film, a projected shadow on a wall: when an actor on a stage looks into an audience’s eyes, it is engaged and drawn in. When an actor looks directly into a camera lens, the audience is reminded it is watching a film and loses its engagement and the whole thing comes crashing down as artificial.”

That difference is one reason that for all of the magnificence of the film, it is still far more engaging to have Salieri confide to you eye to eye rather than through a projected intermediary. As if to emphasize the point, director Gary Griffin has the two sides of the audience see the other side of the audience in a ceiling mirror as Robert Sella’s Salieri compellingly unspools his woeful (and yes, mostly fictional) yarn of jealousy and murder in Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s brilliant new production. But the real surprise of this version is the character of Mozart himself, traditionally a cutout throwaway role that has often been the property of teen idols of yesteryear. Robbie Collier Sublett gives Mozart’s arrogance and vulgarity a credible context as well as shows us Mozart’s heart and soul in Act II. The contrast between a mediocre and great composer in every respect is drawn sharply and convincingly.

The one aspect that keeps this production from heading into the stratosphere is that with the exception of a single soprano who sings along with recordings karaoke-style, all of the music is canned. Finding a small, first-rate ensemble to play live Mozart in a city the size of Chicago would not be hard and would immensely enhance the proceedings. (Dennis Polkow)

At Chicago Shakespeare Theater, 800 East Grand (at Navy Pier), (312)595-5600, Through November 9, $54-$70.

Watching veteran bass Samuel Ramey perform the supporting role of Leporello, the servant to Don Giovanni—the title role that Ramey played countless times throughout his long career—it was hard not to be struck by the irony of a singer at the twilight of a career juxtaposed next to a young singer, Italian baritone Ildebrando D’Arcangelo, who has been principally thus far associated with Leporello singing the Don next to yesteryear’s Don of Dons. But old habits apparently die hard, and as D’Arcangelo was singing away, the still far more charismatic Ramey could be seen actually mouthing the starring role along with him throughout the evening. Even more ironically, at one point the staging calls for Ramey to mouth for D’Arcangelo, when the plot calls for one to pose as the other. It was the highest drama to be experienced in an otherwise problematic production that was hopelessly confused and convoluted. Unlike the responsive ensemble of Chicago Symphony musicians assembled for “The Abduction From the Seraglio,” this alternate set of players of more high profile orchestral personnel never got the right feel for this music, performing in a consistently stodgy and heavy-handed manner, despite conductor James Conlon’s best attempts to keep things light and moving. Even worse, the recitatives are left to be played by a harpsichord far from the stage that had singers falling even further behind. Add to all this that the cast assembled to sing these iconic roles are by and large ill-equipped to sing Mozart and substitute heavy vibrato and a lack of precision for music that needs to be flexible and transparent, and the contrast couldn’t be more dramatic than the excellence being displayed during the “Abduction” performances that are running in repertory with this poorly done “Don” that unfortunately, descends into hell long before the Don himself gets there in the climax. (Dennis Polkow)

Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” plays through August 17 at Ravinia’s Martin Theatre, Lake-Cook at Green Bay Rds., Highland Park, (847)266-5100.

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For the first decades of its existence, Ravinia was the summer opera capital of the United States and concert opera was a significant element of the 22-year music directorship of James Levine, who was also music director of the Metropolitan Opera. That tradition stopped under Christoph Eschenbach but has continued on under James Conlon, who is also music director of the Los Angeles Opera and the Cincinnati May Festival, where this semi-staged version of Mozart’s “The Abduction From the Seraglio” originated in 2006 conceived around Michael York narrating the spoken portions with a script by Marie Therese Squerciati that streamlines much of the action as well as wryly interpolates the proceedings for a modern audience with an Anglo sensibility that perfectly suits York’s narration. But make no mistake: it is the singing and the music that are the clear stars of this production, from Morris Robinson’s velvet-smooth deep bass and terrifying yet comical portrayal of the sadistic Osmin to Hanan Alattar’s stunning ease through the soprano stratosphere as Konstanze to James Conlon’s lively tempos and brilliant shaping of a chamber ensemble made up of non-vacationing Chicago Symphony members. What a rare treat it is to hear a Mozart opera in Ravinia’s Martin Theatre, with its 800-plus seats, close to the size of the theaters that Mozart had in mind when he wrote these works rather than the too large Harris Theater (Chicago Opera Theater) or the cavernous Civic Opera House (Lyric Opera) where nuance and subtlety are lost. The experience is nothing short of revelatory and long may this glorious tradition continue. But next time around, please, Ravinia, keep the standards consistent and hire a professional chorus, preferably members of the CSO’s own unparalleled ensemble rather than a volunteer chorus. For this work a chorus is only heard twice, but they are crucial and climactic moments that mar what precedes them, kind of like baking a cake from scratch and using canned frosting to top it off. (Dennis Polkow)

Mozart’s “The Abduction From the Seraglio” plays through August 16 at Ravinia’s Martin Theatre, Lake-Cook at Green Bay Rds., Highland Park, (847)266-5100.