From: clavazzi@nyx.cs.du.edu (The_Doge)
Subject: Britten's "Midsummer Night's Dream" in St. Louis
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Fri, 1 Jan 93 22:53:23 GMT

	Regarding the earlier discussion of this opera, here's the text of
my review of the Opera Theatre of St. Louis production from this past summer
(the review was broadcast locally on KDHX-FM).  I'm curious as to how this
production compares with others seen by posters in r.m.c

     It's a sad fact of life in the theatre that the success
or failure of a show often depends on things that are mostly
incidental to the production itself.  The Opera Theatre of
St. Louis production of Benjamin Britten's "A Midsummer
Night's Dream" is a good example.  Britten and the noted
tenor Peter Pears have adapted Shakespeare's romantic comedy
in a way that remains true to the spirit of the original,
while still making substantial cuts in the text.  The cast is
solidly professional and conductor Robert Spano gets some of
the best playing yet out of the orchestra.  But in the final
analysis your enjoyment of "Midsummer Night's Dream" will
probably depend on how familiar you are with the text itself,
since most of the members of this cast fail to make it
understandable.
     Not being a singer myself, I have no idea what it is
about the kind of training conservatory musicians get that
seems to discourage clear enunciation of the lyrics.
Certainly singing actors who work mainly on the Broadway
stage never seem to have this problem no matter how well-
trained their voices are.  Whatever the cause, a lack of
clarity seems to be pervasive at Opera Theatre this year.
The one show in which this is not the case -- Rossini's "The
Turk in Italy" -- is the exception which proves the rule.  Is
there any way to weed out the unclear singers during casting?
I don't know.  But surely it's worth a try.
     It's especially regrettable with this production of
"Dream", because it really is fine in every other way.
Counter-tenor Derek Lee Ragin is impressive in the dominant
role of Oberon, the King of Shadows.  And he's well-matched
by the vocal acrobatics and sexy stage presence of soprano
Elizabeth Futral as his queen, Tytania.  Finishing off the
fairy trio, Ward Saxton provides plenty of physical
acrobatics in the mostly non-singing role of Puck.  He is
also the only one on stage who can be consistently
understood.
     The two pairs of lovers who are thoroughly mixed up and
finally set aright in the enchanted forest are sung by mezzo
Kathryn Honan-Carter, tenor Kevin Anderson, soprano Virginia
Browning, and baritone Steven Combs.  They work well as an
ensemble, although Honan-Carter is not quite petite enough to
make the frequent jokes about her character's height
believable.  "Low and little" she's not.
     And then there are the Athenian tradesmen rehearsing a
truly awful tragedy about the legendary Pyramus and Thisbe.
Britten and Pears wisely kept their scenes largely intact,
especially their performance of the piece for Duke Theseus in
the last act.  Shakespeare used the "rude mechanicals", as he
called them, as a device to satirize the bad dramatic writing
of an earlier generation.  Playing along with the joke,
Britten has provided music which parodies the bad operatic
writing of the early years of this century.  It's a smart
theatrical decision and it works.
     The singers in these roles make the most of all of this,
and they deserved every bit of the enthusiastic applause they
got Saturday night.  Bass-baritone Thomas Barrett is
particularly notable as Bottom, the weaver with more energy
than talent.  Spoken or sung, it's one of the great comic
roles of the English stage, and he does it proud.
     Director Colin Graham's decision to turn the enchanted
forest into Central Park and Duke Theseus into a mafia don
doesn't make much sense.  Neither does Derek McLane's "world
turned upside down" set, especially since it remains upside
down long after the Oberon/Tytania feud is settled and
everything is supposedly set right again.  But Britten's
brilliantly evocative music and the fine performances of this
cast make this imposed "concept" mostly irrelevant.
     It's very presence, in fact, is somewhat baffling in
light of the lengthy essay by Graham himself in the season
program decrying imposed and arbitrary directorial imagery in
opera.  Citing a recent New York Times article by critic
Edward Rothstein on "The Imposed Sensibility of the
Designer", Graham notes that "it has become fashionable in
the last decade to put far too much emphasis on scenery
rather than performance."  He adds: "All too often scenery in
opera is distracting; it forms the basis rather than the
complement for a concept, and actually has little or nothing
to do with the actor or his activities, let alone the
composer and his music."  Ironically, his "Central Park in
the Dark" approach to Britten's work is just such a concept.
     So, should you make the trek out to the Loretto-Hiton
center to see "A Midsummer Night's Dream" before it closes on
the 21st?  As I said at the top, it all depends on how well
you know the material.  I played Oberon on stage a few years
ago and still know large chunks of dialog by heart.  I
enjoyed it immensely.  Sara had never seen or read the
Shakespeare original, and she felt left out for long
stretches of the show.  In any case, the box office number is
961-0644.

The_Doge