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Porgy and Bess is an English-language opera by the American composer George Gershwin, with a libretto written by author DuBose Heyward and lyricist Ira Gershwin. It was adapted from Dorothy Heyward and DuBose Heyward's play Porgy, itself an adaptation of DuBose Heyward's 1925 novel of the same name. Porgy and Bess was first performed in Boston on September 30, 1935, before it moved to Broadway in New York City. It featured a cast of classically trained African-American singers--a daring artistic choice at the time.

Gershwin's first version of the opera, running four hours (counting the two intermissions), was performed privately in a concert version in Carnegie Hall, in the fall of 1935. He chose as his choral director Eva Jessye, who also directed her own renowned choir. The world premiere performance took place at the Colonial Theatre in Boston on September 30, 1935--the try-out for a work intended initially for Broadway where the opening took place at the Alvin Theatre in New York City on October 10, 1935. During rehearsals and in Boston, Gershwin made many cuts and refinements to shorten the running time and tighten the dramatic action. The run on Broadway lasted 124 performances. The production and direction were entrusted to Rouben Mamoulian, who had previously directed the Broadway productions of Heyward's play Porgy. The music director was Alexander Smallens. The leading roles were played by Todd Duncan and Anne Brown. The influential vaudeville artist John W. Bubbles created the role of Sportin' Life; the role of Serena was created by Ruby Elzy. After the Broadway run, a tour started on January 27, 1936, in Philadelphia and traveled to Pittsburgh and Chicago before ending in Washington, D.C., on March 21, 1936. During the Washington run, the cast--as led by Todd Duncan--protested segregation at the National Theatre. Eventually management gave in to the demands, resulting in the first integrated audience for a performance of any show at that venue. Around 1938, much of the original cast reunited for a West Coast revival; Avon Long took on the role of Sportin' Life. Long continued to reprise his role in several of the following productions. Blevins Davis and Robert Breen produced a revival in 1952 which restored much of the music cut in the Crawford version, including many of the recitatives. It divided the opera into two acts, with the intermission occurring after Crown forces Bess to stay on Kittiwah Island. This version restored the work to a more operatic form, though not all of the recitatives were retained. In this version, Porgy and Bess was warmly received throughout Europe. The London premiere took place on October 9, 1952 at the Stoll Theatre, where the opera continued until February 10, 1953. This production's original cast featured Americans Leontyne Price as Bess, William Warfield as Porgy, and Cab Calloway as Sportin' Life, a role that Gershwin had composed with him in mind. The role of Clara was played by a young Maya Angelou. Price and Warfield met and wed while on the tour. The role of Porgy was the first for Warfield after his appearance as Joe, singing "Ol' Man River" in the popular 1951 MGM film of Show Boat. After a tour of Europe financed by the United States Department of State, the production came to Broadway's Ziegfeld Theatre in March 1953. It later toured North America. After completing its North American run in Montreal, the company embarked on an international tour, with LeVern Hutcherson as Porgy and Gloria Davy as Bess. The production first performed in Venice, Paris, and London, and in other cities in Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Switzerland, and Yugoslavia. The company also made a stop at the Cairo Opera House in Egypt in January 1955. In 1955-1956 the company toured in cities in the Middle East, Africa, Russia, and Latin America. During this tour, Porgy and Bess was presented for the first time at La Scala in Milan in February 1955. A historic yet tense premiere took place in Moscow in December 1955; it was during the Cold War and the first time an American theater group had been to the Soviet capital since the Bolshevik Revolution. Author Truman Capote traveled with the cast and crew, and wrote an account included in his book The Muses Are Heard. During the 1960s and early 1970s, Porgy and Bess mostly languished on the shelves, a victim of its perceived racism. Though new productions took place in 1961 and 1964, along with a Vienna Volksoper premiere in 1965 (again with William Warfield as Porgy), these did little to change many African Americans' opinions of the work. Many music critics still had not accepted it as a true opera. A new staging of Porgy and Bess was produced by the Houston Grand Opera in 1976 under music director John DeMain; it restored the complete original score for the first time. Following its debut in Houston, the production opened on Broadway at the Uris Theatre on September 25, 1976 and was recorded complete by RCA Records. This version was very influential in turning the tide of opinion about the work. For the first time, an American opera company, not a Broadway production company, had tackled the opera. This production was based on Gershwin's original full score. It did not incorporate the cuts and other changes which Gershwin had made before the New York premiere, nor the ones made for the 1942 Cheryl Crawford revival or the 1959 film version. It allowed the public to take in the operatic whole as first envisioned by the composer. In this light, Porgy and Bess was accepted as an opera. Donnie Ray Albert and Robert Mosley alternated performances in the role of Porgy. Clamma Dale and Larry Marshall starred, respectively, as Bess and Sportin' Life. This production won the Houston Grand Opera a Tony Award--the only opera ever to receive one--and a Grammy Award. The conductor was John DeMain. CANNOTANSWER

Porgy and Bess