Fleshy phantoms stand in silent witness to degradation, thievery and sordid sensuality. These compelling images and others are evoked with impressive imagination by director Paula Suozzi in Skylight Opera Theater's production of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera . The musicians huddled in the pit, led by Jim Coleman, play the loopy melodies with all the appropriate wormy wiggles and boffs that make the atmosphere shudder with sleeze. But Brecht's pointed and complex thoughts, turned into English by Marc Blitzstein, become muffled and hard to understand. Before long, Weill's melodies begin to sound a lot like each other.
Attention narrows on the tale's characters and purpose.
By the time the show ends, despite a large bundle of acting and singing talent, too much remains in the shadows. Mack and Tiger were loving pals during a recent war and continue to hold on to each other. Peachum wants to save his daughter from certain ruin and pays off Jenny to finger Mack for his many crimes, setting him up for execution. Brecht demands more than a story. He loaded his clumps of dialogue and his lyrics with social swipes and digs about poverty and corruption in high places.