A Stunning, Timely Handmaid's Tale

Irene Roberts and Simone McIntosh as Offreds present and past.
Photo by Cory Weaver/San Francisco Opera.

San Francisco Opera

The Handmaid’s Tale

Paul Ruders and Paul Bentley

September 17, 2024

SFO could not have picked a better time to give this 2000 work its West Coast premiere, but in many ways Ruders’ treatment of Margaret Atwood’s ever-topical story seems a little old-fashioned. The music is muscular, modernist and bombastic, more 20th century than 21st, and delivers the story in a stunning package that accentuates the sense of alarm that we should all feel.

The performance opens in a soaring institutional space that resembles an airplane hangar, where Aunt Lydia (soprano Sarah Cambidge) is delivering fierce instructions to her specialized charges. In the face of a fertility crisis, these red-clad ladies have been chosen by the new theocracy of Gilead to move in with powerful families and bear their children, and to do so (cringe) the old-fashioned way. It’s clear from Lydia’s commands that the Christian nationalists have taken power. The size of this opening scene gives Ruders the chance to write chorally, and to introduce an impressive military motif with religious overtones (a tubular bell) to confirm the new marriage of government and church. The sound is immediately huge and startling, delivering thrillingly large crescendos and crackling, exotic percussion. At points, the response felt almost primal.

The irony here is that Atwood’s novel derived its narrative power from telling an intimate story. This takes precedence once Offred (mezzo Irene Roberts) has moved in with the Commander (bass John Relyea) and his wife, a former evangelical singing star named Serena Joy (mezzo Lindsay Ammann). Despite the size and power of his orchestrations, Ruders leaves space for long, plaintive vocal lines that spell out the tremendous conflicts of the situation. (The singing is word-obliterating operatic, so keep an eye on those supertitles.)

The story is also aided by a devilishly clever device for portraying the time before the Gilead takeover. A double (mezzo Simone McIntosh) plays Offred’s younger self, negotiating the increasing misogyny of the new regime with her husband Luke (tenor Christopher Oglesby) and their five-year-old daughter (Valerie Corrales). Set designer Chloe Lamford uses a stage-wide glass framework to separate past and present; at times, one may see past characters pantomiming actions that reflect on what the current characters are singing about upstage. The set also features a fearsome Eye of Gilead (similar to the eye on our one-dollar bills), splayed across the background to keep the peasants in tow.

Roberts as Offred (Of Fred, in case you wondered) does a masterful job with an enormous workload, and manages to keep Ruders’ sustenatos relatable and human. The acting demands are high, on both her and McIntosh’s past Offred, and they truly succeed in keeping this enormous, whirling performance focused on its protagonist. Roberts also has to deal with some very tricky sexual moments, which manage to maintain a fine balance of cringeworthy-yet-meaningful (with the help of an intimacy coordinator, Maya Herbsman).

Soprano Rhoslyn Jones gives a moving performance as Offred’s friend Ofglen, who introduces her to a secret resistance movement. Another standout is soprano Katrina Galka as Janine, a handmaid who keeps flashing back to her previous personality as waitress till she finally suffers a very theatrical breakdown. Another shot of empathy goes to soprano Caroline Corrales as Moira, Offred’s past and present friend, who fights the regime tooth and nail and somehow survives.

Director John Fulljames does an excellent job of setting his troops into one striking tableau after another (with the help of Christina Cunningham’s work on the familiar Handmaid costumes). The most unsettling of these are regular visitations to the handmaids’ recently executed colleagues, and one hanging that’s performed live. (I know they’ve got safety harnesses, but it was still pretty unsettling to watch.)

Conductor Karen Kamensek manages a humongous score, which includes digital effects and exotic percussion such as crotales, an anvil and a sizzle strip. In the tradition of late twentieth century works, the orchestra is absolutely the co-star, and delivers some spine-chilling moments.

My companion, the Punk Princess, expressed the concern that someone not familiar with this story might find the opera confusing, and I’d have to agree. I also think that the second act places too much emphasis on Offred’s interior life and sacrifices a few chances for suspense and action. Perhaps the most intriguing moments in the production come from the Commander and his wife, who show moments of humanity despite the strictures of their government (the Commander, for his part, seems amusingly attached to Scrabble).

Still and all, these are nitpicks, and I would encourage anyone to see this mesmerizing production. It will disturb you in precisely the way that great art is meant to, especially in a time when too many religious types seem hell-bent on stripping away female rights. And though I am very fond of the story-first direction that opera has taken in recent years, I think this story was a great match for good old modernist rabble-rousing.

Through October 1 at War Memorial Opera House, 305 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco. $28-$426, 415/864-3330, sfopera.com.

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera critic and author of 29 novels, including his most recent, Punks for the Opera, which includes scenes at the War Memorial Opera House. All of his titles may be found at Amazon.

A Luminous Zauberflote

 

Emily Misch as the Queen of the Night.
Photo by Kristen Loken.

Opera San Jose

The Magic Flute

September 14, 2024

Opera San Jose’s season-opener is a surprisingly traditional production of Mozart’s famed singspiel with a beautifully light touch. Under the guidance of Brad Dalton and 19-year-old conductor Alma Deutscher, the production illuminates the opera’s ever-shifting secrets and manages to provide a lot of amusement along the way. The feeling of openness and clarity is furthered still more by the decision to use English for the dialogues.

The overture pantomime places the spoiled Prince Tamino in front of a proscenium-within-a-proscenium. He falls asleep before a pack of kids playing with a toy dragon and before you know it he’s taking an Oz-like trip into the action, being chased down by a full-size (puppet) dragon. When the birdcatcher Papageno falsely takes credit for slaying the dragon, the Three Ladies attach a padlock to his mouth. When one of the ladies suggested that all liars should have to wear such devices, the audience responded with an unusual applause. (Now what current event, I ask innocently, could inspire such a response?)

Sergio Gonzalez played Tamino with an enjoyably wry humor and a warm lyric tenor (with just a dram of spinto). I was surprised to learn afterward that he was covering the role, so add an extra “Bravo!” to that.

Gonzalez had a high-quality partner in baritone Ricardo Jose Rivera, who played a note-perfect Figaro in last spring’s Barber of Seville. Applying that same boisterous tone and excellent comic timing to Papageno is a sure-fire winner, and also accentuates Mozart’s great flair for blue-collar heroes: (The Marriage of) Figaro, Papageno, and Leporello. In any case, Papageno is clearly the most relatable character on stage, honest enough to declare himself a lazy hedonist and yet ennobled by his yearning for a life’s partner.

Soprano Melissa Sondhi is well-suited to the role of Pamina, notably in the heartbreaking aria “Ach, ich fuhl’s,” delivered in mournful tones after she mistakes Tamino’s vow of silence for rejection. Sondhi’s delivery has a lovely plaintive quality that inspires oodles of sympathy.

As Papagena, soprano Nicole Koh is a pure delight. In her early appearances, she forgoes the usual old-age mask and portrays the character’s pretended old age by hiding her face in a cloak and using a cackly voice and old-lady gestures to great effect. Her eventual unveiling as a babe, the answer to Papageno’s prayers, turns the stuttering pa-pa-pa duet into a boisterous, joyful party.

But I know what all you operaphiles are thinking: What of the Queen of the Night? Soprano Emily Misch has the sexy wicked mom thing down to a T: statuesque, great voice, very tall wig. Her rendition of Die Holle Rache is just the vengeful showstopper it’s supposed to be, with a beautifully light touch on the immortal staccatos.

Another fascinating presence is tenor Nicolas Vasquez-Gerst, who brings a certain Tim Burton cartoonishness to Monostatos. He’s terribly fun to watch, and even manages to inspire a little sympathy. (It’s not easy being a Moor, or a dungeonmaster.)

Bass-baritone Philip Skinner brings a sardonic dignity to the Speaker (the Temple’s doorman). I feel bad for bass Younggwang Park, who has to play the ever-stoic Sarastro in such a dry fashion.

Watching former prodigy Alma Deutscher at the podium is an entertainment unto itself. Her conducting is elegant and intimate, more along the lines of a choral conductor than the larger gestures of orchestral conductors. She uses a baton in her right hand to keep the beat while using the left hand to sculpt dynamics and signal points of emphasis. All this while, she mouths almost every word of the text to her singers. For those who cannot chew gum and walk at the same time, its fascinating to imagine the workings of a brain that can manage all this multi-tasking. The orchestra responded to this treatment beautifully, revealing all the small treasures of a masterful score.

Ryan McGettigan’s set is unapologetically theatrical, in a silent-movie kind of way, using flyaway flats to swap out rocks and clouds in Act 1. The temple scenes make use of fluorescent wires and a backlit pyramid screen to create stark, beautiful images. The Act 1 background nightscape featured a full moon that slid away to enable the Queen’s entrance (yes, the Queen of the Night entered through the moon). Accompanied by stage smoke and a stunning black and blue gown (costume designer Alyssa Oania), it was a pure rock-star moment.

The accoutrements included some playful dance scenes from the youth of the Antara Asthaayi ensemble (and how cool is it that OSJ has its own community of Indian dancers?).

In the final summation, I have to admit that I have been trying to figure out Schikaneder and Mozart’s labyrinthine plot for more than half my life. With this production, I feel like I got a little bit closer. It could be that Die Zauberflote falls into the same category as Cosi fan tutte. There are no easy answers, and the audience is free to have their own opinions. Where Brad Dalton sees (in his director’s notes) a Mason-like temple enabling a selfish Prince to become a humble ruler, I see a cult that has kidnapped a queen’s daughter and driven her mother to violent madness. Meanwhile, the temple - an overtly patriarchal institution - allows a woman, Pamina, to undergo the initiation rituals alongside her betrothed, a remarkably progressive move. Or perhaps we should just link The Flute to another enigma, Hamlet. You will never, ever figure it out, but it’s certainly fun to try.

Through Sept. 29, California Theatre, 345 S. First Street, San Jose. $58-$215, operasj.org, 408/437-4450.

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera critic and the author of 29 novels, including Punks for the Opera and Mermaids’ Tears, available at Amazon.

Assassins? Now?

 

Sondheim’s Assassins

July 19, 2024

3Below Theater, San Jose

It’s pretty wild that 3Below scheduled this show for a July 13 opening night. They canceled that performance (understandably), but the Attempt on Trump has certainly added an extra layer to the show’s meanings. At a time when the right wants to whitewash anything unseemly about our country’s past, it’s refreshing to hash out some of our ugliest moments in such a bold manner. Consider this one required viewing.

Jon Gourdine and Scott Guggenheim’s set presents the assassination parade as half-carnival, half-horserace. Each criminal is given a chair and a chute under a Vegas-style sign reading TAKE YOUR SHOT. Out comes The Proprietor, a character reminiscent of the Emcee from Cabaret. Kristi Garcia makes the most of it, deploying an impressive array of sly expressions and dazzling red hat and tails to play the role of temptress. The festive opening number says it all: “Everybody’s Got the Right.” (To kill the President.)

Arriving next is The Balladeer, which Jeremy Kreamer performs in an amiable Guthrie/Seeger fashion. His likeability presents a bit of a gut-punch later in the show, when he transforms into Lee Harvey Oswald.

The dubious roll call kicks off with John Wilkes Booth, who seems downright noble compared to the rest of the crazies. Stephen Guggenheim is a perfect match for this role, possessing the needed flash and intelligence for Booth, whose success as an actor meant that he didn’t need the fame sought by so many of the others. The highlight is a monologue in which Booth references the funeral lament of the widow Loman in Death of a Salesman - “Attention must be paid!” - to describe the quiet desperation of his successors.

Meanwhile, a great portion of the show’s appeal comes from recounting the assassins most people don’t know about, including:

Leon Czolgosz, who killed William McKinley, citing the hardships of American laborers. Omar Alejandro plays the part with particular intensity, both of person and (baritone) voice.

Charles Guiteau, a spirited con man who shot James Garfield (the greatest President who never had a chance to govern) because he didn’t grant him an ambassadorship to France. Dario Johnson did a fine job of projecting both Guiteau’s showy positivity and utter lack of substance, especially in his gospel-tinged farewell, “The Ballad of Guiteau.”

Samuel Byck, who dressed like Santa Claus and recorded messages to celebrities (including Sondheim cohort Leonard Bernstein), while working up the nerve to fly his private plane into Richard Nixon’s White House. Rick Haffner is excellent and funny, painting Byck as a sort of left-leaning Archie Bunker.

Fortunately, Sondheim and book writer John Weidman didn’t stop there. They had great fun spinning fanciful combinations. Squeaky Fromme and John Hinckley (Alexandra Shephard and Ryan Sammonds) perform a beautiful love song, “Unworthy of Your Love,” to their dreamboats, Charles Manson and Jodie Foster. The show’s climactic scene has Booth pleading with Oswald to take his notorious shots - and thereby restore the reputations of their infamous little club.

The show accidentally solves a great problem of Sondheim, which is his tendency to overuse his favorite musical devices. With Assassins, he draws on numerous historical sources, including folk, jazz, gospel and minstrelsy, which broadens his palette.

The performance I attended suffered some technical glitches, including the rebooting of a monitor during the show. Even this, however, provided some accidental meanings. The poor tech was stuck on a menu guide that kept returning to an ad for Dateline. Perhaps our assassination attempts are now merely another form of entertainment, as witnessed by the fashionable wearing of ear bandages.

Through August 4 at 3Below, 288 S. Second Street, San Jose. 408/404-7711, 3belowtheaters.com. $25-$65.

Michael J. Vaughn is a forty-year opera and theater critic, and the author of 29 novels, including Mermaids’ Tears and Punks for the Opera, available at Amazon.

Daniel Catan: Ahead of (Before His) Time

 

Elizabeth Caballero as Florencia.
Photo by David Allen.

Daniel Catan’s

Florencia en el Amazonas

April 20, 2024

In 1996, when Daniel Catan’s opera premiered at Houston Grand Opera, he seemed to have no idea that he was leading a revolution. Neither did the critics. Although they paid due tribute to the composer’s impressive abilities, they described his traditional approach, reminscent of Debussy and Strauss, as “quaint.”

Since then, a lot has changed. New works like Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking and Andre Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire wrested opera away from the musical experimentation of the 20th century and returned it to the storytelling and beautiful singing of its past.

I had the good fortune of seeing Florencia at Seattle Opera in the early 2000s, and although I found the music thrilling, the production was a little static. The opera spends much of its time on interior lives, and that’s always a bit of speed bump for stage directors.

As it turns out, the real home for Florencia is San Jose, a city with a rich Hispanic culture, where the local opera company already offers supertitles in both Spanish and English. OSJ has created a production that’s musically and visually gorgeous, never dull, and that features a cast full of Latine performers.

Marcela Fuentes-Berain’s libretto takes us on a river cruise shadowed by celebrity. The world-famous opera star Florence Grimaldi is returning to her native town of Manaus to re-open the opera house. She is surrounded by fellow travelers who represent various permutations of love. Alvaro and Paula (Efrain Solis and Guadalupe Paz) are the bickering long-marrieds. Rosalba and Arcadio are the youngsters, fully occupied with identity crises when they’re rudely interrupted by romance (my bandmate described this as a very Millennial behavior).

The third version is Florence herself, who sacrificed her feelings for a butterfly hunter, Cristobal, to pursue her career. Her return brings the hope of a reunion. She spells out her conflicted feelings in Florencia’s opening aria, a terrifically challenging piece with many peaks and valleys. Soprano Elizabeth Caballero handles the scene with aplomb, displaying a level of control over her top notes that is otherworldly. A similar aria opens the second act, after a storm has deposited the passengers on a riverbank.

Other vocal treats may be found with Alexa Anderson, who performs Rosalba with similar soprano agility, and the strong lyric tenor of Cesar Delgado as Arcadio. The duets between these two are luscious and charming. I found Rosalba to be the most intriguing character of all. Her fangirl pursuit of the great Grimaldi is as deep and Swift as the Amazon currents. The richest moments come when she’s actually talking to the great diva (who’s traveling incognito) and doesn’t know it.

Solis and Paz bring a different kind of magic to their souring marriage, which changes in a flash when one of them appears to be lost in the storm. Bass-baritone Vartan Gabrielian plays the Captain with a great joie de vivre. Baritone Ricardo Jose Rivera centers the more surreal scenes, his Riolobo acting as a human bridge between the present-day world and the Amazon’s indigenous past.

Director Crystal Manich does an amazing job of keeping this all moving, beginning with a market scene that almost bursts off the stage. She is helped tremendously by the ingenious set design of Liliana Duque-Pineiro. Various features of a vaporetto riverboat - the paddlewheel cover, the bridge, a removable helm - are shifted from scene to scene, seemingly moving the action from one part of the deck to another.

Costume designer Ulises Alcala makes the most of the South American palette, notably with Alvaro’s white dinner jacket and Rosalba’s jade-green dress. The capper is Florencia’s stunning final-act gown, a dazzling array of blue, purple and red, designed to represent her transformation into the Emerald Muse butterfly that her Cristobal was pursuing. This and many other tableaux in the production are so vivid that they resemble living paintings.

Conductor Joseph Marcheso and his orchestra were right at home with Catan’s score, as lush and verdant as the Amazon jungle, its unique timbral blend leaning on flute, clarinet and harp and augmented by marimba, steel pan and djembe. The sonic flow gives the opera a dreamlike, enchanting feel.

Through May 5 at California Theatre, 345 South First Street, San Jose. $55-$195. operasj.org, 408/437-4450. OSJ’s ‘24-’25 season incudes The Magic Flute (Sept. 14-29), La Boheme (Nov. 16-Dec. 1), Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle (Feb. 15-March 2) and Hector Armienta’s Zorro (April 19-May 4).

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera critic and the author of 29 novels, including his recent release, Punks for the Opera, available at Amazon.com.

Through the Darkness, Laughing

 

Matthew Kropschot as Mooney.
Photo by Dave Lepori.

San Jose Stage

Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen

April 6, 2024

Hangmen takes us to a Manchester pub in 1965, shortly after the executioner/publican, Harry, has been involuntarily retired by the UK’s abolition of hangings. Harry (Will Springhorn, Jr.) is a little miffed by the situation, and expresses his vast array of opinions to a journalist, Clegg (Matthew Locke). The subsequent article turns Harry into a local celebrity.

At first, quite frankly, the play seems like a bloody mess. The regulars are all yell-talking (the way drunks do) in broad Northern accents, and one wonders how a storyline’s going to fight its way through. Soon, however, one begins to see the logic of McDonagh’s delivery system. The newly ego’d Harry initiates the process by tossing out a heady pronouncement from the bar. Said idea is duly amended by the surly Inspector Fry (Michael Champlin) and amusingly misinterpreted by bespectacled regular Bill (Nick Mandracchia, looking a little like Elvis Costello). The half-deaf elder, Arthur (Randall King), asks what’s going on, and his assistant Charlie (Michael Storm) explains in overly blunt (but completely accurate) terms. Arthur then delivers his appellate summary, which, thanks to King’s masterful timing, is always funny.

Into this well-oiled philosophers’ den walks Mooney (Matthew Kropschot), a blond Yardbird from swingin’ London equipped with scads of charm underlain with a Deniro-like menace. As it turns out, Mooney is conspiring with Harry’s former assistant, Syd (Keith Pinto), to “bring Harry down a peg.” The problem is, the youngster is getting a little addicted to his powers. After escorting Harry’s teenage daughter Shirley (Carley Herlihy) to a seaside town, he returns to the pub to deliver a rambling but mesmerizing monologue about the perils that he may or may not have just set into motion. The entire second act plays out in suspense-saturated air, as McDonagh continually leaves us hanging (pun absolutely intended).

Springhorn, Jr. provides a solid sphere of narcissism and delusion around which Kropschot spins his dazzling satellites. Herlihy endows Shirley with an endearing packet of adolescent tortures, while her desperate mother Alice, played by Judith Miller, provides the play’s emotional center. Julian Lopez-Morillas makes a late entrance as Harry’s former boss, Pierrepoint, delivering a dressing down on all and sundry that verges on pyrotechnics.

Director James Reese succeeds in extracting a maximum dose of humor out of a very dark story. I found myself continually laughing and then thinking, “Why am I laughing at this?” If I had to come up with a tagline for the production, it would be, “Stupidity is much more dangerous than injustice.”

Through April 28 at The Stage, 490 S. First St., San Jose. $34-$74. www.thestage.org, 408/283-7142.

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera and theater critic and author of the novels Punks for the Opera and Mermaids’ Tears, available on Amazon.com.

Jerry Springer The Opera: WTFFF?

Richard Thomas’s

Jerry Springer the Opera

3Below Theater

February 24, 2024

Seeing Jerry Springer the Opera is something like being dumped into a latrine and coming back out with a handful of diamonds. You’ll be richer for the experience, but you will need to do some laundry. And take a shower, you stinky fuck!

Sorry. It’s just that this show is filthy, and it really revs up the potty mouth. Thomas makes it worse by taking the worst of these swear-bombs and turning them into little neoclassical ditties. My favorite is “What the fucking fucking fuck!” (You see, on the real Jerry they would bleep that out.)

Okay. So let’s attempt a plot summary. Mr. Springer - Ric Iverson, who does a dead-on impression - leads us through a typical episode, beginning with blue-collar dude Dwight (Joseph Meyers), who can’t seem to resist putting his dick into anything that moves. He informs his fiancee Peaches that he’s been having an affair with her best friend, Big Black and Beautiful Zandra, and then informs both of them that he’s also been boinking Tremont, a “chick with a dick.” (Thankfully, the confessional stops short of farm animals.)

Photo by Dave Lepori.

Next we have Montel (Jared Lee), who says he wants his girlfriend to treat him like a baby. Like a real baby. And then disposes of his tear-away suit, revealing a ripped bod and a diaper. (Lee also has a great tenor voice. I sorta hate him.)

And so it goes in Springer-land, until Jerry is shot by his warmup guy who’s really Satan, which should surprise no one. He wakes up in the underworld, where he’s ordered to host an episode of Jerry Springer in Hell. Either that, or face a punishment that includes barbed wire up the ass (“Barbed wire up the ass! Barbed wire up the ass!”)

The biblical tropes that follow are a little too predictable, but the Springer element certainly puts them in a new light. When Satan (Stephen Guggenheim) faces off against Jesus (super-bod Lee again), he says, “I have two words for you!” And then spends three or four minutes crafting a Mozartean fugue that begins with the syllable fuh and doesn’t end for a lo-o-ong time. Jesus, meanwhile, tries to dispel the devil’s anger with counterpoint. The sheer breath control from these two is dazzling.

The true opera fan, at this point, may be asking, But is this really opera? To which I would say, well, kinda. We’ve got genuine Handelian runs, Verdian choruses, Wagnerian anthems - sometimes just musical theater sung with operatic technique. One thing’s for sure: 3Below’s unique roster of hybrid opera/musical theater singers are perfectly suited to this weird fucking show.

It’s fun to see Joseph Meyers play horndog Dwight (and later, Elvis as God), because we also get to enjoy his gorgeous lyric tenor. Krista Wigle brings her big opera house soprano to Baby Jane, who does play-by-play on the second act, and Nina Edwards brings a similar bearing to Mary, Mother of God. B. Noel Thomas creates a stir with her baritone-to–soprano range, particularly as the Valkyrie, who repeatedly tries and a fails to act as Jerry’s conscience. Operatic veteran Jesse Merlin has a similar effect as chick-with-dick Tremont, suddenly unleashing a basso profundo. The cognitive dissonance is crazy.

It could be that a good healthy dose of cognitive dissonance is precisely what we need right now, as the whole fucking country goes off its rocker. Thomas and lyricist Stewart Lee premiered this show in London in 2003, and probably didn’t anticipate that the United States would eventually become the Jerry Springer Show writ large.

Oh, and those diamonds. After bathing in all this raunch, the effect of a surprising moment of sweetness is particularly sharp. Lyric soprano Lori Schulman (the unfortunate girlfriend of Diaper Man) expresses her simple desires in “I Wanna Sing Something Beautiful,” followed by hoochie mama Lynda Divito’s similar “I Just Wanna Dance,” a musical theater yearning song along the lines of “What I Did For Love.”  Fred Isozaki gives an oddly effective stage aside as security man Steve Wilkos. Much later, a KKK song-and-dance number seems intentionally similar to Springtime For Hitler.

And yes, there’s even some payback for all of Jerry’s crap-meistering. He’s introduced to hell by a litany of deaths cause by his guests’ appearances on his show. Baby Jane is walking around with a plumber’s wrench in her skull. Toward the end, he’s left to talk his way out, repeatedly slipping and falling on a ladder with each failed attempt.

As for my Final Note, I can’t really tell you what this show is about. That may be the point. I will tell you that opera singers singing about lesbians, drag queens and shitting in one’s diapers is one of the funniest things that you will ever witness. And if you should find the show offensive, I have two words for you: Fuh-uh-uh-UH, Fuh-uh-uh-uh-uh… Well, you get the point.

Through March 17, 3Below Theater, 288 S. Second Street, San Jose. 3BelowTheaters.com, 408/404-7711. $25-$65. 

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera critic and author of the novel Punks for the Opera, available at Amazon.com.

A Riveting Rigoletto

Photo by David Allen

 

Opera San Jose

February 17, 2024

The opening scene of Opera San Jose’s Rigoletto is so intense and perfect that it may lift you right out of your seat. It has a lot to do with Steven C. Kemp’s uber-masculine set, black pillars with blood-red draperies. And Mr. Howard Tsvi Kaplan’s costumes, dark with metallic inlays, which make the Mantuan court look like some badass medieval street gang.

It has mostly to do with the jester Rigoletto and his boss-enemy, the Duke. Eugene Brancoveanu brings to the former a servile desperation with an underlying air of danger, like a veteran with PTSD issues. Instead of the traditional hump, he sports a painful-looking scar across his temple (Christina Martin, makeup design), revealed later to be a kind of brand maintained by the Duke to keep him under his thumb. Brancoveanu has a magnificent baritone, equipped for rough postures, but capable of drawing back for the jester’s more frail moments. He also deploys fine touches, like the butterfly tra-las he lets fly during the court dance, or the odd commedia poses he strikes at key moments.

Our Duke is Edward Graves, an imposing presence with a delicious lirico spinto tenor. On the Duke of Mantua Continuum, from Don Giovanni playboy to pure evil Caligula, Graves errs on the side of “I will do whatever I want and you will like it.” This adds extra force when he very intentionally humiliates the Count Ceprano by making free use of his wife, then blithely dismisses the stentorian threats of Monterone (bass-baritone Philip Skinner) as the poor man demands the whereabouts of his daughter. When Monterone subsequenty lays down a curse, Brancoveanu nearly melts into the stage with anxiety. Graves, meanwhile, finds his vocal apex later with “Bella figlia dell’amore,” with which he somewhat unnecessarily seduces the assassin’s sister Maddalena.

The machismo continues with the assassin Sparafucile, who accosts Rigoletto outside his home and offers his services. Bass-baritone Ashraf Sewailam’s tone is like blackened barbecue ribs, and his stage presence is fringed with menace.

Rigoletto arrives home to his daughter and reconfirms his security demands to housemaid Giovanna in the fetching cabaletta “Ah! Veglia, o donna.” This and his later pleas to the courtiers are the most heartbreaking moments in Brancoveanu’s performance.

Melissa Sondhi plays Rigoletto’s daughter Gilda with a sweet, light tone. The lightness is no sin - Gildas tend to go this way - but Sondhi’s voice pales next to her powerhouse males, and the top notes of “Caro nome” are hesitant and pinched. The lack of power is also an issue for mezzo Melisa Bonetti Luna as Maddalena. She does, however, capture the twisted sister’s sexiness, and her misguided affections for the Duke.

Stage director Dan Wallace makes some intriguing choices. To Rigoletto’s scar he adds a case of syphilis for the Duke, who is shown having his pox bandaged by a servant. Wallace also works with fight choreographer Dave Maier to construct a final killing that is brutal and chaotic. In a sense, Maddalena’s multiple dagger-thrusts are much more real and upsetting than the traditional approach, in which the disguised Gilda accepts Sparafucile’s knife like someone embracing a lover.

Under conductor Jorge Parodi, the orchestra plays beautifully, beginning with that deceptively simple, lushly powerful overture. It’s almost like a content warning on a movie: This will NOT be a happy story.

Through March 3 at the California Theatre, 345 S. 1st St. $55-$195. operasj.org, 408/437-4450.

Michael J. Vaughn is a 40-year opera critic and the author of the novel Punks for the Opera, available at Amazon.