THEATER REVIEW: CINDERELLA



Cinderella (Kate Lindsay) in Cinderella.

 Fairytale Marx a spot

By Ed Rampell

This L.A. Opera production of Gioachino Rossini’s Cinderella (La Cenerentola) is nothing short of a sheer delight. It ranks amongst the most enchanting of all of the operas I’ve ever seen. The music, conducted by James Conlon, is frothy, as lighthearted as the Wagnerian Flying Dutchman’s score and story are full of sturm und drang. Joan Guillen’s sets are inventive, while his costuming, along with the stellar cast -- including a charming quintet of mice -- are exceedingly magical. Mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey fits the bill perfectly in the title role (Georgian mezzo-soprano Ketevan Kemoklidze plays Cinderella during the April performances) and Italian bass-baritone Vito Priante as Dandini steals scenes with a kleptomaniac’s gay abandon.

More on the stellar cast below, but what of the story? Rossini’s cheery concoction, with its libretto by Jacopo Ferretti, is of course a retelling of the vintage fairy tale first published in 1697 and subsequently re-published by the Grimm Brothers circa 1812. Fans beware: Rossini’s version is different from others with some dissimilar elements, which this plot-spoiler adverse reviewer won’t disclose. But the essential storyline remains the same.

In essence, poor little Cinderella is mercilessly exploited by her stepsisters Clorinda (soprano Stacey Tappan) and Tisbe (played, in a bit of unconventional if welcome casting -- despite a libretto line referring to her ivory white skin -- by the Black mezzo-soprano Ronnita Nicole Miller), and step-father, the wittily named Don Magnifico (Italian baritone Alessandro Corbelli). These three rascals dream of grandeur, but apparently live in a home that has seen better days, hence the cutest mice this side of the Mickey Mouse Club and the Mouseketeers in the household that is slavishly looked after by the downtrodden Cinderella. She is reduced in status and role to a mere scullery maid, a servant -- if not an outright slave -- by her step-siblings and stepfather, who are genuinely cruel to this impoverished but pretty young lady who sweeps the cinders and cooks their meals.

In the guise of a fairy tale Rossini and his librettist are clearly making reference to the exploitation of labor. Other scenes and characters reinforce a social critique composed a year before the birth of Karl Marx. In an expression of class solidarity as well as in a simple humane act of compassion, Cinderella surreptitiously gives a character she believes to be a beggar -- whom her haughty stepsisters with their pretensions towards superiority scorn -- food.

But this aspect of class conflict is further expressed by another character, and ladies and gentlemen, please allow me the pleasure of introducing you to the great Dandini. In Cinderella there’s a lot of mistaken and/or hidden identity -- an operatic convention -- and Dandini is actually the (not-so-)humble servant of dashing Don Ramiro (tenor Rene Barbera), although through a series of plot contrivances they trade places and switch roles. Dandini relishes playing the powerful prince and assumes this part, full of social status and stature, with gusto. He enjoys dressing for the part and is quite a dandy -- hence his rather hilariously apropos nomenclature. Priante plays the character with great panache, full of sparkling wit, in portraying the subservient flunky who yearns to be the top banana, but for the unfair societal pecking order he is, unfortunately, born into.

Rossini’s titular character in The Barber of Seville similarly chafes under these unfair class distinctions imposed upon Figaro, who is also the lead character in Mozart’s 18^th century The Marriage of Figaro. Through these class conscious characters in class conflict with their “betters” Mozart expressed nascent Enlightenment ideals while Rossini evoked the French Revolution’s principles of “Liberte, eqalite, fraternite.” One can easily imagine both Figaro and Dandini singing Tevye’s lament in Fiddler on the Roof: “Lord… Would it spoil some vast eternal plan, If I were a wealthy man?”

Although Rossini explores themes of class struggle in Cinderella, the war between the classes is resolved magically -- with a dose of Christian morality -- through the genre conventions of the fairytale, wherein all the characters live happily ever after (with the possible exception of that rapscallion Dandini, who is, alas, once again reduced to servitude). However, the Italian composer was also capable of positing a political solution to social injustice. Rossini’s final opera, William Tell, is an explicitly political tale about revolution, which celebrates Swiss resistance to the tyrannical Hapsburg dynasty. Interestingly, like Cinderella, this 1829 opera is also suggested by legend (if not fairytales per se). In it, Rossini renders rousing music of a revolutionary nature, of justice triumphing over oppression. As all good Lone Ranger fans know its brassy musical fanfare and theme literally trumpeting the arrival of righteousness is derived from the incomparable, galloping William Tell Overture.

But in Cinderella we have a more playful Rossini, his bel canto opera full of great comic performances by droll, grandiose stepsisters and a stepfather who never miss the opportunity to overstep their boundaries; those whimsical, cavorting acrobatic rodents; and the one, the only great Dandini. Cinderella touchingly sings, “Virtue is my splendor, love my wealth” and later, when the wrongs are righted and the last has become first, she warbles: “My revenge is forgiveness.”

What a great fable full of utopian sentiment, of commoners and royals united in a moral certitude and rectitude.

This opera is ideal for children of all ages.


Cinderella runs through April 7 at L.A. Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave. For more info: 213/972-8001; www.laopera.com.

 

THEATER REVIEW: END OF THE RAINBOW



Judy Garland (Tracie Bennet) in End of the Rainbow.

 Live at Rainbow's End

By Ed Rampell

The star playing Judy Garland (Tracie Bennett), playwright (Peter Quilter) and director (Terry Johnson) of the Tony Award nominated End of the Rainbow are all Brits, and this Judy Garland bio-play is appropriately set in London.

After a series of show biz and personal setbacks, Garland sought a career reboot there in 1968. The action takes place in Garland’s suite -- which, the diva repeatedly gripes, is too munchkin sized -- at the Ritz Hotel and the Talk of the Town nightclub, with the sets convincingly designed by William Dudley. Although this is the sizzling sixties at the swinging London town of Sgt. Peppers and the Rolling Stones, Garland -- who’d become a movie star 30 years earlier in Love Finds Andy Hardy and The Wizard of Oz -- still commands a loyal following.

But offstage -- and sometimes on- -- the oft-married Garland is beset by personal demons, bedeviled by financial problems and relationship woes. Worst of all, Garland is in the grips of alcoholism and an addiction to amphetamines and barbiturates that greatly heighten her torment, whether performing in public before a nightclub or radio audience or in the privacy of her quarters.

The gay icon’s fifth husband to be, Mickey Deans (Erik Heiger), is a former club owner and jazz pianist who seeks to control Judy’s substance abuse -- and possibly the out-of-control Garland herself. It’s interesting that toward the end of her life Garland hooked up with a beau who bore the same first name as Mickey Rooney, her co-star in nine Andy Hardy movies. Was this handsome lounge singer a dozen years younger than Garland really in love with her or using Judy as his meal ticket?

The star’s gay pianist, Anthony (Michael Cumpsty), thinks so, and there is even an allusion to Mickey’s writing a book about Garland in order to cash in (indeed, Deans' co-authored 1972’s Weep No More, My Lady). As Anthony and Mickey duel over Garland’s well-being, performances and affections, there’s an exchange about Judy’s gay fans that’s brief but intriguing.

The self-absorbed Garland is alternately touching, lusty, witty, desperate and pathetic during the offstage scenes at the Ritz. While trodding the boards at the Talk of the Town, accompanied (when they can follow her!) by a live five piece band, the onetime superstar alternates between the commanding stage presence of a truly immense talent and a drug addled performer one step away from becoming a has been, as the years and decades of substance abuse catch up with her, along with an unfulfilled private life.

Bennett’s Garland is often salty; she slings some humorous zingers about her sex life (or lack of) with husband Vincent Minnelli, and more. (In the play there’s little if any mention of Liza Minnelli, the daughter she had with this director.) In the interests of full disclosure this reviewer/film historian should reveal he is no expert in all things Judy, but having said that it seems that Bennett does a superb job incarnating -- rather than merely “impersonating” -- a 46-ish year old Garland. Bennett, who’s the right age for the role, seems to capture and express Judy’s mannerisms and movements, minus any trace of Tracie’s English accent. The actress also looks remarkably like Garland, who in her post-Dorothy years was no conventional beauty. Most importantly, Bennett can belt out a tune worthy of the character she is inhabiting and depicting. Bennett’s portrayal is nothing short of uncanny.

However, End of the Rainbow shares a problem with other biopics/bioplays that portray the later years of actual historical personages, such as the 2000 film Pollock starring Ed Harris as action painter Jackson Pollock. The playwright does not provide enough back story for viewers unfamiliar with the subjects being depicted to explain their self destructive behavior. In Quilter’s script there is only a very brief allusion to Judy’s youth that explains where her drug habit began, but there needs to be a bit more info for the uninitiated and younger auds. After all, Garland became a star back in the 1930s and died more than 40 years ago.

Yip Harburg, who wrote the lyrics of Judy’s signature tune, “Over the Rainbow” and other songs in the beloved 1939 classic, The Wizard of Oz (a blockbuster spin off was just released), was a socialist who was later blacklisted. In that spirit, it would have been interesting to pursue the angle of Louis B. Mayer, MGM and even Judy’s mom mercilessly exploiting the labor of this phenomenal child artist, using uppers and downers to squeeze every drop of talent and sweat out of her during her waking moments. Indeed, this lifelong drug addiction enabled the studio powers that be to control the singer-actress part of her life, and arguably to ruin the rest. Although this aspect of exploitation is raised vis-à-vis the Mickey Deans character, and how he comes to cope with her addictions to love and substances, the playwright could have more fully explored this theme in End of the Rainbow.

I mean, how is a star of screen, clubs, live concerts, television and recordings reduced to avoiding a hotel manager in order to beat bills? As great as Bennett’s live numbers performed during the nightclub scenes are -- and her singing and hoofing is worthy of Garland in all her glory -- End of the Rainbow is a cautionary tale. Fame is no substitute for a rewarding personal life offstage and offscreen, with loving family, friends, lovers/spouses. For Garland, celebrity and adulation proved to be empty intoxicants: There was no man behind the curtain for troubled Judy. Like amphetamines, renown may give one a temporary perk and high, but being a legend cannot replace the need for flesh and blood true love.

Why is it that the happiness some artists give to so many eludes them? You’d have to be a Tin Man with no heart to not be moved by this dramatization of the last days of the late, not-so-great Judy Garland.


End of the Rainbow runs through April 21 at the Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N. Grand Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90012. For more info: www.centertheatregroup.org/; 213/972-4400.

 

    

THEATER REVIEW: LA WOMEN'S THEATRE FESTIVAL

Lee Meriwether in Spoon River Anthology.

The new twenty

By Ed Rampell

Spring is here and so is the annual Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival, which kicked off its 20^th anniversary Emerald celebration with a champagne reception, awards ceremony and performances on March 21 at the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center. Actors Danny Glover and Hattie Winston co-hosted the gala for this fete that shines the spotlight on solo performances by females in front of the footlights. In addition to highlighting the female of the species, LAWTF shines a much deserved light on multi-cultural women who are often overlooked by the male dominated culture.

The two pieces presented at the LAWTF launch are prime examples of the one-woman show. Inside the Center’s spacious Renberg Theatre veteran actress and beauty queen Lee Meriwether incarnated a series of completely different women in her abbreviated presentation of a series of vignettes based on Edgar Lee Masters’ free-form poems in the Spoon River Anthology. Each character seemed to be depicted by a different actress, but no, every single Spoon River Anthology woman onstage was indeed expertly portrayed by the same thespian and former Miss America, as Meriwether demonstrated a whirlwind of versatility in doing so.

In Freda Sings Lena and Ella accomplished actress and singer Freda Payne assumed the personas of vocalists Ella Fitzgerald and Lena Horne, performing some of their better and lesser known numbers, accompanied on the keyboards by Eric Butler. The act included Payne bantering in character in between songs, providing intimate glimpses into the souls of those ladies who had sung the blues and much more.

Co-hosts Glover and Winston gave LAWTF’s awards to five outstanding women who have contributed to the performing arts. Choreographer/ dancer Dulce Capdocia received the Integrity Award. Hoofer Heidi Duckler was given the Maverick Award. The Rainbow Award for fostering multi-cultural theatre went to actress Lissa Reynolds, Managing and Co-Artistic Director of Fremont Centre Theatre. To honor her long stage and screen career, thespian Starletta DuPois was awarded the Eternity Award. In presenting this lifetime achievement accolade to his former co-star, co-host Glover quipped, “Eat your eggs, Walter Lee,” referring to a line DuPois had said to him in a theatrical production of A Raisin in the Sun.

All of the honorees delivered acceptance speeches, except for the late Lupe Ontiveros, posthumous recipient of the Infinity Award for exceptional achievements of a theatre talent. One of her sons received the award and spoke movingly on his mother’s behalf. Throughout the ceremony and performances co-host Glover was in fine form, and despite having flown in from the East Coast specifically for the occasion seemed to be immensely enjoying himself. LAWTF co-founder and President Adilah Barnes, looking sharp in a purple beret, was also in fine fettle as she joined her co-founder and board members on the boards to celebrate Festival’s Emerald Anniversary, making it the longest running annual solo festival geared for women in L.A.

LAWTF runs through March 27, when for one night only the Festival relocates from the Renberg Theatre to the Ivy Substation in Culver City, the Actors’ Gang’s usual lair. Some highlights include: Kim Coles presents an autobiographical chronicle of her life in show biz, Oh, But Wait, There’s More!  Sandy Brown’s Oh, Yes She Did! wherein the comedian/actress portrays outstanding women of conscience and consciousness. In Sunday sessions devoted to the male of the thespian species, actor Roger Guenveur Smith (Do the Right Thing) depicts the abolitionist in Frederick Douglass Now. Mzuri Moyo brings another iconic activist alive in The Fannie Lou Hamer Story. LAWTF appropriately takes place during Women’s History Month, and in addition to great performances offers a number of relevant panels and workshops.

An annual theater highlight in L.A.’s stage scene, I’ve covered this Festival for a number of years. My favorite one-woman show remains Saria Idana’s bravura performance in her Homeless in Homeland, which boldly tackled the thorny topic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during the 2011 LAWTF. Here’s hoping for at least another 200 years for LAWTF.


The Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival runs through March 24 at the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center, 1125 McCadden Place, Hollywood, CA, 90038. LAWF’s final performance is March 27 at the Actors’ Gang at the Ivy Substation Theatre, 9070 Venice Blvd., Culver City, CA 90232. For more info: www.lawtf.com; 818/760-0408. 

FILM REVIEW: THE WE AND THE I

A scene from The We and the I.

Fame: bully for them, chilly for you

By Don Simpson

School is officially out for the summer as a bunch of high schoolers crowd onto a city bus. With no adult authority figures willing to keep the kids in line, the bus is quickly segregated into two distinct groups: the bullies and the bullied. Out-numbered and unwilling to take a stand against a gang of hood-rat brats, the adults opt to exit the bus — some more gracefully than others — until the bus driver is left with a bunch of unruly teens. The bus devolves into an urban The Lord of the Flies on wheels as the kids jockey for power by using mental and physical torture against each other. The meanest and the crudest claw their way to the top of the pile, leaving a trail of emotionally devastated victims in their wake, but rather than dissolving into a state of total anarchy, kids exit the bus at their respective stops and their diminishing numbers slowly alter the tone of the remaining group. What begins as a pack of feral wolves transforms into more civil pairings, initiating increasingly intimate conversations.

The We and the I is an interesting social experiment in which writer-director Michel Gondry casts a bunch of non-professional actors straight out of a Bronx high school and crams them into this mobile social boiling pot. In theory, Gondry just wants them to be themselves as he clinically observes the pack mentality of teenagers, then tests what happens when the numbers of the pack begins to dwindle and as the bus transports them farther from school and closer to home. In significant numbers, the bullies are invincible; they are both fearless and selfish. As individuals, however, they are totally different people. Some of them might even become nice, albeit still a bit self-centered. Of course there is no denying the presence of the video cameras and modest crew changes their reality. At the very least, these outside forces form a safety net to ensure that the seemingly immoral bullies won’t push things too far. Sure, there may not be any authority figure on screen, but there is no greater authority than the director behind the camera.

Regardless of their subtle personality adjustments, after suffering through their relentless bullying for so long, these characters can never become likable. These are bad people, constantly fighting, teasing and insulting each other; they wallow in this cesspool of hatred and anger, gossiping and gloating, bragging and bullying. The We and the Iseems to just support the theory that our world is going to hell in a hand basket if these morally-deprived youth of today are any reflection of our future. This is the type of film that makes me glad that I do not have any kids because I would not want to subject anyone to the mental torture presented throughout The We and the I. It is worth noting, however, that Gondry remains merely a fly on the wall; placing any moralizing or condescension into the hands of the critics and audience.

 

FILM REVIEW: ON THE ROAD

Marylou (Kristen Stewart) in On the Road.

The beat goes on

 

By Ed Rampell

 

In Jack Kerouac’s novel and director Walter Salles’ film adaptions thereof, Sal Paradise (Sam Riley), Dean Moriarty (Garrett Hedlund) and male friends with literary aspirations and sexy female companions careen about the continent in a car, driving like whirling dervishes from place to place, stopping long enough to have madcap misadventures from Denver to Louisiana, San Francisco to Manhattan.

 

Of course, this is a gross oversimplification. What makes the novel -- and movie -- riveting is its context and subtext, as a testament of youthful restlessness and rebellion in America’s postwar years. Listen closely, and you’ll hear fascistic Senator Joe McCarthy on the radio; watch intently, and you’ll see Tricky Dick Nixon on the tube. Kerouac rendered in literary form the cadence and tempo of be-bop music. Along with Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, On The Road is the seminal, iconic work of the Beat generation, a countercultural movement against the “American Way” of A-bombs, anti-communism, McCarthyism, materialism, uber-conformity, etc., in favor of a Bohemian quest for the meaning of life.

 

While the film has many attributes, one of the boldest aspects of this movie is its in-your-face homosexuality. It’s been about 20 or so years since I read On the Road, so memory may fail me, but I don’t remember the gay sex openly recounted in the published version of Kerouac’s text, which he self censored prior to Viking Press’ 1957 publication of the novel in those straighter, more straitlaced times. So if the filmmakers decided to inject this by actually making use of our greater freedoms of expression today, bravo.

 

However, I do recall what A. Robert Lee called “interracial love” in “Tongues Untied, Beat Ethnicities, Beat Multiculture” in the aforementioned The Philosophy of the Beats. Lee references “Sal’s campesina lover Terry”; Brazilian actress Alice Braga winsomely plays the character based on Bea Franco; Sal and Dean have an orgy with Mexican women and also befriend the African American jazz musician Walter (Terrence Howard). One can’t stress enough what a taboo it was for Kerouac to daringly depict inter-ethnic sex and friendships in America where apartheid was still widely practiced, as he also courageously did in other works, such as in 1958’s The Subterraneans. Progressives will also be moved by sequences of the migrant farm workers’ plight.

 

  

 

 

SXSW 2013: COMPUTER CHESS

A scene from Computer Chess.

Slouching toward Alphaville

By Don Simpson

Andrew Bukalski’s Computer Chess is exactly what I would imagine an immersive documentary about computer chess programmers circa 1980 to look like. Modeled loosely as a first person — dare I say “found footage” — narrative, Bujalski’s film documents a computer chess tournament a few years before computers are expected to conquer humans…at least within the realm of the 64 squares of the chess board. As if these programmers learned nothing from 2001: A Space Odyssey or Battlestar Galactica, they teach their respective team’s computer to play a board game that was developed centuries ago by humans, for humans.

To win at chess, one must be able to predict his or her opponent’s future moves; presumably these programmers are on the cusp of developing code that will allow computers to do just that, anticipate the decisions that a human will make in the future. Imagine the possibilities in military, political, financial and marketing strategizing if computers could accurately predict human behavior. Essentially, these hyper-intelligent men -- and let’s not forget the one woman -- are laying the groundwork for Artificial Intelligence. You might call it a god complex, their desire to develop a form of consciousness purely out of circuitry and code. Bujalski, however, doesn’t present us with a heavy-handed diatribe about computer programmers with god complexes; these are just a bunch of nerds who can effortlessly ramble on and on and on about technology to eye-glazing — and eye-rolling — proportions. Carbray (James Curry) is the perfect example of a programmer who seems to speak in a language that indecipherable to anyone but himself. The meandering linguistic smokescreen befuddles whoever is listening to him, rendering them powerless in debating his oblique hypotheses. It is the Computer Chess ensemble’s propensity for philosophizing that reminds me of Richard Linklater’s Slacker but, whereas Linklater’s film ruminates upon the existential crises of humans, Bujalski’s film expounds upon the existential crises of synthetic consciousness.

Bujalski makes an interesting decision to juxtapose the technology-driven participants of the computer chess conference with the followers of a new age guru from Africa. The guru professes the significance of the human heart and soul, teaching his followers to be more open and loving to others. The computer chess teams are secretive and competitive. They are focused on exploring a mechanical consciousness rather than looking inward towards their own. This tactic may seem a bit too contrived -- that is until the two groups interact with each other, then Bujalski’s approach makes a lot more sense.

Winner of the Alfred P. Sloan at this year's Sundance Film Festival, Computer Chess carefully balances high-minded philosophy with comedy and pathos. All the while, Bujalski achieves an ultimate level of realism by enlisting a cast of computer savvy actors and non-actors who at least seem like they know what they’re rambling on about. The production design is the real show-stopper though; this is a masterfully stylized film saturated with authenticity.

SXSW 2013: A TEACHER

A scene from A Teacher.

Sex education

By Don Simpson

Diana (Lindsay Burdge) is a high school teacher who is clandestinely carrying out an affair with one of her students, Eric (Will Brittain). The two of them rarely converse, except for whenever they are coordinating their next meet up. Their relationship seems to be purely sexual and mutually consensual: an attractive teacher enjoys the energy and stamina of a teenage boy, while a teenage boy enjoys the maturity and experience of a teacher who is probably the subject of many of his classmates’ sexual fantasies.

Fully understanding the risks of having an affair with a student, Diana continues to do so as means of shirking her adult responsibilities. She has become purposefully estranged from her brother (Jonny Mars) in order to avoid having to take care of their sick mother. Diana’s relationship with Eric is a way for her to latch onto immaturity and youth. Despite her authoritative position at work, Diana enjoys playing a submissive role with Eric, dutifully obeying his commands like a well-trained pet.

Writer-director Hannah Fidell’s A Teacher maintains an extremely high level of suspense as Diana takes bigger and bigger chances in order to be with Eric. Brian McOmber’s masterfully atonal and percussive score escalates the film’s tension with its disturbing alternation between droning and piercing sounds; and it is not long before we realize that McOmber is forcing us inside of Diana’s crazed head-space. Andrew Droz Palermo’s cinematography is equally unnerving as it places us directly within the personal space of the characters. By always placing Diana within or nearby the camera’s frame, we experience the world of A Teacher from her intimate perspective. As Diana’s perception of reality becomes increasingly skewed and confined, so does our view of the onscreen events.

Fidell’s film commendably avoids explaining anything. Beginning and ending in medias res, we never truly grasp Diana and Eric’s motivations; and by honing in on the carnal desires of their present, Fidell cleverly negates the significance of Diana and Eric’s past and future.

Burdge proves herself to truly be a force to be reckoned with in this breakout performance. Not to discredit Will Brittain’s impressive performance, but the effectiveness of A Teacher rests heavily upon the shoulders of Burdge. With the aforementioned assistance of the cinematography and score, Burdge utilizes her eyes and body movements to reveal Diana’s vulnerability, naiveté and desperation. We may have seen stories like Diana’s before, but Fidell and Burdge present Diana from a uniquely feminine perspective. Diana is never a monstrous sexual predator; she is just someone who is just looking for love in a socially unacceptable place.

THEATER REVIEW: THE FLYING DUTCHMAN

Tomas Tomasson in The Flying Dutchman.

Pop Cultured

By Ed Rampell

There is a popular misconception regarding so-called “high art,” like plays by Shakespeare and operas are elitist, only able to be fully understood and appreciated by the hoity-toity. But is this reputation deserved? What is Hamlet other than a revenge tale worthy of Quentin Tarantino and a ghost story? And what is Richard Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman (Der Fliegende Holländer) if not a rip roaring ghost story, highly charged by greed, and lest we forget, sexual frisson?

The composer adapted his 1843 opera from 17^thcentury seafaring folklore, about a phantom ship roaming the high seas, never able to return to its home port. Only one thing can spare the ship’s captain -- the eponymous Dutchman (Icelandic baritone Tomas Tomasson) -- from his eternal nautical roaming: true love. Due to a storm off the coast of Norway the Dutchman encounters Daland (bass James Creswell), and they strike a sort of Faustian bargain: The Dutchman offers the Norwegian captain a treasure chest in exchange for his daughter’s hand in marriage.

Senta was to be played by Portuguese soprano Elisabete Matos, but according to L.A. Opera’s publicist, 12 minutes before the curtain was scheduled to rise on opening night, March 9, in a scene straight out of a 1930s Hollywood musical, Matos “had suddenly become indisposed, and would be unable to perform. Instead, soprano Julie Makerov would.

As the old saying puts it, “the show must go on!”, and boy, did it ever -- and marvelously so. Maerov flew right into The Flying Dutchman. Fortunately, according to her website bio, Makerov had previously played Senta at Canada and Salzburg, and she performed peerlessly at the premiere. Makerov brought the wronged Senta vividly to life with song and acting, as she tried to defend her honor and purity to two suitors: The Dutchman and the hunter Erik (American tenor Corey Bix). Senta’s sonorous, spirited self defense might even make a Shakespeare write “methinks the lady doth not protest too much.” Whether singing “Senta’s Ballad” or the famous duet with the nautical specter she is betrothed to, Makerov admirably rose to the occasion -- especially given her 12-minute notice to report for duty aboard the HMS Chandler.

The sets by Bavarian scenery designer Raimund Bauer, costumes by his fellow German Andrea Schmidt-Futterer and lighting design by Duane Schuler, strike the right imaginative, eerie chords in expressing this shadowy, supernatural saga. During the emotion laden 10-minute overture, a scrim of surging seas is accompanied by music that could best be called “Wagnerian,” conveying a sense of turbulent, crashing waves. Act I transports us out to sea aboard creatively evoked ships near a Norwegian harbor. Later in this three-acter the entire ensemble gathers at Daland’s Scandinavian village, and the mass mise-en-scene is quite impressive and at times appropriately ghoulish. During these scenes the work of choreographer Denni Sayers -- with some balletic moves -- and chorus director Grant Gershon especially shine.

As well it should be, the production is quite Germanic -- Schmidt-Futterer’s costumes are at times extremely suggestive of German silent cinema’s Expressionism, with period apparel reminiscent of the demonic title character of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and F.W. Murnau’s telling of the Dracula fable, Nosferatu. In other scenes the costuming reminded me of L.A. Opera’s highly stylized re-telling of Wagner’s Ring Cycle a few seasons back, with its pseudo-Star Wars panache.

And what of The Flying Dutchman’s music and of the librettist and composer, who about 30 years later would complete The Ring of the Nibelungen? The Flying Dutchman’s theme of exile would psychologically appeal to Wagner -- not only because he was a globetrotter himself, but in only five or so years after presenting The Flying Dutchmanhe would himself become a stateless wanderer due to his taking part in Europe’s 1848 workers revolution. Wagner was forced to flee Germany and live abroad in Switzerland for around 12 years. Like the Dutchman, Wagner would be “banished from his homeland.” The phantom mariner was the first of Wagner’s exile characters, and on a metaphorical, metaphysical level one can perceive that this genius would identify with the outcast. Wagner knew what it felt like to be a persona non grata. And given his tumultuous private life Wagner could presumably relate to the turmoil of the relationship between the Dutchman, Senta and Erik -- a rather messy ménage-a-trois, if ever there was one, with that fourth partner named “fate.”

The sonorous score, deftly conducted by James Conlon, is full of Wagner’s hallmark sonic sturm und drang: brassy refrains, drums, dramatic outbursts and the like, which some might consider to be bombastic. But the earnest music also conveys a powerful, transcendent sense of yearning and longing -- to belong, be loved and for home.

Please note: The two and a half hour-plus opera is performed sans intermission.



The Flying Dutchman runs through March 30 at L.A. Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave. For more info: 213-972-8001; www.laopera.com.