Archive for February 21st, 2010

Margot and Bill Winspear Opera House, Dallas, February 19 21, 24, 27, March 5 and 7, 2010

Review by Dean Cassella

TDO’s mid-season offering is a delightful production of Don Pasquale, Donizetti’s most perennially favorite foray into opera buffa.  The work offers a relatively light breathing space between the comic but musically heavy Così Fan Tutte and what is sure to be heavy melodrama in Jake Heggie’s Moby Dick in April.

Chronologically speaking, Donizetti is the last of the great maestri in the line of Italian opera composers who worked firmly in the opera buffa tradition (Mozart’s comedies are, by contrast, among the earliest canonized examples).  This genre tends to focus on ridiculous, often scurrilous plots in contemporary settings that are full of stock characters, mistaken identities, etc.  Music wise, they tend toward florid vocal acrobatics which goes by the moniker coloratura singing.

The title character in Don Pasquale is a seventy-year old man who decides he is going to marry and produce heirs, in order to disinherit his nephew, Ernesto.  Ernesto, who is in love with a feisty young widow named Norina, plots with her and Pasquale’s physician, Dr. Malatesta, to convince the Don that she is a perfectly demure virginal bride, only to turn into an obnoxious and demanding spendthrift the moment the Don signs a mock marriage contract.  I’m sure my readers can see where this is all heading. . .  In a way, the role of Norina is really a refashioning of Rosina, the cunning, conniving belle of Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia¸ who also shares with Norina the obstacle of an old man who wishes to marry her for all the wrong reasons.

Donato DiStefano in the Title Role of Don Pasquale

Veteran basso Donato DiStefano takes the title role, and his performance is brilliant.  DiStefano is an absolute master of buffa roles, and has graced the TDO stage twice in recent memory: as Don Magnifico in 2004’s La Cenerentola (Cinderella), and in 2006 as Doctor Bartolo in Il Barbiere di Siviglia. He possesses masterful control over a rich, sonorous voice, and is unsurpassed as an actor.  In one of the earlier of his aria’s he performs a ‘strip tease’, as hilarious as it is ridiculous, as he contemplates the first meeting with his prospective bride.

Adriana Kucerova as the Scheming Young Widow Norina

Don Pasquale is a work that has only four heavy singing roles, and only one for a woman.  This makes the role of Norina doubly demanding.  In all honesty, Slovak soprano Adriana Kucerova,  a first-timer to TDO, is one of the most compelling singers I have seen live.  Her voice is at once delicate and powerful, and resonates with a hypnotic vibrato, over which she has absolute control.  She is also a fabulous comic actress and strikingly beautiful, to boot.  We can only hope that she will be returning to the Metroplex soon.

Indianan baritone Nathan Gunn did a fine job in the role of scheming troublemaker, Dr. Malatesta.  In addition to a solid voice, he acted the role with finesse.  Virginian tenor Norman Shankle was solid as the smitten young nephew, Ernesto.  His voice at times seemed thin, though; in his final duet with Kucerova, his voice was sometimes overpowered by the latter’s.

Guest conductor Stefano Ranzani’s conducting was very precise and lively, and the maestro handled the score throughout with grace.    Direction by TDO veteran Candace Evans was solid and sometimes even brilliant; at times, though, the visual pacing seemed to drag and occasionally one got the impression that the singers should have done something more than simply standing while facing the audience and sing.  This was in contrast to the lively direction she has given to TDO in recent years (e.g. The Merry Widow and Ariadne auf Naxos).

The sets, designed by the long deceased Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, are lovely, and just what one could expect: elegant, multi-storied affairs that adhere closely to the librettist’s intentions.  One can hardly ask for more.

To conclude, the production was a lot of fun.  The plot and music is highly accessible and thus Don Pasquale would be an ideal way to introduce someone to opera.  I attended the premiere with a thirteen year old boy, who loved it.  He was especially impressed with DiStefano’s take on the Don.  And as for his impression of the Winspear Opera House: “What a cool building!!!”

[T]here’s another kind of love: the cruelest kind. The one that almost kills its victims. Its called unrequited love. Of that I am an expert. Most love stories are about people who fall in love with each other. But what about the rest of us? What about our stories, those of us who fall in love alone? We are the victims of the one sided affair. We are the cursed of the loved ones. We are the unloved ones, the walking wounded. The handicapped without the advantage of a great parking space!

-Kate Winslet as Iris in The Holiday

Before I begin this tirade of bitterness, and before you sigh, as College Girl goes off on another rant about being single, let me tell you that this post is not my idea; it is the editor’s. I begrudgingly said I would do it, but only because 1) I have no other ideas for a post at the moment and 2) the nagging of small children for parents to do things is only surmounted by the nagging of parents for older children to do things.

Many of you are familiar with my earlier post, “Why Girls Put Guys in the Friends Zone.” It is quite popular; you’d be surprised how many people Google that exact term. You might also be familiar with my not-so-positive recollection of the movie He’s Just Not That Into You, which I despised. Call it salt in a wound, call it too close to home, call it the anger of an irate single person, whatever. I hated it. And I will fill the following with as much shaking-of-fist at the heavens and asking-why, as sardonic wit poured into the above-mentioned post. That was cynical; this is acerbic.

So, the issue, quite succinctly, is as the editor posed in “Submit Your Questions for God.” Looking up to the heavens, raised hands, pleading, one says “is it really fair that those we love are free not to care about us in the least?”

Because they can. Apathy. That’s right, worse than hate, the opposite of caring; their eyes, scanning the room, can pass over you like water over wax; all the flurries in your stomach and hopes and interest can go as unnoticed as any single grain of sand lying in amongst billions of others on a beach. Speaking of a beach, those thoughts of the two of you walking down one, flicking that same sand up with your feet and laughing without a care in the world are apparently not going to be fulfilled anytime soon: the person you are watching so keenly has many cares in the world; unfortunately you aren’t one of them.

Of all the cruelties in the world, this is one of the harshest. How, God, how, can we care so much, so ardently, and yet – nothing?

This experience occurs in nearly every chick movie I have ever seen – the archetypal besotted girl, desperately tries to get him to notice her, day after day or year after year. All’s well that ends well, though, as the guy of her dreams sneaks into her life while she is pining for someone else, or the original object of affection has a total change of heart, and, just in time, resolution occurs – “happily ever after.”

But those are movies. Not real life. As much as they create a great diversion, they are a chimera. Furthermore, even if they are based in fact, they aren’t your life. After all, one may have many colleagues who have finally succeeded to find someone to share their days and weeks with; still doesn’t change the fact that your love life as about as interesting and appealing as a wilted cabbage.

So, are we doomed to wander the planet alone – forever? Is there hope? The outcomes of those movies and books and stories from your best friend – could they all elude you? Patience obtains all things, right? I’m sure if we can all live long enough, we can beat the odds; we can beat the total lack of eligible partners, or the total lack of proper communication and the right coincidences conducive to budding relationships. Too bad that, as Inigo says in The Princess Bride, “I hate waiting.”

Being single isn’t the worst thing that could happen to you, though. And, it is one aspect of your life that could take a turn at any moment; who knows who will come around the corner? Be strong, be patient; “after all,” as Scarlett O’Hara said, “tomorrow is another day!”