Past Production Reviews
2Beginning last Thursday, the New York City Opera staged its resurrection following a dark year, financial jeopardy and management disarray. With straitened means and only a few months to plan (George Steel, the company's general manager and artistic director, started work last February), City Opera's comeback season was pared to 30-odd performances of five operas, two this month and three in the spring. The company also hopes to get a lift from the acoustical and other improvements in its renamed David H. Koch Theater. "Don Giovanni," the season's only new production, performed on Sunday afternoon, came off the best. Director Christopher Alden's abstract, updated concept was convincing, and a good solution to some of the challenges of this piece. Paul Steinberg's set—two walls angled to create a triangular playing space—also seemed to aid vocal projection, and the strong cast made the most of it. The powerhouse cast embraced the concept with verve. Perhaps there's something to be said for engaging singers on short notice: This was a uniformly strong group, with six of the eight principals making their City Opera debuts. Keri Alkema was a rich-toned, passionate Donna Elvira and Stefania Dovhan pushed her soprano to the edge, giving Donna Anna more than a hint of madness. With his suave baritone, Daniel Okulitch made Don Giovanni both lethal and careless; Jason Hardy played Leporello as his cringing slave rather than alter ego. Gregory Turay's Don Ottavio was unusually forceful and interesting. Joélle Harvey and Kelly Markgraf made the peasant couple, Zerlina and Masetto, discover their power to resist and their own sexual connection. Bass Brian Kontes was an imposing Commendatore. Conductor Gary Thor Wedow led a vibrant performance, skillfully balancing the voices and the orchestra.
Marnie, however, keeps you guessing. Hitchcock was more optimistic than Graham, and Muhly and Wright have found a chilling middle way. It’s hard to love Marnie herself, but I was transfixed as she lied and stole her way, as Maggie, Martine and Mary, through Birmingham and most of the sizeable towns in Britain beginning with “B”. (Banbury, beware.) I did feel chemistry between her (spectacularly sung by Sasha Cooke, who showed the requisite stamina, scarcely being off-stage, except to change costumes, for the nearly three-hour performance) and the strangely sexy Mark Rutland (splendidly sung and acted by the Canadian bass-baritone, Daniel Okulitch), lusting for the frigid Marnie, a classy lady despite her upbringing in the “gutter”, and the nastiness of the anagnorisis, revealing who actually killed her newborn brother.
