SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Production

Patrick Gardner, Director

Mark Morris, Choreographer

Adrianne Lobel, Set Design

James F. Ingalls, Lighting Design

Cast

Christine Brandes, Soprano

Lisa Saffer, Soprano

John McVeigh, Tenor

Andrew Foster-Williams, Baritone

It was good to see Mark Morris's revival of his 1988 production of Handel's ode L'Allegro, Il Penseroso ed il Moderato, if only to be reminded of how incredibly creative and imaginative Morris could be. His most recent productions have been, at best, moderate successes. His direction of Haydn's opera L'Isola Disabitata performed last year at the John Jay College by the Gotham Opera Company demonstrated some aspects of this decline. Granted that may not have been a top notch opera, but the Morris didn't help it by having as the sole staging prop (aside from a blow-up toy of a fawn fondled by the ingenue), a rock representing the island. This set reminded me of the dozens of stock desert islands of dozens of marooned New Yorker cartoon characters. The only difference being that this island holds the entire cast of four singers. The two female singers are dressed in diaphanous disarray and one of the two men is dressed solely in a towel as if he had just gotten out of the shower. In his 2008 staging and choreography of Purcell's King Arthur for the New York City Opera silliness meets sublime music. For this semi-opera the costumes were designed by Isaac Mizrahi who previously and successfully collaborated with Morris in Rameau's Plateé. Outrageous costumes work in an opera about a self-centered frog but do not work for King Arthur called by Purcell himself a “dramatick opera.” I don't think the composer or the librettist, John Dryden, would have liked to see their characters dressed in tee shirts or just their underwear; the famous aria, The Cold Song, is sung by the bass-baritone from a refrigerator rolled onto the stage!

 

I am happy to say that few of these eccentricities marred the Mark Morris production of L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato performed at Lincoln Center's David H. Koch Theater. From hindsight one can see some of the above mentioned defects in this early work (1988) work: exaggerated vaudevillian gestures, cartoonish mimicking of what is being sung, silly facial expressions. But here there were no inappropriate props, anachronistic costumes or tacky stage sets. The dancers, the women in flowing pastel colored dresses, the men in similarly colored shirts and tights, created a magical world of comings and goings, appearings and disappearings. At one moment a solitary figure haunts the stage, the next minute dancers materialize, transformed into a chariot of horses or hunters with their bloodhounds. All this without one single blow-up toy or refrigerator. The stage was enclosed by a series of proscenium arches, one within the other, each one containing scrims of varying transparency and color. This was all that was needed to set the scene. A verdant field was suggested by a green scrim covered, except for a small section touching the stage, by a blue scrim. A darkened transparent scrim serves as a mirror for two dancers revealing their steps from the front and the back. Unfortunately the physical construction of the stage might also have been the reason why libretto-clarifying supertitles were not available.

 

In spite of having to give so much of my attention to understanding the text (the libretto handed out with the program booklet was useless during the performance, unless you were viewing it through night goggles) and focusing on the dancers, I was certainly aware of the music. I could not, though, give much of my attention, as well, to the quality of the playing other than to say that I noted no irregularities. Conducted by Jane Glover, the St. Luke's Orchestra performed outstandingly, with special merit given to the key soloists: the oboist in Come, Thou Goddess Fair and Free and As Steals the Morn, the flutist in Sweet Bird, the cellist in May at Last My Weary Age. (Why was the other heartrending cello obbligato aria But O, Sad Virgin, That Thy Pow'r omitted?) Outside of Handel's Acis and Galatea, I can't think of any other work of Handel (including The Messiah) that is filled with more touchingly sensuous melodies, one right after the other. The vocalists were uniformly excellent. Thankfully, also, Handel has given us a reprieve in this ode by sparing us from his usual da capo (A-B-A) structure, the basis of so many of his other arias.

© Elaine Mayson Photography

I must say that I had some trepidation attending this performance. This was the second adaptation of this piece that I had seen, the first being at the Paris Opera in 2007. With an all-star roster starting with William Christie and his Les Arts Florissants and continuing with soloists Kate Royal, Toby Spence and Roderick Williams, it suffered from the pretentious political agenda of the South African choreographer, Robyn Orlin. L'Allegro was set in the mountains of South Africa and Il Penseroso in the slums of Johannesburg. Scenes from these locales were, distractingly, projected on a screen at the back of the stage. The dancers spent their time onstage rummaging through piles of clothes and then changing into them. When not doing this, they trotted around the stage holding pocket video cameras aimed at themselves or others. These recordings were displayed in real time on the screen. Was this some political statement about the tyranny of surveillance cameras in South Africa? What does this have to do with Handel? Who knows? The final chorus, ending optimistically in Morris's version by choosing Mirth to live with or ending sensibly in Handel's version by living with Moderation, ends inexplicably in Orlin's version with a video of the destruction of the Twin Towers. I stood up as the Bravi were shouted and walked out.

Thank you Mark Morris for enhancing the life affirming music of Handel.

,
Stan Metzger