Our Opera Critic Reviews The Latest Local Production Of A Classic Italian Export
By Siegfried Snugbottom
As the official opera critic for The Mercer Island Distorter, I was thrilled when I learned that a local organization would be producing a performance of Ruggero Leoncavallo’s legendary opera Pagliacci in downtown Mercer Island. I was even more impressed to discover that the opera would be performed at a brand new cultural center built on private property across the street from Mercerdale Park. Apparently our parks don’t need protecting from the arts after all!
From the moment I arrive, it is clear that I am in for an unconventional production. The small, rectangular theater features concrete and stainless steel surfaces, and metal stools for the audience. While I appreciate experimentation as much as the next opera aficionado, this is not an acoustic environment designed for the nuanced, emotional performance of a classic Italian tenor.
What starts as merely avant garde quickly ventures into the shockingly post-modern. In place of a live orchestra is a single pair of wall-mounted speakers. And Leoncavallo’s soaring overture has been replaced by something a fellow audience member described to me as “Taylor Swift,” an American libretto with which I was previously unacquainted.
The costumes are similarly confounding. The entire cast, while eager to a fault, dresses in black trousers and t-shirts featuring the name of the opera. How are the performers supposed to project the delicate pathos of this tragic love story when Canio’s iconic clown costume is nowhere to be seen?
Alas, the audience at the performance I attended was no better. While some stayed for both acts and the encore, most stopped in for only a few minutes, staring at their cell phones the entire time. If this is how Islanders behave at the opera, I can understand why gifted practitioners of the genre do not ply their talents here.
While I am grateful for this bold effort to offer the finest in Italian culture on Mercer Island, and I do not dispute local boosters’ assertions that this is the best the Island has to offer, I still sadly conclude that this production of Pagliacci lacks the rich textures and subtle flavors that those of us with a refined operatic palate deserve. Save your money for your next trip to New York, Chicago, or Italy, where you can enjoy it as it is performed by true masters of the craft.
La commedia è finita!
In his next column, The Distorter’s opera critic will review the Mercer Island production of Richard Wagner’s Götterdämmerung, opening soon at the Baskin-Robbins Theater.