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OPERA REVIEW
Plusses and Minuses for Manon February 2, 2002
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By Janos Gereben
Here, in the still-bleeding heart of the Dotcom
ecstasy/destruction, things are not
going well for the arts. Even in the days of paper millionaires,
financial support was meager from the self-deluded nouveau riche; but
now, all those lovely inflated figures are gone, and so are the donors'
circles.
The San Jose Symphony suspended operations over three months ago because
management blunders could no longer be shrouded by additional
contributions — there just weren't any. Among the city's important
arts organizations surviving the bleak times: Irene Dalis' brave little
Opera San José, a company operating through most of the year on a budget
of about $2.3 million. Current funding is fine, having been obtained
before, but nobody knows what will happen next year.
Into this setting came, on Saturday, the San Jose premiere of Massenet's
Manon, the story of a 16-year-old who gambles on having it all,
only to devastate lives all around her, including her own.
San Jose Symphony players have been in the Opera's Montgomery Theater pit
regularly in the past, but now this venue has become more important than
ever to them. Perhaps that made a difference Saturday night.
Unquestionably, Robert Wood's committed and passionate direction did.
Whatever the reason, the small, part-time orchestra provided the
highlight of the evening.
With only seven violins (including Cynthia Baehr, concertmaster), three violas, Lucinda Breed-Lenicheck's and Ellen Sanders' outstanding cello "section," pairs of trumpets, French horns, flutes, oboes, clarinets (the excellent Mark Brandenburg as principal), and Robert Szabo's solo trombone, Wood's band did itself proud. Giulio Cesare Perrone, who has been dealing with tiny stages around the Bay Area, did well with the sets, including an imaginative two-level structure for the first act. Julie Engelbrecht's costumes looked far more opulent than what her budget must have provided. For stage director, Dalis imported a notable former singing colleague: Olivia Stapp, who did wonderful work in Walnut Creek as the head of the opera there until she quit recently. Here, she was trying to "make something happen" repeatedly, and the attempts to liven up the action were mostly unsuccessful. The truly egregious example of overactive direction came in the Saint-Sulpice scene: as Manon finally forced that fateful "Je t'aime" from Des Grieux, she ripped the stole off his neck, exulting with a "HA!" which might just as well been a "YES!" with a pumped fist. The audience burst out laughing, and you cannot blame them. You can — and should — blame Stapp for turning one of the great moments in all opera into a circus. (Why is the abbé, a secular ecclesiastic (Littré), wearing a priest's vestment anyway, and even an epitrachelion kind of stole, which belongs to bishops and priests occupying important church offices? Des Grieux is not even a priest yet, if you only follow the subtitles.) More in the plus column: good French by most of the cast, the work of diction coach Lea Frey. It's no longer possible to postpone this, so, reluctantly, we come to the matter of singers. The news is not good, even for a small regional company, albeit one which has produced fine singers in the past.
In the title role, Tamara Tsoutsouris presented an unusual situation. Looking the part, acting well, she belted out high notes impressively — but did not sing the rest of the music even acceptably. Almost everything (except those high notes!) turned flat — and stayed that way. At times, she was not only off key, she actually substituted imaginative notes of her own for the score. At no time was there any rounded quality, "finish" to her vocal performance. Given Tsoutsouris' resume of singing in Houston, Palm Beach, Knoxville and elsewhere, one wonders what happened this evening. (Sandra Rubalcava sings the role in the alternate cast.) Staying on pitch was a challenge for the des Grieux as well. Jonathan Hodel has done better. This time, the high notes were uncertain, the rest neither accurate nor appealing. (Adam Flowers is the alternate.) Scott Bearden's Lescaut started out impressively, but later in the evening, he too went flat, as if catching a bug. (In the other cast, the role is sung by Joseph Wright.) In the secondary roles, individual performances were on the weak side, but when the singers appeared as chorus, the results were more pleasing. Given the tough situation in which the company — and San Jose — find themselves, one would want to be as supportive as possible, but how can you overlook a uniformly weak cast? I'd suggest you go and listen to the orchestra and look out for Wood in other assignments. Apparently, the Bay Area's exceptional collection of conductors has a fine young addition.
(Janos Gereben is arts editor of the Post Newspaper Group and technologyeditor for
©2002 Janos Gereben, all rights reserved
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