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OPERA REVIEW
"Romeo et Juliette" et Little Else
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By Heather Hadlock
Some people dislike opera because they find its visual elements
distracting; all the costumes, colors, and stage movement interfere with
their enjoyment of the music. While I am not one of those people, Opera San
Jose's production of Gounod's "Romeo et Juliette" made me unusually
sympathetic to their position.
Romeo, Juliette, and the orchestra, the opera's essential elements,
all sounded reasonably good. The orchestra, under the direction of
David Rohrbaugh, supplied much of the musical interest. The harp, low
strings and winds achieved the lustrous pearls-and-champagne sonority
the score demands, and the preludes to the balcony and bridal
chamber scenes were particularly lovely. The brass section, with uncertain
blend and intonation, was less successful in providing a somber note of
tragedy in the overture and in the prelude to the tomb scene.
Vocally, this is a tenor's opera: Romeo is on stage almost the entire time,
and all but two scenes culminate in some lyric outpouring from him. John
Bellemer, an Opera San Jose alumnus returning as Guest Artist for this
production, had just enough presence to keep the show alive. His voice has a supple,
carrying sound, marred by a tendency to choke on sustained final high
notes. His acting ranged narrowly between yearning and longing, but this
can perhaps be blamed on Gounod, who gave Romeo few occasions to show any
other emotions.
Christina Major, as Juliette, did not have the vocal precision to make much
of her Act I waltz song, but sang the love duets with touching ardor
and lyricism. She conveyed well Juliette's development from a smitten girl
to a rapturous bride and teenage suicide, and stood out for the
simplicity and dignity of her stage presence. Both she and Bellemer
avoided the company-wide tendency to overact, at least until the death
scene, where their realistic writhing and twitching seemed excessive.
Unfortunately, the generally good performances of the two leads and
orchestra were undermined by the high-school-quality acting and production
values around them. Director Daniel Helfgot's blocking of the party scene
was a mess, with choristers milling about gracelessly in tacky, ill-
fitting costumes. Helfgot also made nonsense of Romeo and Juliette's first
encounter. The chorus hammed it up like an amateur Gilbert and Sullivan
troupe, and in the intimate Montgomery Theater, every rolling eye and
exaggerated shrug was conspicuous. Brian Carter, as Mercutio, mimed his
patter song about Queen Mab with fidgety gestures that made the fairies'
midwife seem like a pesky fly.
Several members of the cast seemed to have wandered in from other
productions. Romeo's companions, in motley forest green ensembles,
suggested Merry Men rather than Montague retainers. Mercutio stood out as
Verona's only short-haired noble youth. With Romeo, Tybalt, and Paris
sporting shoulder-length tresses, Carter really should have had a wig.
Capulet, in floor- length belted robes and hairband, looked like an Old
Testament prophet, while the Duke of Verona wore a blue velour toga more
suitable for a Roman senator. As the Duke, Robert Harrison captured the
hotly contested award for worst French diction.
The clumsiness of the secondary characters only emphasized the unevenness
of the score, which lavishes lovely music on the title characters and
short-changes everyone else. Sometimes the production exacerbated this
inequality: Sara Blaze, as Romeo's page, was allowed to sing only one verse
of her serenade. Christopher Dickerson, as Friar Laurence, did a
reasonable job with his two declamatory scenes, but the wedding ceremony
seemed long and irredeemably dull. His music, like Capulet's and the
Prince's, rarely transcended recitative. Neither did the hotheaded Tybalt's,
forcing S. Jason Black to convey menace through sneers alone. None of
these really earned their time on stage; I would have been content to see
the balcony, bridal chamber, and tomb scenes, and call it a day.
(Heather Hadlock is Assistant Professor of Music History at Stanford University.)
©1998 Heather Hadlock, all rights reserved
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