On paper, the festival–three new operas in three nights–looked like a suicide mission. In fact, it was a logistical triumph and an imaginative if artistically uneven party. The fare was diverse even for a company that has always offset traditional repertoire with the offbeat. Lukas Foss’s impish “Griffelkin” is loosely based on a German fairy tale; “Marilyn” takes off on a true, grim American fairy tale, and Hugo Weisgall’s “Esther” is a setting of the Old Testament story.
Though each production had its own creative team, the festival’s overseer, Jerome Sirlin, conceived an overall look using only scrims and projections. If the designs were sometimes too scanty, at other times they conveyed remarkable depth–further proof that opera done on the cheap doesn’t have to look it. City Opera may have set a record: sets and costumes for the new trio cost a measly $175,000. (Marilyn’s mink was lent by the Ritz Thrift Shop.) “We put on opera cheaper than anybody in the world,” says Donald Hassard, NYCO’s managing director for artistic administration, who is filling in for Keene. “I don’t know how we do it, but we do.”
Last week City Opera gave evidence of what sets it apart: adventurous repertoire with young singers the company nurtures. “Marilyn,” which sold out, is a model of the eclecticism to which Laderman, 69, is dedicated. It moves (and occasionally lurches) from one compositional school to another. The best moments are jazzy, often under-scored with doom; there’s also a gorgeous vocalise for Marilyn, her shrink and her lover, a senator. It doesn’t pay to try to sort out who’s who: the libretto by Norman Rosten, an old friend of Monroe’s, has composite characters for the men around Marilyn. Kathryn Gamberoni makes the most of the title role, even in the ludicrously staged final scene, in which she dies on an altar. Her soprano is a shade light, but she negotiates every stylistic variation with fire and grace.
“Marilyn” was the hot ticket, but “Griffelkin,” in which a little devil comes up from hell for a day on earth and learns the value of human goodness, was the crowd pleaser. With a rhyming libretto by Alastair Reid (and a character that’s an irresistible talking, walking human mailbox), Lukas Foss has created an oldfashioned, rollicking piece you could wrap up-minus Deirdre Sheehan’s retro choreography-and take anywhere. Soprano Robin Tabachnik was too shrill, but she is agile and slim, a fine physical choice for Griffelkin, and mezzo Diana Daniele was fiendishly delectable as Grandma. Weisgall’s “Esther,” the story of the courageous Jewish queen who thwarts the murderous Haman, rewards those willing to grapple with thorny music. Weisgall always asks a lot, and though the powerful score is not rigorously serialistic, much of it is severe. still, it has moments of lush lyricism. As Esther, soprano Lauren Flanigan was stunning, using her body and voice with ferocity.
But what the festival also pointed up was that it may be time for the City Opera to rethink its mission. Hassard is relentlessly optimistic about the company’s future, but some insiders worry about financial burdens and the falloff in major gifts. The NYCO used to have little competition as the spunky, lowbudget alternative to the Met, but the boom in regional opera and the popularity of televised performances have changed all that. Unfortunately, “traditional” operas are what pay for the nontraditional ones. If the City Opera is to regain its unique place, perhaps it should move out of its marble barn at Lincoln Center. It might set up shop in a small theater and concentrate on seldom-heard operas while continuing to train young artists. As Carol Vaness, one of many singers who passed through the company on their way to a giltedged career, says, “It was a good place for young Americans not only to get your feet wet, but to get your body soaked.” With resourcefulness, City Opera should be able to keep its head above water.
