Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Susannah

Cole Grissom and Patricia Urbano are the minds behind San Francisco Parlor Opera, and Susannah, their latest production, is going to be special.  I have to say for the sake of honesty that, although I've loved the music of Susannah from the beginning of the rehearsal process, I haven't always been 100% on the libretto.  In what I feel is the often-usual (and to me so very annoying) American way, it seemed that the metaphor stuff, the stuff that its author wanted to have the character of Susannah mean, overwhelmed the characterization itself.  It always drives me crazy when I percieve that to be happening (not that I always percieve it, or that it's always happening when I do percieve it), and I think I overreact.  I was kind of ready to write the role off as a man's version of a woman*.

But Patricia's changed all that.  Her Susannah is really well-acted.  I'm just sitting back and watching and empathizing all over the place.  And everyone else is great as well (they just had less far to bring me in terms of approving of their characterizations).  The production seems to me to be getting at all the immediate, intimate human interactions of the score. 

Information is on my calendar page:
http://sara.couden.net/calendar

Performances are on November 5, 10, and 12 at 7 pm, in San Francisco at the Zellerbach mansion.  To purchase tickets, email contact@sfparloropera.org, or visit the website:
http://sfparloropera.org/Home.html


*We call this Memoirs of a Geisha-ing.  No, nobody actually calls it that.

No comments:

Post a Comment