The University of Arizona Opera Theater’s The Rape of Lucretia Is Layered With Lyric Intensity.

Lucretia-Robyn Rocklein, Tarquinius-Seth Kershinik

Sometimes an opera will reveal its artistic nature in a way the listener had not expected. That is what happened at the Opera Theater’s April 3rd performance of Benjamin Britten’s Rape of Lucretia. Composed after the success of his thoroughly orchestrated Peter Grimes, Britten chose to make his Lucretia a two-act chamber opera, with 13 instrumentalists and eight singers. Librettist, Ronald Duncan used Andre Obey’s play Le voil de Lucrèce in telling the tale of Lucretia — the wife of Collatinus, a Roman general — who is raped by Prince Tarquinius, son of the Etruscan tyrant, Tarquinius Superbus. Junius, another Roman general who is jealous of Lucretia’s devotion to her husband and who has aspirations to rule Rome, underhandedly encourages Tarquinius to go to Collatinus’ house in the dead of night to seduce the chaste Lucretia. The opera, which is set in Rome in 500 BC, presents two difficult artistic challenges in its quest to succeed as drama.

Director Charles Roe and Music Director and Conductor Thomas Cockrell had to find a way to keep Britten’s musical pathos flowing at those moments when Duncan’s text became turgid and unresponsive to the story. In addition, Britten decided to mix Christian beliefs with Roman creed throughout the opera, the two contrary views showing up at unexpected intervals. Roe and Cockrell overcame these literary difficulties by concentrating on the emotional and musical aspects of the opera, deflating what was cumbersome in the text, thus allowing the dramatic impact of Lucretia’s plight to be fully realized.

With only a chamber orchestra in the pit, the singers performed the demands of the piece with vocal confidence and dramatic security fulfilling Roe and Cockrell’s artistic intentions.
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Beloved Puccini…exquisite Minghella

In today’s opera world, many opera companies are anxious to seek out theater directors to flesh out the story lines of the operas they are presenting; opera impresarios are overjoyed when they can find a director who can excite their audiences. From the reviews some of these productions receive online and in the press, the results can be a mixed bag. There was no doubt, however, from the Met’s encore telecast of Madame Butterfly on March 18th, that Anthony Minghella’s production of Puccini’s favorite operatic heroine was a stunning success. Assisted by his wife, choreographer and director Carolyn Choa, the couple’s impressive artistic production deserved the praise it received when it opened the Met 2006 season. A great sorrow has accompanied the production’s success since the sudden passing of Mr. Minghella last year, made more tragic because this was the director’s only opera production.

This viewer attended the telecast with a prickly foreboding. After Gary Halvorson’s edgy, dizzying filming of the Lucia di Lammermoor telecast, I wondered if his lack of cinematic restraint would resurface. What unfolded, however, was a beautiful representation of Minghella’s production. One could hardly believe it was the same video director. He deserves praise for capturing the many touching moments Minghella and Choa infused into the opera, as if the camera, along with the rest of the production team, were in love with the opera.

But who wouldn’t think of visually capturing as much of Mr. Minghella’s classic Japanese production as possible. The pleasure of watching Minghella’s work unfold came from the combined artistic choices of his production team.

The costumes by Han Feng, the lighting of Peter Mumford and the set constructed by Michael Levine coalesced into a mosaic of color. The reds, greens and blues flowed into pastel shades of pinks, creams and off whites giving the vivid colors a subdued texture capturing the essence of the Japanese personality. Interwoven in this mosaic was an Eastern sense of design, so clean and orderly, but full of exotic imagery. The work of Feng, Mumford and Levine appeared integrated and yet stood out in crucial ways.
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