BE MY VALENTINE, MACBETH!
PALO ALTO, CA—The romance of Valentine’s Day came face to face with ghoulish rituals and murder most foul by that usurper Macbeth.
Disastrous? Hardly. The plucky little opera company virtually sold out the house February 14th, emulating the mouse that roared. And it brought on high drama on its opening night, overcoming almost all adversity.
This was that jinxed operatic “Macbeth,” by Verdi, out of Shakespeare—an unsettling tale so fearsome that theaters everywhere still leave one light burning on stage all night, and actors dare not mention the name (preferring “The Scottish play”).No Shakespeare work has more devilish incantations, witches, apparitions and clairvoyance, capped by murder of a Scottish king by his host. Surely it’s Shakespeare’s best grand-opera plot, offering the most overdrawn witches’ ballet by way of dessert.
Given the massed scenes, boiling cauldrons and pitched battles, sandwiching it all into a modest site never intended for opera (Lucie Stern Theater) borders on the impossible: Scant fly space, a pit that can accommodate only 18 string players, and a meager backstage that has dancers and choristers bumping into each other. Meanwhile most of the orchestral sound comes from the wings, with the woodwinds, percussion and brass perched on platforms, barely able to see the baton down in the pit. The postage-stamp-sized lobby may fast turn you at intermission into a bosom friend of the boosters that keep the enterprise afloat. Oh, and did we mention, the general director is also conductor and actually a transportation engineer with a graduate degree?
And yet—at West Bay Opera, it works. The drama featuring stellar baritone Krassen Karagiozov in the lead crackles with big-league dramatic fire, abetted by Verdi’s greatly expanded role for the mistress manipulator with the sturdiest backbone, Lady Macbeth. Dramatic soprano Christine Major brought intensity and stage presence (along with her mostly on-pitch delivery) to her role bolstering the weaknesses in the guilt-ridden murderer Macbeth’s makeup. Each gets to spin off a mad scene.
All a fiction from a far-off century? Not with lines like “This country is ruled by criminals” and “This land has become a den of thieves.”
Still lacking: A posted ‘Any resemblance to people living or dead,’ etc., etc. disclaimer above the proscenium. Because evil is eternal.
This is one of the first mature Verdi operas, tackling the inevitably challenging Shakespearean tragedies. His ensembles ending the four acts (telescoped here to eliminate the third intermission) are classic. Supreme subtleties, like the soft-voiced assassins’ chorus prior to Banquo’s murder, appear magically like fairies in the night.
You’re caught up, even when the forests of Birnam Wood are but a few leafy branches, and the victorious army is more filled with white- and gray-beards than with Brave-Hearts.
The skilful, colorful mobile projections by Crompton and Boulay spare WBO having to shuffle a lot of furniture around. Meriting mention too were bass Benjamin Brady (Banco/Banquo) and the well-drilled choruses. The only misfire was the witches’ Act Three, all spiky fingernails, masks and balletic gyrations—once a show-stopper, but now somewhere between hokum and high camp.
Baton in hand, General Director José Luis Moscovich led a striving orchestra, inserting fiery authority. In commentary, he noted that he didn’t know anywhere that a company could sell out ‘Macbeth’ on Valentine’s—It’s yet another only-in-Palo-Alto achievement, produced by this fast-rising ensemble founded in 1956 as a volunteer neighborhood enterprise.
Verdi’s opera “Macbeth” (Macbetto) after Shakespeare, in Italian, by West Bay Opera. 3:15 length, with two intermissions. Closing Feb. 23. Lucie Stern Theater, Palo Alto. For info, call (650) 424-9999, or go online: www.wbopera.org.
