“Opera,” declares the 1948 book Nights at the Opera, “is like an oyster; it must be swallowed whole or not at all.” Seventy years later, this principle certainly applies to Capital Fringe’s The Lives Left Behind, which features four one-act operas that offer a whole lot to swallow — sex, death, infidelity, intrigue, stardom, and more. A rotating cast of six singers brings deep poignancy and no small dose of humor to works that are sure to leave both opera lovers and the merely opera-curious delighted.
Lives Left Behind is Fringe’s sole opera offering this year. Two of the works, “The Female Stranger” and “Dreamless,” are making their world premieres alongside “What Gets Kept,” which premiered at the Kennedy Center in 2017, and “The Name on the Door,” which premiered in 2012. Each of the four works, which span different eras and styles, succeeds wonderfully as singers Katherine Fili, Annie Gill, Kelly Curtin, Spencer Adamson, Elizabeth Mondragon, and Nigel Rowe rotate between roles.
First up is “The Female Stranger,” which brings us back to 19th-century Virginia to imagine the story behind a real-life historical curiosity: a grave dedicated “to the memory of a female stranger” at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Alexandria. In composer and librettist Joseph Kaz’s telling, a strained marriage between Andrew Clermont (Katherine Fili) and his wife, the eponymous stranger (Annie Gill), is at the center of the mystery. Interference from a coquettish neighbor (Kelly Curtin) is played for laughs, but her involvement in their lives proves ultimately tragic.
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The Lives Left Behind
closes July 26, 2018
Details and tickets
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“What Gets Kept,” originally commissioned by the Washington National Opera’s American Opera Initiative, untangles the complicated family dynamics surrounding death and its aftermath. Performances are tremendous all around as terminally ill Amy (Elizabeth Mondragon) navigates both the prospect of death and the tension between her daughter Emma (Kelly Curtin) and husband Lawrence (Nigel Rowe) in her final hours.
In “Dreamless,” Rowe takes the lead as James, a man who claims he never dreams. As narrated in flashback form by a professor (Elizabeth Mondragon) James seeks for help, we learn that a dark truth from the past lurks in his sleeping mind. Mondragon is captivating in her poise as the professor, and Spencer Adamson brings a deadpan jolt of comic relief to his every line as Peter, her assistant. While all the works were strong, I was left wanting more than one act of “Dreamless” in particular — the theatrical pacing, flashback format, and ambiguous ending cultivated a real sense of suspense.
The final opera, “The Name on the Door” combines portions of the King James Bible with new text by Michael Oberhauser to interrogate ideas of stardom and success. Pop-star Jezebel (Annie Gill) finds herself nearing 40 and out of favor with her manager, Eli (Spencer Adamson), who is busy preparing a younger star (Kelly Curtin) for the spotlight. There’s nothing quite like hearing portions of the Song of Solomon truly sung, and, as in “The Female Stranger,” Curtin and Gill once again play off of each other wonderfully as antagonists. Curtin, a lyric coloratura soprano, has comic timing as powerful as her voice (which is to say: quite), and Gill brings a tremendously expressive melancholy to her roles both here and in “The Female Stranger.”
What a treat, too, to have live accompaniment by a four-piece orchestra of clarinet, violin, viola, and piano. Staging at Westminster Presbyterian Church is kept simple; the real boon of the space is the church acoustics, which augmented many divine crescendos and solos throughout.
At one point in “What Gets Kept,” Amy explains her embrace of death, singing, “I can give my body a chance to catch up to my soul.” For the audience, the performances in The Lives Left Behind do this work for us, binding together body and soul for 90 rapturous minutes before returning us to earth — just in time to applaud.
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The Lives Left Behind. Composer/Librettist (“The Female Stranger”), Producer: Joseph Kaz. Composer (“Dreamless”), Producer, Music Director: William Kenlon. Librettist (“What Gets Kept”): Vanessa Moody. Composter/Librettist (“The Name on the Door”), Producer, Music Director: Michael Oberhauser. Composer (“What Gets Kept”): Frances Pollock. Assistant Director, Stage Manager: Michael Sullin. Librettist (“Dreamless”): Katie Vagnino. Featuring: Katherine Fili, Annie Gill, Kelly Curtin, Spencer Adamson, Elizabeth Mondragon, Nigel Rowe. Orchestra: Elena Forbes (clarinet), Molly Jackson and Ava Shadmani (violin), Andrew Weaver (viola), Elizabeth G. Hill (piano). Graphic Designer: Bob Grannan. Stage Director: Corinne Hayes. Produced by Silver Finch Arts Collective . Reviewed by Sarah Elizabeth Adler.
