(Perhaps one or two fewer “slow dances” might have been more effective.) Even Laurey’s future husband, ambitious young cowpoke Curly (Sean Grandillo has a good rockabilly voice) grabs a guitar now and then to accompany his songs.
More than a few songs are paced noticeably slower, which works more often than not-and gives the show’s love songs in particular a thrumming sense of longing. It really is everybody’s business, this pioneering stuff-a premise that carries weight, in a good way, from start to finish.ĭaniel Kluger’s orchestrations, way more C&W and bluegrass than Broadway, are excellent, and played with heart by musician blended in as “just folks” (with instruments) toward the back of the stage. For much of the stage time, then, the story (pot lucks, box socials, wooings, arguments, even an impromptu “trial”) plays out in the presence of the whole community. The hall is set with tables and chairs, strung with streamers and simple lights.
The show plants its feet on a single set by Laura Jellinek, the town hall of a rural ranching/farming town, backed by panoramic panels of an earth-toned, wide-open West.
#WINSPEAR OPERA HOUSE DIRECTIONS PLUS#
Whether that’s a plus or minus will greatly depend on your own opinions.īut let’s find things to like. When the rouser finale number “Oklahoma” leaves a nasty taste in your mouth, you know this isn’t your Grandma and Grandpa’s musical. As if to insist on the truth of it-or to challenge our common belief. “And the land we belong to is GRAND!” Near the end of the show, the sobbing, bloodied bride Laurey (Sasha Hutchings) screams out that line of the song, and then again, straight into the faces of the audience. Fish the iconoclast is hell-bent on de-construction, and won’t let us off the hook-and perhaps little more than one week after Uvalde, it could be said we deserve to look in that mirror. This “new” Oklahoma! reflects something we all know: that the sunny national story we liked to tell ourselves back in the day (say, when we were actually saving the world) skimmed over a lot of darker history. On opening night of Broadway Dallas’ presentation, dozens of attendees bailed at intermission, leaving a noticeably thinned audience for Act Two.Īn initial sense of audience good will toward this old warhorse of the American musical had faded by then, replaced by unease-and that was the intention.Įxperimental director Daniel Fish’s desire to re-work the classic Rodgers & Hammerstein musical is theatrically understandable. “I’ve never seen the show before, or even the movie,” she said. The woman by the elevator looked a bit grim.
0 kommentar(er)
