Up in the grand tier, well-heeled Charlotte Symphony subscribers in Rows F and H must have thought that last week’s concert had ended at intermission. True, Stephen Hough, in his fourth guest appearance with the orchestra, had turned Mozart’s Piano Concerto #24 into a gleaming sacrament. There have been times in the past when the CSO has risen superbly to the occasion, accompanying an internationally renowned soloist, only to recede afterwards into lame mediocrity. Maybe that’s why there was whispering in the row ahead of us as the CSO and their new music director, Christof Perick, launched into Richard Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben (“A Hero’s Life“). Maybe the hero’s theme sounded a bit radical for the patrons seated behind us — their idiotic jabbering continued well into the opening episode.
But eventually the stream of melodic glories emanating from the Belk Theater stage subdued the whispering and jabbering of the moneyed morons. Oh yes, they should have known better — on more than a couple of levels. For it was last October that Perick ignited the PAC with a thrilling rendition of Strauss’s famed Also Sprach Zarathustra, a performance that nailed down his new post.
And after an up-and-down season opener last month, Perick & Company had started off brilliantly on Carl Maria von Weber’s “Overture to Oberon.” Frank Portone’s lovely and forlorn French horn lingered, in the lyrical opening, until blanketed by transparent textures from the winds and the strings. There was powerful kick and scintillating sharpness as the entire ensemble abruptly shifted from a quiet brew of slow and moderate tempi to a boisterous, galloping presto.
A slight tightness was evident when Portone returned, and it carried over into the clarinet solo and the violin filigree. The ensuing accelerando was better until it was torpedoed by sputtering trombones. That was really the last serious problem I heard all night. Again there was marvelous ensemble sharpness — at an irresistibly brisk tempo — as the CSO romped home to the end of the Weber. Sound was buoyant and clear with none of the muddiness I’ve heard in the past when the group gallops at full volume.
Perick trimmed his forces conspicuously to accompany Hough in the C minor concerto. The reduced forces played elegantly, retaining their keen focus, ushering in Mozart’s allegro. Hough was beautifully expressive, as always. When he reached the bravura passages, he resisted the urge to raise his volume to show off his speed. Eventually, we were rewarded with modest fireworks as Hough frisked through some bass runs, but the cadenza was starkly hushed and intimate.
The jeweled perfection continued into the larghetto, sparer than ever. So sparse was the orchestral answer to Hough’s exquisite lyricism, you’d swear this was chamber music. Virtuosity was ratcheted up a notch for the concluding allegretto, building steadily in showers of clear crystal to longhair intensity. Winds had a nice bounce and blend as the accompaniment broke loose. Hough’s final hushed cadenza slowed to a halt before a rousing build triggering the final entry of the orchestra. A powerful ending, but not flashy enough to bring the Charlotte audience to its feet.
Before last Friday, the CSO had never played the Mozart — and their only previous performance of Ein Heldenleben was almost exactly 25 years ago. Perick bulked up for the Strauss, not only bringing back the rest of the CSO but adding 16 musicians especially for the occasion.
Notwithstanding the skepticism and inattention up in the grand tier, our introduction to “The Hero” had impressive builds and momentum. The winds issued an evocative percolation transitioning to the section unveiling “The Hero’s Adversaries.” Lower strings were powerfully morose as the upper strings and winds fretted and fluttered above them.
But it was probably concertmaster Jinny Leem’s ardent violin cadenzas in “The Hero’s Companion,” magically introducing the wife, that began to convince the skeptics that we were witnessing something special. Fireworks breaking out in “The Hero’s Battlefield” cinched it. Trumpets that had exited during Leem’s solos sounded the distant call to battle from behind the stage. The angularity of Strauss’s rhythms and the insistent tattoo of the snare drum simulated the conflict and the excitement. Lower strings and the returning brass added to the turbulence. What a tutti!
Luminous harp arpeggios ferried us into the mesmerizing pastoral section, “The Hero’s Works of Peace,” wherein Strauss quoted Till Eulenspiegel and numerous other hits he’d composed by 1898. There was a marvelous weave of different instrumental colors here — including a tuba draped with a baggy — and some gorgeous oboe from Hollis Ulaky. The closing “Hero’s Retreat from the World” was beautifully launched by a bevy of bassoons scored to sound like bagpipes and a violin melody as open and airy as anything written by Copland.
Then Leem’s violin re-emerged seemingly transfigured, drawn out by Portone’s caressing horn. Luminous dialogue gave way to heavenly duet before the stately, brassy close.
Everybody seemed to jump to their feet at once. As well they should. Charlotte Symphony has flashed this sort of brilliance before. But I’ve never them play more solidly, more purposefully, or more sharply in navigating so much new repertoire. Clearly, this was one of their best concerts ever.
When George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart were churning out their hit comedies back in the 30s, their prime instinct was to make a virtue out of eccentricity. Nowhere do Kaufman & Hart uphold the sanctity of idiosyncrasy more devoutly than in You Can’t Take It With You, currently revived at Theatre Charlotte.
The Sycamore household, where all the action takes place, is a prolific nut hatchery. Mom writes plays because somebody mistakenly left a typewriter on her doorstep some years back. Dad cooks up homemade fireworks in the basement with a drop-in, drop-out house guest who has lingered for the better part of a decade. Daughter Essie, all grown up, takes ballet lessons from a gloomy Russian. Her husband plays Beethoven on the xylophone, publishes the family dinner menu on his own press, and dutifully gets permission from his father-in-law to procreate. Instructions to follow?
Kaufman’s idea of a huge theatrical bellylaugh is to get as many of his zanies behaving with their trademark oddities as possible at the same time while the curtain falls. The louder the chaos, the better.
How funny is all this? Seems to largely depend on who’s performing this intricately orchestrated mayhem — and when. A star-studded cast, including James Stewart and Lionel Barrymore, helped capture Best Picture honors for the film version at the 1939 Academy Awards, two years after the Broadway production earned the Pulitzer Prize. Yet I’ve never been able to stomach the celebrated celluloid and do not recall laughing even once when I watched it from beginning to end.
Live productions deepened my distaste. When Charlotte Shakespeare brought the show to town in 1990, under the direction of Lon Bumgarner, I finally warmed to the script somewhat. Perhaps that’s because the Sycamores were less dopey and adorable than usual. Or perhaps a little extra starch was added to the Kirbys, the Wall Street plutocrats who come calling when their son Tony falls for the one normal Sycamore, Alice.
At Theatre Charlotte, artistic director Daina Giesler goes the orthodox, high-energy route. Pacing is swift and effervescent. The more seasoned cast members go a bit over-the-top having fun with their characters’ quirks. Newbies tend to be more restrained and subdued. Action, as always in Giesler’s work, is beautifully spaced, giving full weight to all the action.
But to me, Giesler’s most effective touch is casting older actors in the roles of Mr. Kirby and the Sycamore patriarch, Grandpa Martin Vanderhof. Grandpa, the fountainhead of his family’s footloose joie de vivre, abruptly took stock of his life many years ago while riding an elevator, returned to the ground floor and never went back to work. Instead, he busies himself “having a good time,” with a special fondness for university commencement exercises.
When the other actors abruptly freeze, and the spotlight shines on John Ahrens as Grandpa reporting on the state of the family, the warmth of his simple affections is unforced and natural. And when Ahrens powwows with Hunter Garbee’s Mr. Kirby about the welfare and future of the lovebirds — and their own common experiences — the usual silliness is transcended.
There’s some delectable silliness along the way. Among the inner circle, you’re likely to enjoy Jorja Ursin as Mom, Lynn Cox and Christopher Leonard as the fey daughter and son-in-law, and Bob Tully as the nyet-saying dance teacher. Among the strange guests, Hank West’s IRS investigator and Pat Heiss’s countess-waitress are the strangest.
Andrea King and Paul Gibson are likable as the lovebirds, if not super-slick. The same can be said about this Can’t Take It With You overall. But costumes, lights, props, set, and technical execution are all first-rate.
Plenty of interesting theater events are popping up this fall at local campuses. UNC-Charlotte revives some early O’Neill this week. After a fine professional production of Marivaux’s Triumph of Love at Winthrop U, the collegians took over with Giraudoux’s Madwoman of Chaillot. Up at Davidson, where Maria Irene Fornes workshopped her newest work earlier this year, former Charlotte Rep producing director Keith Martin masterminded a fascinating revival of Alfred Uhry’s first major work, his musical adaptation of Eudora Welty’s The Robber Bridegroom with songs by Robert Waldman.
Martin’s nifty direction included some spirited square dance choreography, ably complemented by Scott McKenzie’s musical direction. Costumes for the large cast were by another designer with Rep credentials, Rebecca Cairns. And the atmospheric backwoods set unveiled yet another facet of Bill Neville’s talents — he student-directed Vagina Monologues earlier this year and is slated to direct Boy Gets Girl, opening November 28.
Onstage the standout in this Southern-fried folktale was Anna Jensen as Salome, a fearsome combination of evil stepmother and termagant wife. The sweetest voice belonged Laura Filosa as the stepdaughter and would-be bride. Best acting and singing chops among the guys were claimed by Alan Stevens as the inept robber who somehow blunders his way to glory by liquidating the vile Salome. Luke Farmer was OK in the title role when he stopped trying so hard — and when he wasn’t cornered into singing high notes.
For the Moving Poets, October’s saturnalia have come and gone as the theater/dance/media/percussion outfit presented Halloween 6/15 last weekend at the Hart-Witzen Gallery. It was good to see other choreographers in the mix of 15-minute pieces besides group founder Till Schmidt-Rimpler.
I didn’t always follow the point-of-view of Shannon Wightman’s “Fire,” exhuming the Salem Witch Trials, but it was certainly an arresting multimedia opener. My favorites were the three that followed immediately afterwards, combining the comical and the macabre.
Bryan Quan and Bridget Morris took turns murdering one another in their grotesque “Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater.” Sarah Emery’s “Coulrophobia” linked the comedy and terror of clowns with engaging Cirque de Soleil music. And Tammy Westafer’s “In the Chair” choreographed sadistic dentist humor to a score that ranged from Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A to Dinah Washington’s “Long John Blues.” Favorite line was Dinah’s “You thrill me when you drill me.” *
This article appears in Nov 3-9, 2001.
