Boccaccio

DAVID SHENGOLD - Opera News Online, April 2002

NEW YORK CITY

For its yearly January offering, the enterprising Bronx Opera customarily chooses a work new to (or long neglected in) New York, playing two nights in its home theater at Lehmann College and two at the excellent, underused little theater of Manhattan's John Jay College, just south of Lincoln Center. A happy capacity crowd there on January 18 clearly appreciated the company's adventurousness and skill in reviving Boccaccio, Franz von Suppé's disarmingly tuneful, musically accomplished score. The work was last heard locally in a 1931 Met staging (using recitatives by Artur Bodansky, as did the company's Fidelio in that era), centered around the Florentine "hero" of Maria Jeritza.

The Dalmatian composer (trained as a singer) had a talent not only for pleasant Italianate melody but for contrapuntal forms beyond the ken of many operetta composers: some of the most entrancing numbers are complicated trios and multi-part choruses. The libretto, by F. Zell and Die Fledermaus co-author Richard Genée, self-consciously mocks the operetta genre itself. The historical persona of Giovanni Boccaccio is conflated with elements from his works; thus we see an insatiable Don Juan figure pursued and condemned (by middle-aged hopeless husbands like those who populate Offenbach's contemporaneous operettas) for both his illicit romances and the literature he makes from them. Withal the hero has a "pure" true love, Fiametta, who proves (like Saffi in Johann Strauss II's Der Zigeunerbaron) to be the daughter of nobility. Book-burnings and near-lynchings are all diffused by Boccaccio's wiles, and everything works out happily in the end. John Barker's very singable edition was here augmented by some apt and (usually) funny gags and references, including acknowledgment of a Boccaccian ex-president and a walk-on coffee vendor named Starbucchia. Director Ben Spierman generally kept the pace fast and the improbable doings sharply defined, and Isabel Rubio's handsome costumes lent color and class to the proceedings.

Bronx Opera employed two casts for most, though not all, leading roles. Appearing in both casts, Sorab Wadia was amusing as the bibulous barrel-maker Lotteringhi, and Sean Attebury brought a light tenor and self-parodying whippet charm to the part of the disguised Prince of Palermo (engaged to Fiametta but ending up with Lotteringhi's wife Isabella). The erstwhile-soprano role of Boccaccio was rightly restored to a male performer. In this cast, Kyle Pfortmiller made a confident, plausibly dashing hero with excellent diction, good comic timing and a ringing "baritenor" of considerable promise.

The role of Fiametta lay a bit low for the gamine, charming Noelle Barbera, but the soprano has a face made for the stage, and when the music allowed it (as in the disarming multilingual Act III duet with Boccaccio), she showed a shining upper register and fine musicianship. She seems a natural for Donizetti's Adina and Norina. Christina Martos, unveiling a sensuous instrument and presence, handily dominated several ensembles as the wayward wife, Beatrice. Others offering staunch support included Natalie Anne Levin as a Lainie Kazan-like Isabella, Joanna Hill as Fiametta's gracious foster-mother and solid bass Steven S. Timoner as her father (in multiple disguises). Yet the most impressive element of the production was the strong effort by the entire ensemble, especially Garrett Keast and Elaine Smith Purcell's well-prepared chorus. The valiant, generally able orchestra, under Michael Spierman, brought out Suppé's melodic flair and wit.