Utah Opera's Hansel and Gretel

Last night I went to see Utah Opera's production of Hansel and Gretel because it is an opera that I had never seen before.  Everything about this production is extremely well done but it just wasn't for me.  Hansel (Sarah Coit) and Gretel (Maureen McKay) are left alone in their cottage in the woods to make brooms and darn socks, respectively, but Hansel complains that he is hungry and there is nothing to eat so Gretel distracts him by getting him to dance with her.  Mother (Aubrey Adams-McMillan) comes home and is angry that they have not completed their work and, when she attempts to spank them, she breaks the jug containing the cream she was going to use to make rice pudding for their dinner.  She sends them out into the woods to gather strawberries as punishment and then despairs that she cannot feed her children.  Father (Gabriel Preisser) returns with a feast because he was able to sell his brooms to the wealthy who are cleaning for an upcoming festival.  They celebrate but Father becomes worried when he hears that the children are in the woods and tells Mother about the evil witch who turns children into gingerbread and then eats them.  After Hansel and Gretel encounter woodland creatures, they begin picking strawberries but, when they eat all of them, they realize that they can't go home without picking more but it gets dark and they get lost.  The Sandman (Sarah Scofield) visits them to help them go to sleep and, after saying a prayer, fourteen angels gather to protect them through the night.  In the morning a Dew Fairy (Stephanie Chee) wakes them up and they soon find a large house made of gingerbread.  Hansel is so hungry he begins nibbling on it and is caught by a witch (Freddie Ballentine).  She tries to lure them into her oven but they trick her and push her inside, instead.  They also rescue all of the gingerbread children who were trapped by the witch and bring them back to life before being reunited with their Mother and Father.  Coit and McKay have amazing voices, especially in the incredibly beautiful "Evening Benediction" before Hansel and Gretel go to sleep in the woods (it gave me goosebumps), and I really enjoyed their physical performances during the folk dances in Act 1 and when the witch controls their movements in Act 3.  Ballentine steals the show with his over the top comedic performance (but I would really love to see him in a dramatic role because I loved his voice) and the children (the dancers from Children's Ballet Theatre who portray the woodland animals and the angels and the Choristers of The Madeleine Choir School who portray the gingerbread children) are wonderful.  The sets and costumes are magical and the special effects are a lot of fun, particularly the broom that chases the witch across the stage.  The score by Engelbert Humperdinck, which incorporates folk music into its themes, is lovely.  However, with the exception of "Evening Benediction," I didn't find any of the songs particularly memorable and the story feels like a simple fairy tale that has been extended and embellished to make a full-length opera and it really drags in some places (I kept waiting for the witch to appear).  To be fair, I definitely prefer tragic operas to comedic ones so others may appreciate this more than I did.  It runs through January 26 and tickets may be purchased here.

Twilight Marathon

When I noticed that an inordinate number of my students were reading the same book with a distinctive black cover, I was really curious because getting them to read for pleasure was a hard sell and I wanted to know what had them all so enthralled.  I asked one of my classes and then immediately went to my computer to order a copy of Twilight by Stephenie Meyer.  They all told me to order New Moon at the same time because I would definitely want to read it as soon as I was finished with Twilight but I decided to see if I liked it before ordering the next one.  The book came on a Friday and I ended up staying up all night to finish it (then drove to Barnes & Noble and waited an hour in the parking lot for it to open so I could get New Moon and pre-order Eclipse).  Since I enjoyed the books, I was really excited for each of the movies to come out and I saw all five of them at midnight screenings.  I have to admit that I love them and binge watching them is a guilty pleasure so, of course, I had to go to a Twilight marathon at the Megaplex with my sister Kristine yesterday.  We had so much fun at the Harry Potter marathon last summer so we were really excited for this one because it was considerably shorter (only 12 hours instead of 22).  The set-up at the theater was very similar to the Harry Potter marathon and, once again, I was really impressed with how organized everything was because checking in and ordering concessions was quick and easy despite the large crowd (six theaters were in use at the Legacy Crossing location). Our audience was very animated with lots of cheering whenever Jacob appears without a shirt (which is most of the time) and whenever Edward appears in the sun.  There was also a lot of laughing when the Quileutes turn into wolves and when we first see baby Renesmee (the CGI is admittedly pretty bad).  What I noticed most when watching these movies on the big screen again was how much I love the music, especially "Supermassive Black Hole" by Muse, "Decode" by Paramore, and "Flightless Bird, American Mouth" by Iron & Wine in Twilight, "Possibility" by Lykke Li and "Meet Me on the Equinox" by Death Cab for Cutie in New Moon, "Neutron Star Collision (Love Is Forever)" by Muse in Eclipse, "From Now On" by The Features, "I Didn't Mean It" by The Belle Brigade, "It Will Rain" by Bruno Mars, and "A Thousand Years" by Christina Perri in Breaking Dawn Part One, and "The Forgotten" by Green Day in Breaking Dawn Part Two (I remembered the words to all of these songs even though I hadn't heard them in a long time).  I think I love these movies so much because they are a form of escapism and spending my Saturday escaping from the world was really fun (and much needed).  Kristine and I can't wait for the next marathon at the Megaplex (we are hoping for The Hunger Games).

Nickel Boys

I was very moved by Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Nickel Boys so I was eager to see the movie adaptation Nickel Boys by director RaMell Ross.  I was hoping that it would get a wider release after the fall film festivals and, luckily, it is now playing at the Broadway.  I had the chance to see it last night and the more I think about it the more I love it.  Elwood Curtis (Ethan Herisse) is an idealistic Black teenager living in Tallahassee, Florida with his grandmother Hattie (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor) during the era of segregation.  He is inspired by Martin Luther King, Jr. to participate in the Civil Rights Movement and by his history teacher Mr. Hill (Jimmie Fails) to enroll in college courses.  He is picked up by a man driving a stolen car while hitchhiking to campus and, when the man is pulled over by police, he is unjustly arrested as his accomplice.  Because he is a minor, he is sent to the reform school Nickel Academy where he befriends a cynical student named Turner (Brandon Wilson).  Elwood soon discovers that the academy is both cruel and corrupt after he is brutally whipped for defending a student who is being bullied and when he and other students are hired out as slave labor.  They come to suspect that a student has been executed and buried on the property but, when  Elwood wants to expose the academy to a visiting government inspector so that conditions will improve, Turner advises him to keep his head down.  He does not listen and is severely punished.  Many years later, Turner is inspired by Elwood to come forward after mass graves are discovered at the academy.  This features a non-linear structure and the narrative is told through the first person POVs of Elwood and Turner (the audience only sees what they see) with lots of archival footage of the Black experience during this time period interspersed in between.  It took me a little while to adjust to this but eventually something clicked and I realized that I was actually experiencing everything that the two characters do.  It was both visceral and powerful.  The images on the screen are hauntingly beautiful and the performances by Herisse and Wilson are incredibly compelling even if some of the scenes are difficult to watch.  I don't think I have ever seen anything like this before and I highly recommend it but I will say that those who have not read the book might not understand everything that is happening.

The Brutalist

Last night I went to an early screening of The Brutalist at the Broadway with my nephew (I sure do love going to movies with him) and I think it is an epic masterpiece.  Laszlo Toth (Adrien Brody) is a Hungarian Jew who emigrates to the United States after surviving the Holocaust while separated from his wife Erzsebet (Felicity Jones) and niece Zsofia (Raffey Cassidy).  He lands in New York Harbor but soon travels to Philadelphia where he is taken in by his cousin Atilla (Alessandro Nivola), who has become very assimilated and has an American (and Catholic) wife named Audrey (Emma Laird) who does not want him staying with them.  Atilla eventually gives in to Audrey's wishes (and a false claim that Lazslo made advances to her) and asks him to leave.  He becomes a heroin addict while working a construction job and living in a shelter run by the Catholic church but soon meets a wealthy, but mercurial, industrialist named Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) who knows of his reputation as an innovative architect before the war.  He proposes that Laszlo design a large project as a memorial to his mother and offers to help facilitate the immigration of his wife and niece as an incentive.  Laszlo is reunited with his family and moves to Van Buren's vast estate as work on the elaborate community center begins.  The project is fraught with complications including the last minute addition of a chapel, Van Buren's insistence on having another architect supervise the work, the derision of Van Buren's arrogant son Harry (Joe Alwyn), and the derailment of a train carrying materials which is blamed on Laszlo.  However, it is a violent encounter with Van Buren that ultimately dooms the project.  Many years later, at a retrospective of Laszlo's work in Venice, it is revealed that the community center was eventually completed and now stands as a monument to him rather than Van Buren.  I was absolutely riveted (despite a runtime of over three hours) by this bold exploration of the immigrant experience and I loved how Laszlo's first distorted view of the Statue of Liberty, which is often called a symbol of the American dream, foreshadows what is to come.  Brody is utterly captivating with an emotional performance that, in my opinion, is the best of 2024, especially in an incredibly intense scene where Lazslo tells Van Buren that his buildings will be his legacy, but I was also impressed with Pearce because he is the perfect embodiment of Van Buren's privilege juxtaposed with Laszlo's suffering.  I could not look away whenever the two of them appear on screen together.  The production design is immersive, particularly Laszlo's innovative buildings, and the cinematography is dazzling (it was filmed in VistaVision).  I even loved the titles because they mimic Brutalist architecture.  Finally, I was blown away by the score by Daniel Blumberg, especially the continuous music in the ten minute opening sequence, because the repetition of a four note motif (by the brass and the piano among other instruments) is so evocative.  I cannot recommend this enough!

Note:  Watching this felt like an event because the theater was packed and the structure of the movie (which includes an overture and an intermission) is a throwback to the way movies used to be presented.

Dial M for Murder at PTC

I love the movie Dial M for Murder (I'm a big fan of Alfred Hitchcock) so I was really excited to see a new adaptation by Jeffrey Hatcher at PTC last night. This version is still set in the 1950s but there is an update that intensifies the motivations of the characters and I found the whole production to be incredibly compelling. Tony Wendice (Dan Domingues) blackmails his old college friend Lesgate (Aaron Cammack) into killing his wife Margot (Awesta Zarif) for her money after he discovers that she is having an affair with a crime writer named Maxine Hadley (Lucy Lavely). However, all of his elaborate plans go awry when Margot kills Lesgate instead and he must improvise to make Margot culpable for the murder. Will Margot, Maxine, and Inspector Hubbard (Peter Howard) be able to expose Tony as the mastermind before it is too late? This is an incredibly intense psychological thriller because it is not so much about "whodunnit" but about how the plot will be unraveled. Every aspect of the production adds to the tension and I especially loved the set, which features a well appointed living room surrounded by discolored mirrors that distort the contents within and a murky scrim through which you can see the all-important staircase on the other side of the door, and the dramatic lighting, which uses light and shadow to great effect (especially in the scene where Tony is compelling Lesgate to do his bidding because Tony's shadow looms over Lesgate and it is so ominous). I was also impressed with the sound design because hearing Maxine's interview on the radio during the attack sequence creates a sense of unease that is palpable. The pacing is absolutely brilliant because, despite the heavy reliance on dialogue, my attention never wavered as more and more secrets are slowly revealed (the audience gasped out loud during a particularly heated scene). The cast is uniformly exceptional and it is difficult to single anyone out but I had a lot of fun watching Dominigues subtly manipulate everyone around him with a smirk on his face (he is such a cad) and Howard bumble around with an overwrought delivery (he is the source of much comic relief) until he reveals himself to be Tony's equal in manipulation. Finally, I think having Margot's lover be a woman (the biggest change from the original play by Frederick Knott) really ups the stakes for her and provides a more persuasive motive for the lengths she goes to hide the affair. I thoroughly enjoyed this and, if you are a fan of suspense, I highly recommend getting a ticket (go here). It runs at PTC through January 25.