OPERA REVIEW : Britten’s ‘Dream’ Comes True

I happen to be a vegetarian. Never mind. Pass the crow.

When the Music Center Opera first ventured Benjamin Britten’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream” in 1988, the performance seemed too long, too cute and too precious. Immediacy and charm, crucial components in this fragile challenge, threatened to evaporate in the vast open spaces of the Wiltern Theatre, a renovated vaudeville palace afflicted with bad sight lines and worse sound lines.

Now, Peter Hemmings, our dauntless operatic generalissimo , has brought the Shakespearean fantasy back to Los Angeles. This time, the venue would seem to be even less appropriate. With its 3,200 seats, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion accommodates nearly a thousand more patrons than the woeful Wiltern.

One approached the Music Center on Friday fearing the worst. But, miracle of miracles, nearly everything seemed to work this time--and to work elegantly.

Two-thirds of the excellent cast was new. So, more significantly, was the conductor. The stage director had refined and refocused his interpretive concept a bit.

For all its size, the Pavilion stage is better equipped than its Wiltern counterpart. It should be noted, moreover, that your faithful scribe viewed the previous “Dream” from the alienating distance of the balcony, this one from the inviting proximity of Row F, downstairs.

Be all that as it may, the Los Angeles “Dream” remains much the same. But the nightmare has vanished. Britten has triumphed at last against the odd odds.

For those who have trouble grasping his less than idiomatic word setting or who find the meek piping of male sopranos difficult to comprehend, Hemmings & Co. have introduced the crutch of supertitles. Now we can literally brush up our Shakespeare with one eye on the screen atop the proscenium, one eye on the action, and at least one ear on the pretty tunes.

The prankish Puck, in the current production, resembles a delirious cross between Peter Pan and the Artful Dodger--and Los Angeles can use an artful Dodger these days whenever and wherever we may find one. “Gentles,” he admonishes us, “do not reprehend. If you pardon, we will mend.”

He and his knowing cohorts certainly mended nicely on Friday.

Roderick Brydon, the new conductor, coaxed exquisite playing from a 28-piece pit ensemble evasively identified as the Music Center Opera Orchestra (the overworked and often misnamed Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra apparently was occupied elsewhere). The Scottish maestro tellingly focused the distinctions between the chatterly glitter of the fairies, the sweet-and-sour lyricism of the lovers, and the bumbling platitudes--part music-hall mockery, part operatic parody--of the rustics. He brought a sensuous glow to the transparent night music, and never lost dramatic point in his quest for pretty poetry.

Gordon Davidson, who returned as director, stressed character rather than caricature, even when Shakespeare made that a trying task. He kept the action moving wittily, and with graceful fluidity, on Douglas W. Schmidt’s revolving forest set, sensitively lit by F. Mitchell Dana.

Davidson, who ought to venture more operatic excursions, respected the precarious distinction between magic and kitsch. Once again, he tellingly drafted Oberon’s simian henchmen to serve, unobtrusively, as props and stagehands, and he introduced a beguiling ballerina to wave the wand as Tytania’s lieutenant. His picturesque decision to swap a new Victorian frame for the original Athenian ambience did no harm. (Nor did his comfy stress on American rather than British English.)

The basic ingredients may have been the same--or, at least, similar--in 1988. But what had looked contrived and glitzy then somehow looked sweet and mellow now.

The youthful cast--from lofty King of the Fairies to lowly mutt of the rustics--was uniformly strong, uniformly attractive (Lewis Brown provided the characterful costumes), uniformly responsive to the theatrical cause. There was no room here for isolated star turns.

Jeffrey Gall again stalked the boards as a mildly sardonic, leather-clad Oberon who deftly piped his schemes in sexless countertenor tones. Constance Hauman, the virtuosically erotic Zerbinetta of “Ariadne” in Long Beach, found the perfect balance between hot sensuality and cool brilliance as his Tytania.

The tangled lovers were subtly delineated by Jonathan Mack (the thoughtful Lysander) and John Atkins (the temperamental Demetrius) vs. Stephanie Vlahos (the gutsy Hermia) and Jennifer Smith (the ethereal Helena). Bucolic bonhomie was amply provided, without comic excess, by the booming and bumbly Bottom of Michael Gallup, ably seconded by Brian Matthews’ paternal Quince, not to mention Greg Fedderly’s boyish Flute, Wayne Shepperd’s winsome Starveling, Richard Bernstein’s cowardly-leonine Snug and Bruce Johnson’s dutiful Snout.

Sanford Sylvan and Paula Rasmussen held court with elan on behalf of the misplaced Athenian aristocrats. John Allee flew through the air with the greatest of ease and uttered his Puckish platitudes with cheek that never cloyed.

In all, this “Dream” turned out to be a thoughtful example of stylish musical theater. Too bad it wasn’t appreciated as such four years ago.

Perhaps the focus of the production has indeed changed. Perhaps one’s perspective has changed. Perhaps nothing has changed.

If the third possibility is true, what a fool this mortal was.