Post by rick on Aug 25, 2012 22:32:20 GMT -5
In the thread I started about Broadway star Howard McGillin praising Linda, there was a discussion about him appearing in the same production of "La Boheme" with Linda.
I knew that Gary Morris was billed as her co-star. I see from the review below that while the role of Mimi was triple-cast with Linda sharing performances with Patti Cohenour and Caroline Peyton, Gary Morris shared his role with the actor David Carroll. Howard McGillin appeared as Marcel.
The New York Times
Published: November 30, 1984
OPERA REVIEW
LINDA RONSTADT IN PUCCINNI'S 'LA BOHEME'
By FRANK RICH
It's not consumption that's killing Linda Ronstadt's Mimi in the New York Shakespeare Festival's crazy- quilt production of ''La Boh eme'' - it's abject fear. From the moment she first knocks on the door of the poet Rodolfo's Parisian garret, Miss Ronstadt seems tentative and shaky, and the panic rarely subsides thereafter. Whatever else is to be said about this performer, she's no fool and no coward. One can tell at a glance that Miss Ronstadt herself knows that she's not at home with Puccini - and one can only admire the bravery that allows her to forge ahead anyway, reason be damned.
A few missed notes and many indistinct lyrics notwithstanding, the performance isn't embarrassing, just lackluster and anxiety-inducing. By forcing her lovely soprano into places where nature or training has not yet permitted it to go, Miss Ronstadt battles her way through the role, giving us the fragrance if not the beauty of the gorgeous melodies. Yet even her minor victories so deplete her energies that she never does get around to characterizing the impoverished seamstress: Fragile and almost expressionless from the start, Miss Ronstadt's Mimi might as well leap right from her first aria to the death- bed finale.
Perhaps this hugely talented pop singer undertook this daunting task out of loyalty to the show's producer, Joseph Papp, and its director, Wilford Leach - the team that launched her theatrical career in ''The Pirates of Penzance.'' Since ''Penzance,'' Miss Ronstadt has successfully expanded her repertoire from rock to vintage pop, and one can certainly imagine her undertaking more ambitious musical-theater roles than Gilbert and Sullivan's Mabel. But why ''La Boh eme''? Wouldn't it have made more sense for Miss Ronstadt to grace a musical by composers like Richard Rodgers and George Gershwin, whom she serves so splendidly in her recent concert appearances and record albums?
Then again, it's fruitless to apply logic to nearly any aspect of the production at the Public's Anspacher Theater. ''La Boh eme'' is being performed with rotating leads - three Mimis, two Rodolfos - and, by sampling two pairs of stars at critics' previews this week, one could determine that this show is too lackadaisically conceived to ignite, no matter who's appearing in it.
Like Miss Ronstadt's performance, the production is by no means a debacle. In the hands of its strongest players - David Carroll's Rodolfo, Patti Cohenour's Mimi and Howard McGillin's exceptionally dashing Marcel (as Marcello is here renamed) - this vestpocket ''Boh eme'' boasts an intimacy, charm and sexiness that some may find an antidote to the Franco Zeffirelli extravaganza at the Met. The cozy, arena-shaped house and attractive, youthful cast are well suited to a piece that celebrates the high spirits, passions and esthetic fevers of struggling artists. But Mr. Leach doesn't make the most of the evening's potentially rousing virtues. Lilting interludes are outnumbered by bungled opportunities, finally to produce a benign collegiate mishmash that will leave theatergoers undernourished even as it antagonizes Pucciniphiles.
The show is so casual and evaporates so quickly that it's unlikely to spark another heated debate between opera purists and theatrical libertarians. If anything, this production has miscalculated by attempting to be too faithful to Puccini. As was not true in Peter Brook's ''Carmen,'' the score is presented unabridged, with even the stripped-down orchestrations (by the gifted Michael Starobin) following the broad outlines of the originals. But given the clashing, miked and sometimes strained voices of the singers - and the tinny, inevitably emaciated sound of the 12-piece band - any token fidelity to the opera does more harm than good. The company's musical inadequacies, which cry out for artful camouflage, are instead accentuated at every turn.
The musicianship in ''Carmen'' or, for that matter, Mr. Leach's ''Penzance'' wasn't always great, either, but it was designed to serve the directors' vibrant theatrical schemes. What is most deflating to ''La Boh eme'' is Mr. Leach's surprising inability to provide a vision that at least might let the show soar as theater.
This time out, the director offers no unifying point of view, let alone style, and settles for musty, sloppily executed vignettes redolent of any mediocre opera house ''Boh eme.'' The clownish horseplay of Rodolfo and his bohemian boon companions (Act I) and the farcical Christmas Eve shenanigans in the Latin Quarter's Cafe Momus (Act II) have none of the wit and precision Mr. Leach brought to the roustabout sequences of ''Penzance.'' When the course of true love and Mimi's health decline in Acts III and IV, the tragedy isn't played for keeps (as Mr. Brook might have done), but as creaky melodrama.
The production's laissez-faire approach is everywhere apparent. Though the timeframe has been advanced from the 1830's (the setting of both the opera and its source, Henri Murger's ''Sc enes de la Vie de Boh eme'') to Puccini's own 1890's, it's hard to say why: Bob Shaw's drab scenery barely capitalizes on the new, Art Nouveau period. Meanwhile, David Spencer's clever, if wordy, English libretto too often drifts into present-day vernacular and psychobabble. (Marcel sings of giving his tempestuous Musette ''room to breathe in.'')
It's almost as if the show's creators couldn't decide whether to leave ''Boh eme'' in its original setting or move it to contemporary TriBeCa (a not unpromising fancy) - and instead compromised at an arbitrary midpoint. Whatever the explanation, the mood- breaking inconsistencies of time and place won't allow the company or audience to settle securely into the work's rhapsodic spell.
The casting of the supporting roles - the philosopher Colline, the musician Schaunard, the landlord Benoit, and the sugar daddy, Alcindoro - is equally erratic. One would think that performers with weak voices were chosen for their compensating comic skills - but their clowning is often more nondescript than their singing. Cass Morgan's excessively vulgar Musette is particularly damaging: While she brings a big, brash belt to her Act II waltz, her incessant mugging destroys the credibility of Musette's eventual redemption and transforms the Cafe Mamus into a burlesque parody of the restaurant of ''Hello, Dolly!''
Although no one expects this cast to recreate grand nights at La Scala, the superior principals do meet the reasonable goal that too often eludes the rest of the company: They take us back to the heyday of Broadway singers like John Raitt and Barbara Cook. Miss Cohenour may not have a bigger voice than Miss Ronstadt, but she has the requisite technique for Mimi, as well as a fetching personality. Mr. Carroll's Rodolfo, who partnered Miss Ronstadt at the critics' performances, and Mr. McGillin's Marcel not only convince us that they are sensitive young romantics but also deliver the score forcefully in pop terms.
The company's other Rodolfo and second pop celebrity, the Nashville- accented country singer Gary Morris, has a winning, teddy-bearish presence, not to mention a sweet, untrained voice that soon bursts at the seams. And, like Miss Ronstadt, he has guts. For pop stars to attempt ''La Boheme'' is challenge enough. By doing so in a production too haphazard to accommodate their special talents, Mr. Morris and Miss Ronstadt must walk the tightrope without a net.
The Cast
LA BOHEME, music by Giacomo Puccini; music supervised and conducted by William Elliott; orchestrations by Michael Starobin; adaptation and new lyrics by David Spencer; original libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, based on the novel by Henri Murger; directed by Wilford Leach; scenery by Bob Shaw; costumes by Jane Greenwood; lighting by Paul Gallo; sound design by Tom Morse; associate producer, Jason Steven Cohen. Presented by Joseph Papp.
At the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street.
Marcel -- Howard McGillin
Rodolfo -- David Carroll and Gary Morris
Colline -- Keith David
Schaunard -- Neal Klein
Benoit -- Joe Pichette
Mimi -- Linda Ronstadt, Patti Cohenour and Caroline Peyton
Musette -- Cass Morgan
Alcindoro -- Merwin Goldsmith
The Maitre D' -- John Herrera
Waiters -- Bill Carmichael and Daniel Marcus
Trumpet Vendor and Head Sweeper -- James Judy
Bonnett Vendor -- Marcie Shaw
Lady with Pearls -- Nancy Heikin
Students Margaret Benczak, Carol Dennis, Caroline Peyton and Joe Pichette ParpignolMichael Willson SweepersJohn Herrera and Bill Carmichael Night ClerkDaniel Marcus Hall PortersJoe Pichette and Michael Willson Dairymaids Margaret Benczak, Carol Dennis, Nancy Heikin, Caroline Peyton and Marcie Shaw
I knew that Gary Morris was billed as her co-star. I see from the review below that while the role of Mimi was triple-cast with Linda sharing performances with Patti Cohenour and Caroline Peyton, Gary Morris shared his role with the actor David Carroll. Howard McGillin appeared as Marcel.
The New York Times
Published: November 30, 1984
OPERA REVIEW
LINDA RONSTADT IN PUCCINNI'S 'LA BOHEME'
By FRANK RICH
It's not consumption that's killing Linda Ronstadt's Mimi in the New York Shakespeare Festival's crazy- quilt production of ''La Boh eme'' - it's abject fear. From the moment she first knocks on the door of the poet Rodolfo's Parisian garret, Miss Ronstadt seems tentative and shaky, and the panic rarely subsides thereafter. Whatever else is to be said about this performer, she's no fool and no coward. One can tell at a glance that Miss Ronstadt herself knows that she's not at home with Puccini - and one can only admire the bravery that allows her to forge ahead anyway, reason be damned.
A few missed notes and many indistinct lyrics notwithstanding, the performance isn't embarrassing, just lackluster and anxiety-inducing. By forcing her lovely soprano into places where nature or training has not yet permitted it to go, Miss Ronstadt battles her way through the role, giving us the fragrance if not the beauty of the gorgeous melodies. Yet even her minor victories so deplete her energies that she never does get around to characterizing the impoverished seamstress: Fragile and almost expressionless from the start, Miss Ronstadt's Mimi might as well leap right from her first aria to the death- bed finale.
Perhaps this hugely talented pop singer undertook this daunting task out of loyalty to the show's producer, Joseph Papp, and its director, Wilford Leach - the team that launched her theatrical career in ''The Pirates of Penzance.'' Since ''Penzance,'' Miss Ronstadt has successfully expanded her repertoire from rock to vintage pop, and one can certainly imagine her undertaking more ambitious musical-theater roles than Gilbert and Sullivan's Mabel. But why ''La Boh eme''? Wouldn't it have made more sense for Miss Ronstadt to grace a musical by composers like Richard Rodgers and George Gershwin, whom she serves so splendidly in her recent concert appearances and record albums?
Then again, it's fruitless to apply logic to nearly any aspect of the production at the Public's Anspacher Theater. ''La Boh eme'' is being performed with rotating leads - three Mimis, two Rodolfos - and, by sampling two pairs of stars at critics' previews this week, one could determine that this show is too lackadaisically conceived to ignite, no matter who's appearing in it.
Like Miss Ronstadt's performance, the production is by no means a debacle. In the hands of its strongest players - David Carroll's Rodolfo, Patti Cohenour's Mimi and Howard McGillin's exceptionally dashing Marcel (as Marcello is here renamed) - this vestpocket ''Boh eme'' boasts an intimacy, charm and sexiness that some may find an antidote to the Franco Zeffirelli extravaganza at the Met. The cozy, arena-shaped house and attractive, youthful cast are well suited to a piece that celebrates the high spirits, passions and esthetic fevers of struggling artists. But Mr. Leach doesn't make the most of the evening's potentially rousing virtues. Lilting interludes are outnumbered by bungled opportunities, finally to produce a benign collegiate mishmash that will leave theatergoers undernourished even as it antagonizes Pucciniphiles.
The show is so casual and evaporates so quickly that it's unlikely to spark another heated debate between opera purists and theatrical libertarians. If anything, this production has miscalculated by attempting to be too faithful to Puccini. As was not true in Peter Brook's ''Carmen,'' the score is presented unabridged, with even the stripped-down orchestrations (by the gifted Michael Starobin) following the broad outlines of the originals. But given the clashing, miked and sometimes strained voices of the singers - and the tinny, inevitably emaciated sound of the 12-piece band - any token fidelity to the opera does more harm than good. The company's musical inadequacies, which cry out for artful camouflage, are instead accentuated at every turn.
The musicianship in ''Carmen'' or, for that matter, Mr. Leach's ''Penzance'' wasn't always great, either, but it was designed to serve the directors' vibrant theatrical schemes. What is most deflating to ''La Boh eme'' is Mr. Leach's surprising inability to provide a vision that at least might let the show soar as theater.
This time out, the director offers no unifying point of view, let alone style, and settles for musty, sloppily executed vignettes redolent of any mediocre opera house ''Boh eme.'' The clownish horseplay of Rodolfo and his bohemian boon companions (Act I) and the farcical Christmas Eve shenanigans in the Latin Quarter's Cafe Momus (Act II) have none of the wit and precision Mr. Leach brought to the roustabout sequences of ''Penzance.'' When the course of true love and Mimi's health decline in Acts III and IV, the tragedy isn't played for keeps (as Mr. Brook might have done), but as creaky melodrama.
The production's laissez-faire approach is everywhere apparent. Though the timeframe has been advanced from the 1830's (the setting of both the opera and its source, Henri Murger's ''Sc enes de la Vie de Boh eme'') to Puccini's own 1890's, it's hard to say why: Bob Shaw's drab scenery barely capitalizes on the new, Art Nouveau period. Meanwhile, David Spencer's clever, if wordy, English libretto too often drifts into present-day vernacular and psychobabble. (Marcel sings of giving his tempestuous Musette ''room to breathe in.'')
It's almost as if the show's creators couldn't decide whether to leave ''Boh eme'' in its original setting or move it to contemporary TriBeCa (a not unpromising fancy) - and instead compromised at an arbitrary midpoint. Whatever the explanation, the mood- breaking inconsistencies of time and place won't allow the company or audience to settle securely into the work's rhapsodic spell.
The casting of the supporting roles - the philosopher Colline, the musician Schaunard, the landlord Benoit, and the sugar daddy, Alcindoro - is equally erratic. One would think that performers with weak voices were chosen for their compensating comic skills - but their clowning is often more nondescript than their singing. Cass Morgan's excessively vulgar Musette is particularly damaging: While she brings a big, brash belt to her Act II waltz, her incessant mugging destroys the credibility of Musette's eventual redemption and transforms the Cafe Mamus into a burlesque parody of the restaurant of ''Hello, Dolly!''
Although no one expects this cast to recreate grand nights at La Scala, the superior principals do meet the reasonable goal that too often eludes the rest of the company: They take us back to the heyday of Broadway singers like John Raitt and Barbara Cook. Miss Cohenour may not have a bigger voice than Miss Ronstadt, but she has the requisite technique for Mimi, as well as a fetching personality. Mr. Carroll's Rodolfo, who partnered Miss Ronstadt at the critics' performances, and Mr. McGillin's Marcel not only convince us that they are sensitive young romantics but also deliver the score forcefully in pop terms.
The company's other Rodolfo and second pop celebrity, the Nashville- accented country singer Gary Morris, has a winning, teddy-bearish presence, not to mention a sweet, untrained voice that soon bursts at the seams. And, like Miss Ronstadt, he has guts. For pop stars to attempt ''La Boheme'' is challenge enough. By doing so in a production too haphazard to accommodate their special talents, Mr. Morris and Miss Ronstadt must walk the tightrope without a net.
The Cast
LA BOHEME, music by Giacomo Puccini; music supervised and conducted by William Elliott; orchestrations by Michael Starobin; adaptation and new lyrics by David Spencer; original libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, based on the novel by Henri Murger; directed by Wilford Leach; scenery by Bob Shaw; costumes by Jane Greenwood; lighting by Paul Gallo; sound design by Tom Morse; associate producer, Jason Steven Cohen. Presented by Joseph Papp.
At the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street.
Marcel -- Howard McGillin
Rodolfo -- David Carroll and Gary Morris
Colline -- Keith David
Schaunard -- Neal Klein
Benoit -- Joe Pichette
Mimi -- Linda Ronstadt, Patti Cohenour and Caroline Peyton
Musette -- Cass Morgan
Alcindoro -- Merwin Goldsmith
The Maitre D' -- John Herrera
Waiters -- Bill Carmichael and Daniel Marcus
Trumpet Vendor and Head Sweeper -- James Judy
Bonnett Vendor -- Marcie Shaw
Lady with Pearls -- Nancy Heikin
Students Margaret Benczak, Carol Dennis, Caroline Peyton and Joe Pichette ParpignolMichael Willson SweepersJohn Herrera and Bill Carmichael Night ClerkDaniel Marcus Hall PortersJoe Pichette and Michael Willson Dairymaids Margaret Benczak, Carol Dennis, Nancy Heikin, Caroline Peyton and Marcie Shaw
