St. Louis theatre calendar for the week of January 15, 2024

What's on St.Louis theater and cabaret stages this coming week. Please leave a comment if anything was wrong or got left out

Hold On!
Photo courtesy of The Black Rep

The Black Rep presents the world premiere of Hold On! By Paul Webb through January 24.  “Although the Civil Rights Act of 1964 legally desegregated the South, discrimination was still rampant in certain areas, making it difficult for Blacks to register to vote. In 1965, an Alabama city became the battleground for suffrage. “Hold On!,” the inspiration behind the award-winning 2014 feature film “Selma,” explores the conflict between two extraordinary men, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Lyndon Baines Johnson. Both brilliant leaders, their personal battle, like the battle on the streets of Selma, is ultimately decided by King’s greater moral courage.” Performances take place at the Edison Theatre on the Washington University campus. For more information: www.theblackrep.org.

The Blue Strawberry presents Introducing: Haley Driver on Thursday January 18 at 7:30 pm. “Join up and coming artist Haley Driver as she explores her favorite songs and genres of the jazz, R&B, and musical theater persuasion. Haley Driver is in her final year as a vocal jazz and contemporary music major at The New School in New York City. A St. Louis native, she has performed in both her hometown as well as her new home of New York. Haley has performed at Jazz St. Louis and Don't Tell Mama (NYC) with the St. Louis Cabaret Conference. She is currently in the process of creating her debut EP and couldn't be more excited to share it with the world.” The Blue Strawberry is at 364 N. Boyle. For more information: bluestrawberrystl.com.

Tim Schall and Carol Schmidt

The Blue Strawberry presents Sunday Standard Time with Tim Schall and Carol Schmidt on Sunday January 21 from at 6 pm. “Join Tim Schall (vocals) and Carol Schmidt (piano) in the lounge for a casual, classy Sunday evening of jazz standards, a little sophisticated pop and a dash of classic Broadway. Tim is no stranger to the theater and concert stages of St. Louis, Chicago and New York's Lincoln Center. Carol has a rich history of entertaining St. Louis audiences as musician and singer. Together they will help you wind down your weekend with timeless music and a lot of irreverent dry humor.”  The Blue Strawberry is at 364 N. Boyle. For more information: bluestrawberrystl.com.

The Fabulous Fox presents Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill: The Musical January 19 – 21. “Joy, love, heartache, strength, wisdom, catharsis, LIFE — everything we’ve been waiting to see in a Broadway show — is here in the exhilarating, fearless new musical based on Alanis Morissette’s world-changing music. Directed by Tony© Award-winner Diane Paulus (Waitress, Pippin, 1776) with a Tony-winning book by Diablo Cody (Juno) and Grammy-winning score, this electrifying production about a perfectly imperfect American family ‘vaults the audience to its collective feet’ (The Guardian).” The Fabulous Fox is on North Grand in Grand Center. For more information: fabulousfox.com.

The Lemp Mansion Murder Mystery Dinner Theatre and Jest Mysteries present A Fistful of Hollars  January 19 through May 4. "Gun slingers, dance hall girls, cowboys, gold diggers, cowboy boots and ten-gallon-hats will abound. Rowdy cowboys will duel to the death as the crooked sheriff watches with glee. But none of these characters are as dangerous as Nasty Nate, he’s the orneriest gun in the west and word is that he’s going to be stirring up trouble at the Lemp Mansion. " The Lemp Mansion is at 3322 DeMenil Place in south city. For more information: www.lempmansion.com

Winter Opera presents Puccini’s Manon Lescaut Friday at 7:30 pm and Sunday at 2 pm, January 19 and 21. “Manon Lescaut is an opera composed by Giacomo Puccini about the tragic love affair between the young nobleman Des Grieux and the beautiful but ambitious Manon Lescaut. The ill-fated couple fall passionately in love at first sight, defying societal conventions and the wishes of Des Grieux’s father. However, their love is tested when Manon is enticed by the allure of luxury and material wealth. Puccini’s masterful composition brings to life the tragic tale of love, sacrifice, and the fragility of human desires.” Performances take place at the Kirkwood Performing Arts Center, 201 E. Monroe in Kirkwood, MO. For more information: www.winteroperastl.org.

Looking for auditions and other artistic opportunities? Check out the St. Louis Auditions site.

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Review: At Lyric Opera of Chicago, "Don Quichotte" sings a song of kindness

This review originally appeared at 88.1 KDHX, where Chuck Lavazzi is the senior performing arts critic.

L-R: Ferruccio Furlanetto and Nicola Alaimo
Photo: Todd Rosenberg

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Powerful, moving performances and a strong sense of whimsy highlight a beautiful production of Jules Massenet's last big hit, Don Quichotte, at Lyric Opera of Chicago.

When Jules Massenet wrote his operatic treatment of poet Jacques Le Lorrain's play Le chevalier de la longue figure (very freely adapted from Cervantes' Don Quixote) in 1909, both he and his style of composition were on the way out. Two years after the opera's highly successful 1910 premiere in Monte Carlo, Massenet would be dead of abdominal cancer and his poplar, romantic style would soon be eclipsed by revolutionaries like Stravinsky, impressionists like Debussy and Ravel, and serialists like Berg.

But fashionable or not, Don Quichotte has proved to be enduringly popular over the last century and is still produced often enough to come in at number 140 worldwide on the Operabase list for the 2014/15 season. The current Lyric production, which originated with San Diego Opera in 2009, does full justice to Massenet's colorful score and librettist Henri Cain's gentle, elegiac version of the tale of the Knight of the Woeful Countenance.

Clémentine Margaine and Ferruccio Furlanetto
Photo: Todd Rosenberg

The characters of the Don and Sancho are essentially unchanged from the originals in this treatment but aside from the famous battle with the windmills, the story is radically different. Instead of being a figment of the Don's imagination, Dulcinea (now Dulcinée) is a very real and very wealthy beauty who is pursued by many suitors and bored with them all. Amused by the Don's absurd attempts to woo her, Dulcinée send him on a quest of sorts to retrieve a pearl necklace stolen by Ténébrun, a local bandit.

Disarmed by the Don's nobility, Ténébrun gives him the necklace. But when the Don returns the necklace to Dulcinée and proposes to her, he's mocked by her party guests and gently rebuffed by her. Broken in spirit and health, he retreats to the mountains where, tended by the faithful Sancho, he has one last hallucination of Dulcinée's voice calling him to the heavens as he expires.

The role of Don Quichotte was first sung by the legendary Russian bass Feodor Chaliapin, and many of history's great bassos have taken it on since. When Lyric first presented Don Quichotte in 1974, for example, the role was sung by Nicolai Ghiaurov. This time around, the man behind the Don's spiky hair and beard is Ferruccio Furlanetto, who has made something of a career of the part, playing it to great acclaim all over the world.

Nicola Alaimo and Ferruccio Furlanetto
Photo: Todd Rosenberg

His is a gentle and even bemused Don Quichotte, confident in his folly and passionate in defense of his core values of honesty, compassion, and generosity. His complete immersion in the character and his powerful voice -- solid even in its lowest notes -- make his performance the solid foundation on which this fine production is built.

Baritone Nicola Alaimo is Sancho, a role which has more dramatic depth than you might expect. When his heartbroken master is mocked by Dulcinée's party guests, it's Sancho who rises to his defense in the passionate "Riez, allez, riez du pauvre ideologue" ("Laugh, laugh at this poor idealist"), excoriating the crowd for their heartlessness. While Mr. Alaimo is very affecting here and in the Don's death scene, he's equally adept at the comedy of the first and second acts.

Mezzo Clémentine Margaine rounds out the principal cast as a languid Dulcinée, as disappointed with her easy life as she is amused by it. Like Mr. Furlanetto and Mr. Alaimo, she has a voice that easily fills the Lyric's large house.

Tenors Alec Carlson and Jonathan Johnson are Dulcinée's adult suitors Juan and Rodriguez while soprano Diana Newman and mezzo Lindsay Metzger have the "pants" roles of her juvenile admirers Pedro and Garcias. These are primarily comic parts and they do a fine job with them. Bradley Smoak, who St. Louis audiences will recognize from his many appearances at Opera Theatre, turns in a nice cameo as Ténébrun.

L-R: Ferruccio Furlanetto and Bradley Smoak
Photo: Todd Rosenberg

The members of Michael Black's chorus sing and act their roles with great skill and Sir Andrew Davis conducts with his customary authority.

"Like children," observes director Matthew Ozawa in the program book, "when we open a book we are given permission to use our imagination to create a new world." And in fact, this Don Quichotte opens with a small boy alone on stage reading the Don's adventures in a huge book. As he turns the pages, the story comes to life around him in the bright storybook colors of Ralph Funicello's sets and Missy West's costumes. The literary concept is carried out as well in the quotes from Cervantes's novel that are projected on a scrim at the beginning of each act. Even when their stories are radically altered, it seems, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza stubbornly remain true to their essential selves.

As his dramatic arc passes from simple comedy to pathos and eventually tragedy, Don Quixote's dedication to kindness and mercy is a reminder that our natures do have better angels, if only we would pay them more heed. Like Pushkin's "holy fool" or Shakespeare's clowns, the Don's folly shows those around him the way to wisdom, if they have eyes to see and ears to hear.

Lyric Opera's production of Don Quichotte runs through December 7 at the opulent Civic Opera house in the Chicago Loop.