Ian Strasfogel ‘Operaland’

 

As the rehearsal finally shuddered to its end, Egon took me aside and said, “This tenor is utterly impossible.”

“He’s raw. He’s untrained. I’ll give him some private coaching.”

“This will not help.”

“I’m rather clever, you know. I think I can reduce some of his more grievous excesses.”

“And the missed entrances, the lack of subtlety? What can you do about that?”

“I rather thought that was your department, Egon.”

“Na ja, but this man is so unmusical he doesn’t even keep the tempo.” Neither did Egon, but I chose not to mention it.

“Come, come, it’s just a first rehearsal. Give him a chance; he’ll improve.”

“Never in a million years, never in all eternity.”

“Lieber Egon, where’s your native optimism?”

“I don’t have any. I’m Viennese.” I may not have liked his awkward conducting, but I did rather enjoy his curdled sense of humor. I repeated that we really had to give the poor man a proper chance. Egon looked skeptical and Polyna, who had been hanging on our every word, started to wax poetic about her last BUTTERFLY in Brussels where she was partnered by a gorgeous young Mexican, Jorge Alvorado, six feet tall, not yet thirty, with a voice as warm as the Neapolitan sun. “That’s all well and good, cara,” I said. “But it’s only our first rehearsal.”

“Another one like this and we’re going,” she replied.

“Going, as in canceling, leaving the show? What about your contracts?”

“We didn’t sign on for amateur night. I can’t be expected to rehearse myself to death just to humor some shoe salesman.”

“Cars, actually. He sells cars.”

“That’s even worse. He pollutes that way the atmosphere,” said Egon. “He has absolutely no place in opera.”

“Egon, we really have got to be patient.”

“Warum?”

“Signed contracts for one thing. Besides, Richard did seem to get a bit better near the end of rehearsal.”

“Better doesn’t always mean good,” replied Polyna.

“If you really feel that way, you should speak to management now, while there’s still time to find a replacement.”

“Ach, that idiot Jennings, he doesn’t understand anything.” Egon had a point. Roger Jennings was hired as director of the Calgary Opera because he had helped a local grain storage company turn a profit. The board of trustees, in their infinite wisdom, no doubt, thought he might do the same for the opera. They were soon disabused of that notion and stuck with a mediocre manager. “I worry that we bring this up with Jennings,” said Egon. “He finds us someone even worse.”

“That’s a real possibility, alas.”

“So, what do we do?” asked Polyna.

“How about this? We’ll focus on Act Two for the next few days, which doesn’t require the tenor, while I give Richard some intensive private coaching. Who knows? Maybe magic will strike.”

“Or maybe not,” said Polyna.

The prospect of private sessions with Richard filled me with dread. How on earth was I going to turn a bumbling middle-aged man into even a faint approximation of Puccini’s young lover?

Richard resisted me every step of the way, not because he was arrogant or bloody minded, but because he was totally untrained. He had taken only singing and music lessons, not acting, not stage movement. And acting, easy as it might appear to the uninitiated, is a complex, evanescent discipline. It can’t be mastered overnight. I tried to convince Richard that acting was basically reacting, that all an actor really had to do was lose himself in the given situation and respond naturally to it, but that was beyond him. He kept reverting to posing and posturing. I longed – ached – for a brief instant of credible, lifelike behavior. In vain, alas, utterly in vain.

Into my slough of despond, there did flicker a few feeble beams of light. Richard took rather well to practical tips. He could follow clear and simple instructions, as long as they stayed far away from such intangibles as “credible, lifelike behavior.” I got him to stop singing into the wings. He learned to angle himself so he seemed to be addressing his partner while projecting out to the public. He even abandoned those bewildering outbursts of robotic activity.

After three days of hard work, he seemed a bit less raw and out of place. Was he an ardent young lover? Was he a convincing Pinkerton? Far from it.