TODAY’S PAPER

Countess still casts spell despite timid staging

By ROBERT HARRIS

Special to The Globe and Mail

Saturday, January 1, 2005 - Page R9

Countess Maritza

Toronto Operetta Theatre

At Jane Mallet Theatre

In Toronto on Wednesday

One can only assume that Hungarian operetta composer Imre Kalman would be shocked to know that his 1924 Viennese smash, Countess Maritza, was still packing them in, half a world away, 80 years later. Kalman was not writing for the ages, but for the moment, trying to compete in a cutthroat theatrical world that included the likes of Franz Lehar, Sigmund Romberg and others. Nonetheless, his tuneful, well-constructed confection about an impoverished nobleman, who falls for a beautiful countess on whose estate he has sought employment as a mere commoner, has an ability to connect with audiences beyond the tired conventions of its fairy-tale plot.

Countess Maritza should be taken about as seriously as an episode of The Bachelorette. However, it’s hard not to see in this tale of loss of status and social change, written a mere half-decade after the First World War and only a decade and a half before the Second, a desperate attempt to come to terms with a Europe in the throes of a sea change, a Europe about to dissolve into anarchy. Add to this the fact that the conventions of the European operetta, transferred almost whole to the New World, formed the basis of the Broadway stage for almost 50 years, and you find that the dear Countess and her love-sick, but proud Count, play more powerfully on stage than you might expect.

This is especially, and delightfully, true, thanks to a surprisingly strong performance of Countess Maritza currently on display at the Jane Mallett Theatre, mounted by Toronto Operetta Theatre. Despite a rather timid and restrained staging, this Maritza works quite well due to the strong musical performances of virtually every one of its principal performers.

Starting with Elizabeth Beeler, in the title role, who both looks and convincingly acts the role of a countess, surrounded by luxury, who knows in her heart that the real value she seeks in a companion cannot be measured by mere superficials. Beeler has a powerful, if a bit strident soprano voice, which eventually relaxed into a finely tuned, expressive instrument even as she soared, operetta-style, high above the rest of the musical ensemble for what seemed like pages at a time.

Her performance was almost matched, note for note, by tenor Kurt Lehmann, as the fallen-on-hard-times Count Wittenburg, whose sound was rich and delicate at the same time, and who only lacked some of Beeler’s theatrical instincts in a match for her performance.

Keith Savage and Curtis Sullivan turned in nice, if a bit stereotypical, performances as Maritza’s other suitors. Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth was a convincing second female lead, and Margaret Maye, a bit unclear as a Gypsy Woman, redeemed herself as Count Wittenburg’s deus ex machina aunt. Wayne Strongman’s direction in the pit provided clear, musical accompaniment to his singers on stage.

One could only wish that Guillermo Silva-Marin’s stage direction might have been a little more vigorous and unrestrained, but even then, this was a Countess Maritza that provided a very pleasant, and very pleasing, three hours in the theatre.

Imre Kalman, looking down from his own musical Heaven, undoubtedly scratching together his next Hungarian-tinged, minor-key, diminished-seventh musical tunes, could only have been pleased.

Photos Gilberto Prioste

January 3, 2005

Toronto Operetta Theatre – “Countess Marítza”

Toronto Operetta Theatre’s production of Kálmán’s “Countess Marítza” is one of its dramatic best, primarily because director Guillermo Silva-Marin played it straight. The local jokes and other silliness were kept to a minimum while the pathos was writ large. When both the countess, played by soprano Elizabeth Beeler, and her swain Count Tassilo, performed by tenor Kurt Lehman, had their singing breakdowns, they each brought a poignancy rarely seen at TOT – a company usually known for high-jinks over personal angst. Of course, having conductor Wayne Strongman in the pit was a great boon because he made the music shiver with sobbing romance and throb with gypsy élan.

Talented Beeler and Lehman were both in good voice and good character, and led a strong supporting cast, but all were upstaged by excellent song and dance man Keith Savage in the comic role of Baron Zsupan. Diction, however, remains a TOT problem when singing in English.

“Countess Marítza” continues at Jane Mallett Theatre until Jan. 8.

I’m Paula Citron, arts reviewer for CLASSICAL 96.3 FM.

Photos Gilberto Prioste

Countess Maritza

by Imre Kálmán, directed by Guillermo Silva-Marin
Toronto Operetta Theatre, Jane Mallett Theatre, Toronto
December 28, 2004-January 8, 2005
by Christopher Hoile, Principal Reviewer for Stage Door

Waltz Your Worries Away

“Countess Maritza” by Imre (or Emmerich) Kálmán is one of the greatest of all Silver Age Viennese operettas. Lovely melody follows catchy tune in uninterrupted succession. When one sees it play so effectively on stage as in the Toronto Operetta Theatre’s latest production, one can only wonder why such a marvelous work, a repertory work in Central Europe, is not as well known in North America as “Die Fledermaus” or “The Merry Widow”. Yet, because of the TOT, Toronto is well acquainted with “Maritza”. This is the TOT’s third production of it in twenty years. How lucky Toronto is to have the TOT to keep such joyous works alive!

“Maritza” became a worldwide hit following its première in 1924. Maritza, a wealthy land-owner, is constantly besieged with proposals of marriage by impoverished noblemen. Knowing that all they are interested in is her money, she has become wary of all men and announces her engagement to the fictitious Baron Koloman Zsupán (a character from Johann Strauss’s “Der Zigeunerbaron”). To Maritza’s surprise and consternation a lovelorn baron of that very name turns up to claim Maritza as his fiancée. Meanwhile, Maritza is falling in love with one of her staff, the bailiff Bela Törek, who is in reality Count Tassilo, an impoverished nobleman who has taken on the work to pay off his father’s debts and amass enough money for a dowry for his sister Lisa. The barriers of wealth and class are compounded by suspicions on each side as to the real intentions of the other, giving the work a complex psychological dimension not always found in operetta. Nigel Douglas’s new English version is especially good at finding witty equivalents for the lyrics.

The chief glory of this production is the performance of Elizabeth Beeler in the title role. She has previously showed a great flair for comedy in the TOT’s productions of “The Chocolate Soldier” and “Die Fledermaus”, but here she combines a striking stage presence with beautiful singing and highly nuanced acting to make Maritza more than an typical operetta heroine but also a sympathetic and intriguing character. Beeler carefully delineates Maritza’s changing attitude toward Tassilo from disdain to fascination to love, disappointment and jealousy with a number of points in between where these intermingle. She has a bright, crystalline soprano that shines through in ensembles but that she is also able to give an affecting air of fragility. It is Beeler’s ability to communicate conflicting feelings such as in Maritza’s play-acting at love with Tassilo in “Waltz Our Worries Away” that give the production its depth.

As Tassilo, Kurt Lehmann as an expressive, beautifully cultured voice that brings out the emotion on such hits as “Play Gypsy!” This makes it all the more surprising that this sensitivity and grace do not extend to his acting or dancing. He is fortunate to be paired with Beeler, who frequently has to do the acting for both of them. As Lisa, Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth has a clear soprano and a pleasant demeanour but is not quite as engaged with her character as she could be.

On the other hand, both Curtis Sullivan and Keith Savage light up the stage whenever they appear. Sullivan is the domineering Prince Popolescu, who is one of Maritza’s more aggressive suitors. One wishes his role gave him more chance to sing. Savage makes the befuddled Baron Zsupán into a richly comic character who has a inner puppylike nature beneath his outward pose of egotism. He is so fleet of foot one wishes he had more chance to show off his dancing.

Margaret Maye is much better as the gypsy fortune-teller Manja than as Tassilo’s wealthy aunt Princess Bozena. While she somehow expunges the clichés from the first role, the second really requires a star turn from a comedienne (like Denise Ferguson in 1991) if it is to succeed. Viennese operettas have a strange penchant for coming to a complete halt in Act 3 for an interlude of spoken comedy (e.g., the jailer Frosch in “Die Fledermaus”). In the absence of just the right comedian, it would be better to excise the scene entirely and head straight for the conclusion. Sean Curran has to try rather too hard to be funny as the Princess’s theatrical companion Penizek. In minor roles Christopher Blair is very effective as Tassilo’s friend Karl Stephen as is Saemi Chang as Maritza’s friend Ilka.

As usual the operetta is directed by TOT General Director Guillermo Silva-Marin. While his choreography is not always successful, his emphasis on the psychological interplay of the characters, so well expressed by Beeler and Savage, gave an intelligence to what is so often dismissed as “light” entertainment. TOT scenic designer has become an expert at creating elegant sets that suggest much without ever seeming minimal, enhanced as always by Cameron A. More’s sensitive lighting. Conductor Wayne Strongman led the 16-member orchestra in a lively account of the score, particularly good at picking up the jazzy influences of each of Zsupán’s numbers and at bringing out the sensuousness of the waltzes.

The virtues so outweigh the flaws in this production that anyone unfamiliar with this lovely work should make sure to see it. Those already familiar with the score will enjoy it all the more on stage.

©Christopher Hoile

Dec. 30, 2004. 01:00 AM

Soaring singing saves lengthy operetta

JOHN TERAUDS

TORONTO STAR

The world of operetta is similar to the world of Hollywood romance-comedies. Everything turns out for the best and, if well done, provides great fluffy entertainment.

Every Christmas at the Jane Mallett Theatre, Toronto Operetta Theatre presents escapism culled from the music boxes of early-20th-century Central European schlag-meisters Franz Lehár, Imre Kálmán, or one of their less-known contemporaries.

This year, it's Kálmán's Countess Maritza, a high-calorie, Hungarian-flavoured confection that was an instant smash when it hit European and New York stages in the mid-1920s.

Even then, the setting and themes redolent of the Austro-Hungarian empire were already the stuff of nostalgia. By now, the whole affair is as quaint as Agatha Christie's Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, but the tunes are as hummable as ever.

Toronto Operetta Theatre's eager cast, palm court-sized orchestra led by Wayne Strongman and serviceable staging certainly did Countess Maritza justice, but the sum of the parts lacked the élan to etch a three-hour running time (including one intermission) into memory.

The all-Canadian singers were excellent, especially fiery soprano Elizabeth Beeler as the headstrong Countess who says she is not ready to marry, and tenor Kurt Lehman as Tassilo, the impoverished count who wins her heart.

Kálmán's soaring songs ask a lot from the voices, yet both Beeler and Lehman made them sound as easy as a campfire round.

Rachel Cleland-Ainsworth was perfectly cast as the ingénue Lisa and Keith Savage's bits of business and butterfly-light presence stole the show whenever he set foot on stage.

But in so doing, Savage also helped highlight the leaden acting (by everyone else but Beeler) and hopeless choreography. The ever-so-lame attempts at traditional Hungarian dancing made the men look as if they were swatting at mosquitoes.

Despite making the lyrics understandable to a Toronto audience, the English translation sapped the show's vitality. This may be the only time you will hear the word "pulchritudinous" sung, and that's just as well.

Or how about: "Do you not see life as anything but a long string of pork sausages?"

In a Central European context, this is an amusing bit of dialogue. But in English, it's bizarre.

Most of the show's music was performed more slowly than on German-language recordings, helping push the final curtain on Tuesday night to 11 p.m.

Longtime Toronto Operetta Theatre director Guillermo Silva-Marin deserves much praise and encouragement for keeping the operetta tradition alive in Toronto. But with a bit more rehearsal time, the whole would likely equal — if not surpass — the sum of its musical parts.

Performances of Countess Maritza continue tomorrow night and Jan. 2, 5, 7 and 8 at the St. Lawrence Centre's Jane Mallett Theatre. Tickets: 416-366-7723.

More Production History

Visit www.torontooperetta.com