Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center. Balcony (Seat D106, $79.)
Story. Marnie is a thief who goes about stealing from her
employers using different identities. She
works at the accounting firm Crombie & Strutt where customer and widower Mark
Rutland is attracted to her. After she
leaves the accounting firm she goes to Halcyon Printing, owned by Mark. Mark doesn’t seem to recognize her. Mark’s brother Terry also works at the firm
and makes a pass at Marnie. Mark catches
Marnie in the act of breaking into the company safe, and threatens to turn her
in unless she marries him. When she refuses
sex with Mark on their honeymoon, he assaults her, causing her to slash her
wrist. To get Marnie to see an analyst,
Mark agrees to stable her beloved horse Forio on his property. They go on a fox hunt, Marnie is thrown from
the horse and Mark is hurt trying to help.
Forio is injured and has to be shot.
Even though there is a connection with Mark, Marnie still steals the keys
but finds herself unable to take anything from the safe due to her feelings for
Mark. She tries to visit her mother, but
finds out she has died. At the cemetery,
Marnie is finally told the truth: she has grown up thinking she killed her
brother when he was born, but the murder was actually committed to committed by
her mother. The police finally catch up
with Marnie, and she says “I’m free” as she is taken away.
Conductor – Robert Spano.
Marnie – Isabel Leonard, Mark Rutland – Christopher Maltman, Little Boy –
Gabriel Gurevich, Marnie’s mother -
Denyce Graves, Terry Rutland – Iestyn Daves, Mrs. Rutland – Janis Kelly.
The story is based on the 1961 novel by Winston
Graham. It is made famous because Alfred
Hitchcock adapted it into a novel in 1964, although with substantial deviations
from the original plot. This work was
commissioned by the Met. Nico Muhly (b.
1981) is the composer. Per the “In Focus”
article, the music is “simultaneously rooted in lyric tonality and highly
innovative techniques.” It calls for “18
soloists, a prominent role for the chorus, and large orchestral forces.” Marnie’s role is sung by a mezzo-soprano, and
Mark by a baritone. There are also four
Shadow Marnies who appear as her psyche.
The composer also made Marnie’s vocal intervals reflect her internal
state, moving from very disjointed in the beginning to more lyrical as she
discovers herself.
Given all that, I was quite looking forward to see the
opera. I came away quite disappointed.
When you think Hitchcock and suppressed childhood
memories, you think thriller (at least that is what I think.) Yes, Marnie took on a life of crime because
she mistakenly thought she had murdered her baby brother. But she wasn’t a serial killer who murdered
her husbands, she didn’t even rob, but “merely” burglarized from company safes
when no one was present. I don’t think
you need a traumatized childhood for that.
Intentionally or not, there were more comedic moments in the story, if
the audience reaction was any indication.
The only tender moment was the horse scene where Marnie showed
some emotion for Mark. Which some may
argue points to what her psyche was.
However, for most of the rest of the opera she was just bland, as opposed
to cold. The audience didn’t empathize
with her, nor did it dislike her. That
she utters “I’m free” at the end would lead one to think that she had not been
able to get out from under whatever was governing her behavior, but we had no
idea what that was – not even in hindsight.
The singing was generally okay, except for that of
Marnie. Since other voices came across
clearly, it wasn’t a problem of the acoustics at our seats. Turns out I had seen Isabel Leonard in the
Carmelite Nuns before, as Blanche, a main character. I looked at the blog, her
singing left zero impression for me during that performance – I didn’t mention
her at all. She is playing three major
roles this season at the Met, that tells you how much I know.
The staging was okay, not surreal, not modern, just
functional. I was hoping for a real fox-hunting
scene, naturally I was disappointed in that count also.
I suspect Terry is quite germane to the story as he
appears in quite a few scenes in this opera, including being suspected of
buying out Halcyon. The story (as I
outlined it above) still hangs together without any mention of him, or the Rutlands’
mother, who was the person trying to buy the company, for that matter. If they are characters used to “explain” or
illustrate Marnie’s psyche, I didn’t get that at all.
Since the entire performance, including the intermission,
was about 2 ½ hours, I didn’t find it unbearable. However, about 30 minutes in I already
thought to myself: interesting, but please, not another 90 minutes of this.
Curtain Call. The shot is too bright, but I think both Mulhy and Spano were in this photo.
The New York Times review is uncharacteristically long, and somewhat unfocused (inevitably, perhaps). The reviewer says a lot of positive and
negative things, and I am not sure exactly where he stands. The headline is “Marnie stays in the shadows,”
but the last line in the second to last paragraph (about Robert Spano) is “where
has he been?”
We drove up, and had a simple meal at a pizzeria.
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