A Little Night Music
My thoughts on A Litle Night Music or…a grand night for singing
Liaisons and trysts abound in this romantic comedy with a lush score by Stephen Sondheim. It’s late 19th century Sweden and love and lust are certainly in the air. There’s old love, new love, and surprising love in this enchanting musical that is itself so easy to love.
Under Dennis Canright’s direction and Jeff Crouse’s music direction Night Music flows like a great waltz. There are gorgeous costumes from Michael A. Robinson, marvelous colorful lighting from Mia Lindemann, and a simple, but effective set by Director Canright that transitions easily from residence to residence and city to country. There’s not a great deal of dancing in Night Music, but Director Canright devises movement that shifts from winsome to fun to seductive, while Intimacy Director Monalisa Amidar supplies the more sensual moments of the musical.
To say that the singing in this Night Music is outstanding is a huge understatement. Canright has filled his cast with actor/singers who deliver Sondheim’s lyrics gloriously. After the show I talked with cast and audience members about the show and why it is produced so infrequently. The consensus seemed to be that finding so many singers of the quality required for this show is difficult. Happily, Canright took on the challenge and succeeds.
The voices are incredible and all of the featured talent in the show could easily step into a star role. And backed up by Music Director/Conductor Jeff Crouse and his musicians the effect is often transportive.
Actually transporting us from scene to scene are Nolan Shaver, Jake Busher, Jacy Schoening. Megan A. Liles, and Katie Krasovec who form the dazzling storytelling quintet that literally sets up the action of the musical and provides commentary throughout.
Desiree Armfeldt is a famous actress who has had many lovers over the years including a longstanding relationship with lawyer Fredrik Egerman who has recently married eighteen-year-old Anne. Fredrik also has a son named Henrik who is hopelessly in love with his stepmother. Also in the Egerman household is the maid, Petra. Desiree is currently seeing Count Carl Magnus Malcolm who is married to Charlotte. Desiree’s daughter Fredrika Armfeldt resides with her grandmother Madame Armfeldt in the country. All these complicated relationships and entanglements play out through one sumptuous melody after another.
Riley Nowicki is wonderful as the fresh faced Fredrika. She’s precocious, intelligent and devoted to her grandmother. Nowicki gives the character grace and charm.
Ariana Stephens is a wildly lusty and free-spirited Petra and generates some real stage heat with her number “The Miller’s Son” and in her scene with Frid the butler played by Kristobal Rios who creates quite a bit of heat of his own. I think Stephens and Rios would have set off the fire alarm if their scene went on much longer. Whew!
Luke Weber with his soaring tenor brings all the moodiness and seriousness to Henrik the Lutheran seminarian and is excellent clashing with his lawyer father and declaring his love for his stepmother.
Samantha Snow, one of DFW’s finest sopranos, is a terrific Anne Egerman. She’s young and naive and still virginal months into her marriage to a man who is her father’s age. Snow captures all of Anne’s youthful exuberance and curiosity.
Jacob Catalano is the dashing and vain Count Carl Magnus. He is obsessed with Desiree, but ignores and openly cheats on his own wife, Charlotte. Catalano’s robust vocals are impressive, and he gets all the humor from this somewhat buffoonish character, who is ready to duel whenever provoked by jealousy.
As Charlotte, the heavenly voiced Sarah Powell gets one of the shows best songs, “Every Day a Little Death.” It’s a duet Charlotte shares with Anne in which they bemoan what loving the men they do does to their lives. Powell’s Charlotte is a cynical woman with a wry sense of humor. Powell’s comic delivery garners many laughs, but it also gives Charlotte a bit of power which she uses to her advantage.
Frederik Egerman and Desiree Armfeldt are the central characters of Night Music and are played masterfully by John Wenzel and Susan Metzger, who both have beautiful, powerful voices. Wenzel and Metzger have an ease with each other on stage that gives credence to their characters long-term loving relationship. There’s a definite warmth that comes through from them. The comical moments as in “You Must Meet My Wife” are as touching as they are sweetly funny.
Desiree and Fredrik are going through midlife crises. She is realizing her life of going from lover to lover is unfulfilling, while he deals with the emptiness in his life by marrying a decades younger woman. “Just when I stopped opening doors, finally knowing the one that I wanted was yours,” sings Desiree in “Send in the Clowns.”
Metzger delivers Sondheim’s most famous song with such beauty and poignancy that it got to me emotionally for the first time. It’s extremely difficult to bring something new to a well-known song, but Metzger does just that. Metzger and Wenzel …”Aren’t we a pair?” Yes, you are a pair, a pair of great actor/singers who are perfectly cast.
The jewel in the crown of this production of A Little Night Music is Sally Soldo as the elegant, wheelchair bound Madame Armfeldt. “Liaisons” in which Madame Armfeldt reveals her past indiscretions and road to riches is a melancholy masterpiece in the hands of Soldo. Looking regal dispensing witticisms and criticisms from her chair, Soldo’s Madame Armfeldt is a classic.
Kaily Bermudez, Chelsea Catalano, Jordan Smith, and Timothy Lizarraga form the talented ensemble of the show and play many different roles.
I am probably overusing the word glorious here, but that’s just what MainStage’s production of A Little Night Music is. An unforgettable evening of theater.
