The Metropolitan Opera is celebrated for many things. Producing new works is not one of them. This company, after all, coddles a notoriously conservative public, subsists essentially on private funding, and wants to sell 4,000 tickets a performance. Still, adventure does rear its head occasionally. In 1999, the Met mustered the premiere of John Harbison's The Great Gatsby. On Friday Tobias Picker's An American Tragedy joined the lonely ranks.
The project seemed promising. Picker knows his way about the lyric stage. Theodore Dreiser's novel of 1925 - a sprawling examination of social inequity, love, death and the American dream - is familiar to the masses, thanks to George Stevens' classic film of 1951, A Place in the Sun. Gene Scheer's libretto, in spite of some awkward word-setting, demonstrates enlightened shrinkage.
Francesca Zambello staged the circuitous proceedings with sharp dramatic focus. Adrianne Lobel's ingenious set, sensitively lit by James F. Ingalls, accommodates the action on three austere tiers, vignettes appearing and disappearing behind sliding panels. Dunya Ramicova's costumes define the turn-of-the-century milieu meticulously. Everyone seems to appreciate that less is usually more.
The cast - call it an ensemble - offered revelations. Handsome, agile and suave, the baritone Nathan Gunn projected Clyde Griffiths' agony as well as his fatal ambition with astonishing sympathy. Patricia Racette managed to fuse vulnerability and ardour as Roberta, the working girl he betrays, and she floated some exquisite pianissimo tones in the process.
Susan Graham exuded both erotic compulsion and sophistication as Sondra, the socialite who inadvertently hastens Clyde's downfall. Although she sang in some lush foreign tongue that recognises no consonants, Dolora Zajick brought intense pathos to the sanctimony of Clyde's mother. James Conlon, ever virtuosic, conducted as if a masterpiece were at hand.
To these ears, alas, the vehicle was less than that. Picker's score is undeniably crafty, also cautious and well-mannered to a fault. It deals knowingly in second-hand operatic devices, cranking out good mood music and gutsy cliches at every turn. There are no surprises here, no shocks, and very few dissonances. The first-nighters seemed grateful. An American Tragedy may be the perfect modern opera for people who hate modern opera.
Tel +1 212 362 6000
