By Carol Davis
SAN DIEGO— The West Coast Premiere of Jake Heggie’s long waited Moby-Dick finally anchored at The Civic Center for at the opening night production on Feb. 18 and from my seat in row U it was a visually splendid sensation. From the time the theatre went dark and Donald Holder’s brilliant light show with Elaine J. McCarthy’s bigger-than-life projections began outlining the bow of the whaleship, Pequod, to Robert Brill’s massive set design of the actual ship to the lifting and placing of the sails as white scrims dropped into place, I don’t think I took a breath.
The show had its world premiere in Dallas in 2010 and was scheduled to open here in San Diego last year but due to unforeseen circumstances it was postponed until this year. It will open in San Francisco later this year. An opera of this magnitude, or any other opera for that matter, isn’t created in a vacuum. Moby-Dick was commissioned by the Dallas Opera, The San Diego Opera, San Francisco Opera, State Opera of South Australia and Calgary Opera.
Brilliantly conducted by American Conductor Joseph Mechavich (Karen Keltner had to bow out because of illness), Heggie’s music with Gene Scheer’s libretto lulls yet soars in the beginning, as the story of Captain Ahab’s (Ben Heppner) obsession with the killer whale moves along at a pace sometimes at odds with what’s going on on the seas around them, but not in the attitudes of the whalers who want to hunt whales for the oil and safely head home. Their goal is not to hunt down a Great White.
Unfortunately tenor Ben Heppner was not at his best on opening night. (He is being replaced, so far, for the Tues, night performance) He gave us an ample, yet not very convincing performance since his strained voice just didn’t have the right stuff. Unfortunately that had a somewhat adverse affect in the tensions between the crew and captain. Ahab’s anger and killer obsession was simply missing because of Heppner’s less than forceful performance.
In one of the more moving passages, Starbuck’s (baritone Morgan Smith) moment of truth is uncovered when he has the opportunityTO kill Ahab by holding a gun to his head while he was sleeping. Smith’s deep voice resonated beautifully on opening night.
With some whittling down (the opera is still three hours long), Sheer’s libretto manages to hit all the high points in character development without over doing the importance of any of Melville’s characters yet managing to single out characters like first mate Starbuck with the strong and resonant voice of Morgan Smith and Jonathan Lemalu as the Polynesian, Queequeg whom we find praying in his native tongue, at the top of the show. Tenor Jonathan Boyd is outstanding as the first time and lonely sailor, Greenhorn (They call me Ishmael), and as the one and only female performer, in a pants role Talise Trevigne is ship’s keeper, Pip who has more than singing duties to perform as she/he is all over the stage and at one point is swinging in a harness above the stage before he goes missing at sea.
Heggie’s score is beautiful and even haunting at times with impressive arias and immensely strong performances by most of the cast and chorus. All this is happening on the spectacular set that looks fraught with danger as huge ropes are moved about by certain crewmembers. Others are straddled across sail bows looking equally at ease while others hold on for dear life on parts of the steeply raked backdrop that give the impression they are on the stern of the ship.
When the ship is tossed about in the stormy seas they are the ones who slide down into the waters behind them. And when their dinghies break up they are left in the turbulent seas, it’s almost a fête of disbelief just watching the projections work hand in hand with the skill of the crew.
Director Leonard Foglia’s cast and very large chorus move about the stage and are positioned perfectly so that all the moving and non-moving parts in the construction of the shipwork to perfection and no one gets hurt. On some level it’s like watching a Monarch butterfly unfolding from a cocoon.
But it’s at the end of the opera when finally, what looks like the eye of the storm is about to come into the theatre, that we see the Great White and the destruction and inevitable ending in its wake.
“Moby-Dick, the opera in all its splendor, is a must for opera aficionado’s. This is most certainly one opera that up and coming and established companies will want to keep in their repertoires.
* It was announced that Jay Hunter Morris will replace Ben Heppner for Tues, nights performance. Stay tuned!
See you at the theatre.
Dates: Tues. Feb. 21 @7PM, Friday Feb. 24@8PM, Sunday Feb. 26 @2PM
Organization: San Diego Opera
Phone: 619-533-7000
Production Type: Opera
Where: 1200 Third Avenue, San Diego, CA 92101
Ticket Prices: $50.00-$210.00
Web: sdopera.com
Venue: Civic Theatre
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Davis is a San Diego-based theatre critic. She may be contacted at carol.davis@sdjewishworld.com