'Threepenny Opera' opens Friday

Last week, Richard Wagner's great-grandson, Gottfried Wagner, gave a lecture about the music of Kurt Weill and Berthold Brecht. This week, Bloomington residents will have the opportunity to see a live performance of one of their best-known works. Under the direction of Terence Hartnett, the Detour Theatre Company performs Weill and Brecht's 1928 work "The Threepenny Opera" at the John Waldron Arts Center this weekend.\nHartnett said the presence of IU's School of Music was a main factor in his company's decision to perform "The Threepenny Opera." Hartnett said he knew he could interest music students in performing the opera, especially since this show has not been done locally since the 1970s. Hartnett said IU's brilliant jazz department and the excellent area musicians have made the performance of the opera possible.\nHartnett also added that his company has a lot of background in musical theater and generally performs modern works from Ibsen to the present. Adding "The Threepenny Opera" to their repertoire will expand the company's focus and broaden the scope of what their performances.\nThe company has been planning this performance for about three to four years, so staging its first performance a week after Gottfried Wagner's lecture was purely coincidental. Hartnett, however, views it as an advantage for his company. \n"We have had pure, blind luck in our timing with the Wagner lecture," Hartnett said.\n"The Threepenny Opera" is best known for its music. Martin Wolter, a graduate student at the IU School of Music, is the music director for this opera. He described it as a fusion of opera, operetta, musical theater and classical theater. \nWolter said Weill wrote the opera while he was still in Germany. Due to the Nazi invasion, later in Weill's career he was forced to move abroad and write in more popular genres. In comparison with his later works, "The Threepenny Opera" has a more epic feel. Weill and Brecht attempted to mirror their masterpiece "The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny" in this opera. Wolter said the music was composed in the normal operatic tradition, but with a different kind of music.\n"(It has) a very special character," Wolter said.\nIn his dealing with the music, Wolter said he tried to take the closest possible approach to the original score, using almost the exact same jazz band that Weill used in Berlin in 1928. Wolter said he wanted to take advantage of the great musicians at IU to bring out the colors in the music.\nA difficulty Wolter encountered with the music's execution was the cast's unfamiliarity with professional singing. Since the selected cast has primarily dramatic experience, Wolter needed to teach them the basics of operatic singing. \n"I am proud of how far they've come," Wolter said.\nTwo of the cast members with whom Wolter worked are graduate student Matthew Gailey, who plays Mr. Peachum, and graduate student Laura Stelman, who plays his wife, Mrs. Peachum. Gailey and Stelman both said their characters make an interesting couple whose relationship is strictly business. Stelman described Mrs. Peachum as a bitter and sarcastic old woman who is usually drunk. Gailey said his character was similar to Mrs. Peachum. He said that Mr. Peachum knows no right or wrong, only profit. He likened his character to a snake, having a slithery, sly mode and a striking mode.\nBoth cast members said Hartnett has done a wonderful job with the direction. Gailey said Hartnett accepts the actors' ideas and input, and values individual interpretation, not wanting a duplicate performance with the double cast. Gailey said working with Hartnett is more fun than work.\n"(Hartnett) is a really nice, open-minded guy who allows us to shape our own parts," Stelman stated.\nAs far as the work itself is concerned, Hartnett didn't want to force it into one particular genre, preserving the hybrid character while accenting the cabaret elements in it. He said the episodic structure helps lend the opera this motley feel. Hartnett said "The Threepenny Opera" does not seem 75 years old to him.\n"It has a fresh and relevant message without being preachy, and it still feels new, vibrant and alive," he said. "I want the audience to walk away with a sense of meaningful engagement and a greater appreciation for the music. I also want them to clearly receive the central idea of being sensitive to the suffering of others."\n-- Contact staff writer Adam Sedia at asedia@indiana.edu.