Opening night, just a week away!

Alicia Berneche as Polly, Jim DeVita as Macheath, and
Tracy Michelle Arnold as Jenny Diver

We are one week away from opening night of The Threepenny Opera, and the excitement is setting in. Having sat through rehearsal on Wednesday night, a few things strike me about Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's masterpiece. It can be aggressive and gritty, but also surprisingly tender, and quite honest in its portrayal of longing. I was also surprised at how funny it can be - the humor is at turns witty and crass. There is of course an air of satire and irony, and yet, despite what Brecht may have intended, one can't help but empathize with certain characters. In summary, The Threepenny Opera is every bit as entertaining and thought provoking as its reputation has led me to expect.

Two items of note:

1) If you don't follow @MadOpera on Twitter, you may want to, or at least visit the site to view our live-updates and photos from rehearsals. Same goes for our Facebook page, where there's always an interesting conversation or contest going on, like our recent Threepenny CD giveaway.

2) This is the 300th post on The MadOpera Blog. Thank you to all of the generous readers of the last two and half years!

Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson

The New York Times published an interesting piece today: "Rare Reprises for an Unlikely Collaboration," a look at Kurt Weill's partnership with the playwright Maxwell Anderson, and Weill's post-Germany career in New York. Two Weill/Anderson pieces - Knickerbocker Holiday (1938) and Lost in the Stars (1949) - are receiving performances in the coming weeks.

Several commentators note the disparate genres that influenced Weill's music at different points in his career. The piece also points out that it wasn't until the 1954 production of Marc Blitzstein's adaptation of The Threepenny Opera in New York that Weill's reputation was secured (Madison Opera is producing the Blitzstein adaptation). Additionally, it's fascinating to think that Weill and Anderson were working on a musical version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn at the time of Weill's death in 1950.

Here is Weill's famous "September Song" from Knickerbocker Holiday and "Lost in the Stars" from Lost in the Stars:

Famous Macks

The role of Macheath (aka Mack the Knife) in The Threepenny Opera has been taken up by a slew of famous actors in the 20th and 21st centuries, including these guys:

Left to right: Jerry Orbach (1956, Off-Broadway), Tim Curry (1986, London), Sting (1989, Broadway), Jesse L. Martin (2003, Williamstown), Alan Cumming (2006, Broadway)

Now, Jim DeVita is not a British celebrity, nor was he a fixture on Law and Order (as far as I know), but if you've ever seen him down the road at APT, you know you're in for a treat with this Mack!