Sunday, July 7, 2013

Doubt


Doubt – Less reimagined than simply transcribed and musically illustrated, Doubt is an opera adaptation of John Patrick Shanley’s celebrated play (and Oscar-nominated film). Douglas J. Cuomo wrote the music to Shanley’s words which closely follow the text of his play and the result is compelling, but, probably, superfluous – that is, the play isn’t necessarily improved or deepened by being set to music. Doubt, as everyone knows, involves a duel to the death between a nun, Sister Aloysius, and the priest that she believes to be a pedophile, Father Flynn. Flynn is guilty of something but Shanley never clarifies his actual offense – thus, instilling in the audience the titular doubt as to whether the priest deserves the persecution inflicted on him by the monstrous nun. The play is exceptionally well-written and gripping and, on its own terms, works splendidly. Shanley shows how visceral distaste – the nun doesn’t like Flynn’s fingernails, his slovenly use of ballpoint pens, his taste in music – morphs into scandal and accusation and the play convincingly demonstrates that ordinary people of good will are helpless against a fanatic absolutely convinced of the rectitude of her opinions. (In fact, the secret subtext to Doubt is the fear that ordinary good faith inevitably succumbs to terrorism – whether it be the explosive, or intellectual, variety). The play has a few tricks up its sleeve, including an extraordinary dialogue between the crusading nun and the mother of the boy supposedly victimized by the priest: the mother understands that her son is “different”, presumably, homosexual, and grasps that he will have difficulty adjusting to life – thus, she thinks that, on balance, it is better than her boy be seduced by a priest, after all a kind and gentle man, other than someone else. The mother’s indifference to the priest’s alleged crimes seem to certify Sister Aloysius’ convictions that Flynn is a child-molester and she uses all her wiles to destroy him. The play’s only misstep occurs after its sudden, but effective climax – having ruined the priest, or, at least, effected his humiliating transfer, Sister Aloysius confesses to doubt; although this is dramatically effective, it is unrealistic – true believers never admit that they were wrong, or, even, had the capacity to be wrong. Cuomo’s music is not irritating and, for the most part, resourceful – his strategy is to find sounds that most effectively illustrate the emotional tenor of the words being spoken. Where the text is placidl;y banal or transitional – that is moving between big points – Cuomo falls back on Glass-style arpeggios to fill time. In general, the score illustrates, by comparison, how decisive and effective Philip Glass’ music works for opera – Glass scores doesn’t overpower the words, lets them be heard, but can swell to imposing climaxes that seem integral to the sonic texture of the opera. Cuomo doesn’t want to directly imitate Glass and so his music, which is very eclectic in its scoring, is less effective and more derivative: we hear shards of Aaron Copland, some mildly atonal stuff, bits of jazzy sounding saxophone, and a chilly abstract quaver when we are supposed to feel doubt. Cuomo, who has written much music for TV, creates every effective mood music – but I wonder whether the words and speeches in the play would not really be sufficient in themselves and, so, suspect that all the busy-ness in the orchestra doesn’t really add that much to the experience. Because Cuomo is committed to illustrating every line and each word, if possible, he can’t build his score into any kind of musical form – I don’t hear any arias or duets really in the music. The scoring is vaguely late Romantic, like Wagner without the leit motifs or Strauss without the showy set-piece numbers. Cuomo and Shanley have added some liturgical scenes to the opera so that there is music for a chorus and those parts of the score seem to me to be the most effective and fully musical aspects of the opera. (There is even a vestigial dance scene in case someone wants to deploy the company’s ballet for the show.). The production that I saw at the Minnesota Opera on February 2, 2013 was very effectively sung by its principals – Denyce Graves as the molested child’s mother was particularly strong. The show’s staging was simple and coherent without much in the way of spectacle – an appropriate way to present this opera. I thought the show was thoroughly enjoyable, emotionally compelling, with strengths that were entirely within the play’s text and libretto, the music not really adding that much, but, also, not subtracting anything from Shanley’s conception.

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