Word: straussed
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Most of the performers give the interpretations they've chosen talented treatments, and the singing is impressive for a college production. Perhaps the fact that conservatory students or graduates take all but one of the main roles helps to explain that. But trying to take Vienna out of Strauss is like trying to perform a heart transplant--you'd better have the replacement handy. The first act, for example, could as easily be set in Yonkers as in Vienna. True, the Lowell dining hall has little potential to be converted into a ballroom, but Lowell Opera gives up in despair...
...every showpiece aria in the book--like a disco cruiser hoping to score; William Walton at one point debases Eisenstein to use Steve Martin's "wild and crazy guy" line; and Mary Ann Martini gives Prince Orlofsky a German-accented sadism that's hard to take along with Strauss's froth...
...these quirky ideas conflict with each other and Strauss's score. Worse, they muddle even further a typically inane--though enjoyable--operetta plot. "Fledermaus" means "bat," but the title has almost no relation to the story of marital cheatings, mixed identities, and revenge. In fact, as the plot wanders from Eisenstein's home to Orlofsky's ballroom to the local jail, you realize that it's all just an excuse for the dance music. In the famous trio "So muss allein ich bleiben" ("I must remain alone, then"), Rosalinda--whom Gretchen Johnson plays with vocal agility but no sense...
...ballroom of the second act, too--famous for Orlofsky's aria "Chacun a son gout" as well as some of Strauss's best dances--the waltz should be king. Even though the Lowell performers cut much of Strauss's music, deliver the rest on a distinctly un-Viennese stage, and have to work on the less-than-ballroom-size Lowell dias, they can't help unleashing the waltzes by the end of the act, and a little of the Wienerblut seeps...
...ragged ensembles, missed cues, and squeaky strings--weakens the production immensely, and the musicians play right next to much of the audience so it can hear every flub, and wince. Whether conductor Nicholas Palmer '79 or the musicians themselves are to blame, they seem to have much trouble with Strauss' relatively easy music...