Category Archives: Books

Lyric Opera’s DON QUICHOTTE: A Hymn to a Holy Fool

A dying Jules Massenet wrote Don Quichotte knowing the woman he loved, soprano Lucy Arbell, would play the courtesan-lady Dulcinee after his death. Rather than create his own libretto from Cervantes’ mammoth novel, Massenet used Jacques Lorrain’s bastardized and abridged verse play, Le Chevalier de la longue figure, for his libretto. La Lorrain’s short play […]

December 8, 2016 – 10:12 am | By Paul Kuritz | Posted in Books, from Paul, History, Men and Women, Music, Opera, Poetry, Quotations, The Gospel of the Kingdom, Theater, Theology | Comments Off on Lyric Opera’s DON QUICHOTTE: A Hymn to a Holy Fool

Lyric Opera’s THE TROJANS: The “Most Profoundly Moving Experience”

“For grandeur of conception, nobility of tone, and imaginative range [Berlioz’ The Trojans] has scarcely a rival in operatic history.”[i] The words of the great musicologist Winton Dean would seem impossible to fulfill in production. But, after seeing the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s brilliant production of The Trojans, Mr. Dean may have been understating the […]

November 22, 2016 – 1:24 pm | By Paul Kuritz | Posted in Art, Books, from Paul, History, Men and Women, Music, Opera, Poetry, The Gospel of the Kingdom, Theater, Theology | Comments Off on Lyric Opera’s THE TROJANS: The “Most Profoundly Moving Experience”

Interrobang’s THE AMISH PROJECT: An Icon of Forgiveness

In his famous Law of the Drama, the French critic Ferdinand Brunitiere (1849-1906) insists on the primacy of  “conflict” in dramatic literature: “Drama is a representation of the will of man in conflict with the mysterious powers or natural forces which limit and belittle us; it is one of us thrown living upon the stage […]

November 13, 2016 – 5:52 pm | By Paul Kuritz | Posted in Art, Books, from Paul, History, Men and Women, Music, Quotations, The Gospel of the Kingdom, Theater, Theology | Comments Off on Interrobang’s THE AMISH PROJECT: An Icon of Forgiveness

Lyric Opera’s Lucia di Lammermoor: Superlative Voices Reign Supreme

+ You can hear it in films – not just in The Great Caruso (1951), but also in The Departed (2006), Man on the Moon (1999), two Mickey Rooney  movies, Captain January (1936),Little Women (1933), Scarface (1932) , with the Marx Brothers in Animal Crackers (1930), and even in the Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie (1979). […]

October 20, 2016 – 9:59 am | By Paul Kuritz | Posted in Art, Books, from Paul, History, Men and Women, Music, Opera, Poetry, Quotations, Theater | Comments Off on Lyric Opera’s Lucia di Lammermoor: Superlative Voices Reign Supreme

Remy Bumppo’s Pirandello’s HENRY IV: A Modern Masterpiece Given Life

Though considered a major modern playwright, the plays of Luigi Pirandello are rarely produced. The reasons are numerous. First, the large casts require large budgets. Second, the plays’ philosophical facades are difficult to crack. And third, directors struggle to find a production style which makes the plays both clear and exciting to an audience. Consequently, […]

October 18, 2016 – 7:57 am | By Paul Kuritz | Posted in Art, Books, from Paul, History, Men and Women, Music, Opera, Quotations, Theater | Comments Off on Remy Bumppo’s Pirandello’s HENRY IV: A Modern Masterpiece Given Life