The San Francisco Symphony's recent concert performances of Leonard Bernstein's comic operetta "Candide," conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, should have been the icing on the cake in the season-long celebration of the composer's birth centennial. A further-amended presentation of Scottish Opera's 1989 version proved instead to be a surprisingly bland piece de resistance.
Wrangling Voltaire's sprawling satire into anything resembling show-sized entertainment has been a challenge ever since Bernstein and a brilliant team of lyricists first made an unsuccessful attempt on Broadway in 1956. "Satire is what closes on Saturday night," George S. Kaufman once said, but "Candide" also had to contend with playwright Lillian Hellman's relentlessly earnest libretto. Bernstein's genius magpie score, synthesizing everything from bel canto to Gilbert & Sullivan, was friskier and a better fit for Voltaire's trenchant wit. It kept the bite and the humor and fantasy, too.
For generations, the fabulous original Broadway cast recording (in remarkable early stereo) made an indelible impression. Without the book (Voltaire's or Hellman's) to slow the pace, it created a wonderful theatre of the mind for enchanted listeners.
Bernstein's cornucopia of melodic invention still deserves revivals and fresh interpretation. The long journey from the Broadway stage to European opera houses and back again has also taken some side trips to symphony halls. A new concert reading with the composer's former prot�g� on the podium was well-timed.
Unlike MTT's wildly successful previous concerts of Bernstein theatre works (a definitive "West Side Story" and exuberant "On the Town"), "Candide" was not presented semi-staged. The cast performed on a raised platform behind the huge orchestra and below Ragnar Bohlin's massed SFS Chorus. There were few props (some hats and trinkets) and only one costumed singer to provide visual interest.
There still should have been a stage director. Deleting almost all dialogue helped streamline the action, but left most plot cohesion duties to suavely handsome baritone Michael Todd Simpson as the Narrator/Pangloss. He did well in the former assignment, but was under-characterized in the latter.
All parts were well sung, and the Chorus was predictably rich. With the sumptuously refined SFS supporting the vocalists and expertly playing the famous Overture, it was certainly a beautiful aural experience.
New Zealand baritone Hadleigh Adams added some swishy humor to his performance as the vain Maximilian. Soprano Vanessa Becerra made her zesty best of the diminished role of Paquette, and tenor Ben Jones (Governor/Vanderdendur/Crook) nailed his solo in the bouncily cynical "Bon Voyage."
SFS Chorus members bass David Varnum, tenor Jonathan Thomas, baritone Matthew Peterson, bass Clayton Moser and tenor Elliott Encarnacion were freed from their Terrace seats to make appreciated funny contributions.
In the title role, young tenor Andrew Stenson floated some lovely high notes and brought genuine emotion to his introspective solos. His passage from innocent optimist to sadder-but-wiser humanist was credible despite the concert's curious distancing effect.
Soprano Meghan Picerno repeated her well-received New York City Opera performance of Candide's adorably quixotic beloved Cunegonde from a year ago. She alone made costume changes, but her couture was probably not borrowed from the NYCO production, staged by legendary director Harold Prince. Looking like Helena Bonham Carter fresh from a Betsey Johnson clearance sale, she sailed through the coloratura of the score's most famous aria, "Glitter and Be Gay." The subtle darkness in her tone was pleasing, but her shameless mugging seemed out of context.
Leave it to veteran soprano Sheri Greenawald to steal the show as the Old Lady. As current director of San Francisco Opera Center and artistic director of the Merola Opera Program, her casting might have been a shoo-in, but she earned her place after an acclaimed singing career. She proved she still has the pipes.
I wish some of the jokes and especially the hilarious monologue in which her character finally describes how she came to lose one buttock had been left in, but Greenawald managed to inject flavorful comedy in the show-stopping "I am Easily Assimilated," and her decidedly un-PC duet with Cunegonde "We Are Women" was terrific.
The title of that number isn't enough to make it an anthem for #metoo; just listen to the lyrics. Retaining it for this relatively inoffensive rendition of Bernstein's glorious score did help restore some of the sardonic tone of Voltaire's outrageous lampoon.
When MTT made an aside to the audience, with typically perfect timing and a gleeful smile, he also reminded me that "Candide" is timeless.
The final "Make Our Garden Grow" ensures a standing ovation. Even with these quibbles about the production, MTT and the full company deserved it. They did Lenny proud.
The Bernstein Celebration continues Feb. 1-3: "West Side Story" film with live orchestra; and Feb. 22-24: Bernstein Divertimento and Serenade; Andrey Boreyko, conductor; Vadim Gluzman, violin; with Shostakovich Symphony No. 5.
sfsymphony.org.
Tenor Andrew Stenson (Candide) and Soprano Meghan Picerno (Cunegonde) sing "Oh Happy We" from Leonard Bernstein's "Candide" with the San Francisco Symphony. Photo: Kristen Loken
Michael Tilson Thomas leads the San Francisco Symphony in Bernstein's "Candide." Meghan Picerno (Cunegonde), Andrew Stenson (Candide), and Vanessa Becerra (Paquette) in the background. Photo: Kristen Loken