University Daily Kansan / Friday, February 19, 1988
Jacque Janssen, arts/features editor
Arts & Entertainment
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'Barber of Seville'is praised
Audience reaction favorable
Michael Rees Davis as Count Almaviva. Julia Parks as Rosina and Thomas Hammons as Dr. Bartolo.
By Julie Adam Kansan staff writer
Some things are always the same.
Some things are always the same. An example is the way audiences record a performance, like Barber of Seville", an opera performed by the New York City Opera National Company at Hoch Auditorium last night.
The company staged only one performance of the opera in Lawrence. Last spring, they performed "Madame Butterfly" at the University of Kansas.
The beginning orchestral piece set the mood for the opera, with an unmistakable melody for the new opera-goer. Even the children in the audience probably recognized it from the Bugs Bunny rendition of "The Rabbit of Seville."
Gerry Davie
Laughing and chuckling from the audience was heard throughout the program. The audience reacted to many of the performers' slapstick-type actions, which sometimes happened simultaneously on different areas of the stage.
imagine anyone could come in here and enjoy this.
But when Figaro, played by Ron Peo, the chubby barber dressed more like a bullfighter than a hairdresser, rolled on stage with his portable barber shop affixed upon a large, pinkish tricycle, the audience found the star of the show.
Gerry Davis Bakerfield, Calif., senior
Figaro got himself into more than he bargained for when he happened to park his cart in front of the house of Doctor Bartolo, played by Thomas Hammons, and proclaimed how efficient he was in all parts of life, not just barbering and attracting women.
While Figaro is ranting and raving the praises of himself to himself, Count Almaviva, played by Michael Rees Davis, who has been hiding out there all morning, asks for the barber's help to think of a clever plan for Almaviva to get inside the house. Figaro agrees to help Almaviva rescue Rosina, played by Julia Parks, the young girl captive in
the mansion by the old doctor who plans to marry her.
And so the love triangle develops into the entangling plot
Opinions about the performance were unanimous: The opera was a success.
Stanley Shumway, professor of music, said he thought the opera was delightful.
"I'm enjoying it a lot," he said.
"It's an opera the public can enjoy.
The music is very pleasant. I think everyone is enjoying it."
Gerry Davis, Bakerfield, Calif., senior, said this was the first time he had seen a live opera.
"The music is very nice, and it's a very humorous plot, which makes it enjoyable," he said.
He said that he thought "The Barber of Seville" was different in the sense that the general public appreciate it, not just the upper class.
"I imagine anyone could come in here and enjoy this," Davis said.
The scene that received most reaction from the audience was when Doctor Bartolo was locked out of his house by the rest of the cast. The set was the interior of the house. Doctor Bartolo simply walked around the set and entered the room from the audience's view of the scene.
The entire cast then proceeded to do a marionette-like dance, which also received overall approval from the audience.
Colleen Ryan, Lawrence resident,
said she liked all parts of the opera.
"I love their acting and their voices," she said. "It's a little differ-
Carol Rooseg Martha Sweep Associates Thomas Hammens as Dr. Bartolo and Julia Parks as Rosina. ent than a student production because of the depth of their voices and the good setting."
Cartoon opera is unforgettable
Bugs introduced kids to culture
By Regan Brown
Kansan staff writer
The average student, when asked to hum a few bars of Figaro's famous "Largo al factotum" from Rossini's "The Barber of Seville," will draw a total blank.
But the same student is likely to have almost total recall of Bugs Bunny as Figaro in the Warner brothers' version, "The Rabbit of Seville."
In that cartoon, directed by animator Chuck Jones, Buns Bugyn and Elmer Fudd carry on their never-ending feud throughout the courtyards and drawing rooms of Seville. This time, Bugs is a fast-talking barber trying to win a fair damsel for his employer and the "wabbit-hunting" Fudd is the damsel's evil guardian.
Throughout this and the other Chuck Jones opera parodies, such as his "What's Opera, Doc?" two of Wagnerian opera, wise-cracking cartoon dialogue is set to the composer's original melodies.
Larner Fudd still stalks "the wassically wabbit" in "What's Opera, Doc," only this time, Bugs Bunny impersonates a female warrior on horseback with his ears cleverly disguised. The dialogue of the two adversaries is carried on by Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde."
Daniel Politiske, professor of music history, said he had no problem at all with the popularization of opera through cartoons or other media.
"Popularization just points out how good the original work was," he said. "People usually parody the best works."
Politoske said his History of
Opera class was basing its study of "The Barber of Seville" on traditional recordings, not on the Bugs Bunny version.
John Barish, a comic book collector and employee of Clint's Books in Kansas City, Mo., said the Chuck Jones cartoons of the 1940s and 1950s were a high point in animation.
"Most of those cartoons are still running today, and many are out on videotape," he said. "The opera take-offs have probably introduced more kids to the idea of opera than anything else."
Jones also was responsible for the Tweety and Sylvester, Daffy Duck, and Wile E. Coyote and Roadrunner cartoons.
Animation combined with themes from classical and operatic music was explored in Walt Disney's 1940 film, "Fantasia."
In the film, which was a commercial failure at its introduction, conductor Leopold Stowkski exchanges batons with Mickey Mouse. Elaborate animated sequences are set to Modest Moussorgsky's "Night on Bald Mountain" and Amilcare Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours."
Robert Howi, lecturer in English and a classical music announcer at KXTR-FM in Kansas City, said he enjoyed popularizations of classical music when they respected the integrity of the original work.
"After all, Stravinsky and Rossini showed great senses of humor in their works," he said.
Rossini's operas display a sophisticated sense of humor not unlike that seen in the Bugs Bunny opera parodies, he said.
Correction
Because of a reporter's error, Museum of Art was reported incor
the ticket price for the Courtauuld rectly. The tickets cost $5.
Collection at the Nelson-Atkins
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