Opera Pacific Brings New Life to Dead Man

By Truman C. Wang
Thursday, April 18, 2002

DEAD MAN WALKING

Opera in Two Acts by
Jake Heggie, music
Terrence McNally, libretto

Joseph De Rocher…………….John Packard
Sister Helen Prejean…………..Kristine Jepson
Sister Rose…………………….Donita Volkwijn
Mrs. De Rocher……………….Frederica von Stade
Father Grenville……………….Matthew Lord
Warden George Benton……...Charles Austin
Owen Hart……………………..Kelly Anderson
Kitty Hart……………………...Rachel Cobb
Jade Boucher………………….Stephanie Woodling
Howard Boucher/Cop………..Chad Berlinghieri

Opera Pacific Orchestra and Chorus

John DeMain, Conductor
Henri Venanzi, Chorusmaster
Leonard Foglia, Director
Michael McGarty, Scenery

Performance of Thursday, April 18, 2002 at
The Orange County Performing Arts Center

COSTA MESA, Calif – With its dramatic new production of Dead Man Walking, Opera Pacific can now stake out a claim as one of the most successful and enterprising companies on the operatic firmament.  This significant new work, by American composer Jake Heggie and playwright Terrence McNally, saw its successful premiere in San Francisco a year ago, and has been gathering kudos from critics and fans alike ever since (damning words from a few dyspeptic critics notwithstanding).   The new production features the original principal singers from the San Francisco, augmented by a strong lineup of secondary players from Opera Pacific’s own resident artists.

The sharp production design by Leonard Foglia and Michael McGarty is memorable for its authentic depiction of the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola, with its claustrophobic metal cages and scaffoldings that move on eight chain motors.  Instead of a death chamber as in the San Francisco premiere, only a death table is used which is an authentic replica of the actual table used for Joseph De Rocher’s execution.  This unprecedented seven-company co-production will subsequently travel to New York (City Opera), Cincinnati, Austin, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Baltimore in the next three years.  It is rumored (and hoped) that the death chamber might return to the production later on.

The opera is based on Roman Catholic nun Sister Helen Prejean's book on her death row experiences.  Her involvement with convicted murderer Joseph De Rocher has to do with saving his soul, with allowing him to take responsibility for his acts so he can die in peace and grace.  So, with the spiritual “He will gather us around” serving as a recurring motif, Dead Man Walking takes us along on the reluctant, difficult, spiritual journey that these two unlikely people make together.

Kristine Jepson used her finely focused mezzo-soprano to portray Sister Helen in her courageous and torturous journey through evil and eventual salvation.  John Packard, with his rough-hued but sympathetic baritone, managed to humanize a guilty-as-hell lowlife Cajun without trying to make us like the guy too much.  Mr. Packard’s astonishing performance rivaled that of Sean Penn in the 1995 film adaptation, and would dominate the show were it not for co-star Frederica von Stade’s equally shattering portrayal of the convict’s mother Mrs. De Rocher.  Ms. Von Stade’s emotional plea before the pardon board, “Don’t kill my Joe!”, and her poignant arioso before her son was taken away in Act Two, were the musical and dramatic highlights of the evening.

Ironically, what appears to be the greatest strength of the opera may very well become its undoing.  By expanding Mrs. De Rocher’s character and making her the emotional core of the drama, the opera risks losing its balance and becoming an anti-capital punishment pamphlet.  In this respect, I feel the film version deals with this complex issue better, by giving us a full hearing on both sides and showing us the private grief of the victims’ parents.  (There aren’t any solo numbers/motifs in the opera representing the victims or their families.)

Musically speaking, Dead Man Walking is a skillful amalgam of the American folk medium (jazz, rock-and-roll, spiritual) and the European lyricism (Britten, Debussy spring to mind).  I found the music beginning to grow on me after a few repeated hearings of the recording (Erato).  Maestro DeMain conducted the 63-piece orchestra with great care and affection.  The stirringly powerful Act One finale, with its complex weaving of melodic threads and massed choral writing, is a coup de théâtre worthy of the great masters of the past.

Truman C. Wang is editor of Classical Voice.

[ previous | back to top ]