Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – Opera as downtown theater: Heartbeat Opera’s intimately scaled SALOME is an in-your-face thriller

• By drediman
• February 18, 2025
• No Comments

This past holiday weekend, I also had the opportunity to catch the final performance of Heartbeat Opera’s compact version of Salome. Based on Oscar Wilde’s 1891 play of the same name, the opera tells the Biblical story of the titular teenage Jewish princess — the daughter of Herod and Herodias — who falls in lust with the prophet Jochanaan (perhaps better known as John the Baptist), whose refusal of Salome’s advances leads to notoriously tragic and gruesome consequences. With its combustible mix of profane and sacred, Richard Strauss’s daring opera rightfully caused a sensation when it first premiered in 1905.

I’m happy to report that in the hands of co-adaptors Jacob Ashworth (music director), Elizabeth Dinkova (stage director), and rest of the Heartbeat Opera creative team, Salome still has the power to shock, disturb, and captivate. Updated to an apocalyptic world in what seems like an oppressive dictatorial regime, the opera uses elements of surveillance and aggressive power play to heighten the salacious and racy sexual undercurrents of work, which contrasts jaggedly with Jochanaan’s ecstatic religious outbursts (the staging makes ingenious and theatrically effective use of a transparent cube to represent the prophet’s prison cell). If anything, the production calls to mind the visceral quality of “anything goes” downtown theater (the opera’s grotesque final aria would fit right into an outrageous play like Tracy Letts’ Killer Joe). Also adding an element of immediacy is the use of Tom Hammond’s English translation (originally used for English National Opera’s production), instead of Hedwig Lachmann’s original German libretto. In summary, Heartbeat’s production is a claustrophobic and in-your-face psychological thriller — a unique point of view and certainly a welcome shift away from the often distancing wide angle lens afforded by the Metropolitan Opera.

Necessarily, Richard Strauss’s luxurious orchestrations have been truncated by Dan Schlosberg for just ten instruments, with particular emphasis on arrangements for reeds. Although I missed the power and colorful nuances of the original version, I was nevertheless impressed by how the smaller ensemble captured the intensity of the drama. As such, the famous “Dance of the Seven Vails” registered more as a part of the fabric of the narrative than it did a standout set piece. Soprano Summer Hassan made for a disarmingly youthful Salome, which was in unsettling contrast to the maturity and full bloom of her voice. The other standout was was tenor Patrick Cook, who as Herod, brought an uncommonly rich sound and ample character to his portrayal.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

SALOME
Opera
Heartbeat Opera
1 hour, 40 minutes (without an intermission)
Closed