Welcome to the world of Voltaire in a revival of Leonard Bernstein’s 1956 musical, CANDIDE, opening as a holiday offering at the Shakespeare Theatre in Washington. The tale follows a most picaresque trajectory, depicting a battle between forces of optimism and life seen through the lens of the greatest of all possible pessimists. It’s a battle that all too clearly points a finger at our current society where, on the one side, the public reels against Wall Street, Capitol Hill politicians, and all others who spread doom and gloom here and abroad, and on the other side the strange alliance converging between new age spiritualists and the religious right in their evangelical sincerity and determined optimism.
CANDIDE is a production marked by collaboration through the ages and geographically. Bernstein felt it was his best work for the theatre, and, for sheer musicality, many people feel there has never been anything quite as dazzling on stage as some of its musical numbers. Not only did Richard Wilbur, America’s second poet laureate, contribute the original lyrics but Broadway’s king of most musical Tony’s, Stephen Sondheim, doctored other lyrics for one of the revivals. The book’s original writers included Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker and Bernstein himself. Now, Mary Zimmerman, the production’s director, has returned to the source to deepen the bite of Voltaire’s satire, adding length and depth to the tale. CANDIDE has arrived in Washington this December after a run in Chicago as a joint production with Goodman Theatre.
To read a full synopsis of the story, go to the website: www.shakespearetheatre.org
Check out two recent reviews from our members:
Questions for discussion following performance:
- Why does the character Candide hold onto his belief that he is in the best of al possible worlds despite all contraindications?
- Does Bernstein’s spirit of the music seem to ask us to believe there is (only) optimism in the worst of all possible situations? Or is Bernstein reminding us not to cave in too easily to foolhardy optimism? What else are we meant to take from this score?
- Do Mary Zimmerman’s written additions and directorial concept further amplify and enrich the story?
- Why does the story end with the image of the little band of characters settling down to cultivate a plot of earth and the performers singing inspirationally to make “our garden grow” – and then what?
It is one sign of a thought-provoking adaptation to stage when a production sends one back to the original. I found a translation by Peter Gay of Candide, and was curious, like Joe Petrillo, who pondered the issue of whether a restoration can abridge too little or too much. I was also trepidatious, like son Eamonn, at the task of scaling Voltaire’s work, remembering it hadn’t been much fun first time through in school! But I was only further entranced at the careful “packing” Mary Zimmerman had done to get so much in her staging. Others might say too much. But I loved the original this time through. Hearing the voices of the actors in my head, I found the characters in the book leap off the page while the stage pictures brought back some brilliant moments of a special evening of theatre. The sheer dizzy-making literal and emotional geography of the work is, after all, the point or one of the points. It is exhausting, at times, as human beings, to keep learning the lesson that nothing stands still in life, and a fixed ideology is brain rattling, bone crunching business. As my first husband once said his life joke amounted to “someone told me cheer up things could get worse; so I cheered up and, sure enough, things got worse.” Voltaire had some fun with his readers and Zimmerman obviously had some fun exhuming Voltaire’s skeleton for her equally wicked dance of the macabre. Luckily, she agrees with Voltaire that with a little bit of pluck and a lot of resilience, one can find a garden to cultivate somewhere along the way. Zimmerman herself has said this is not the Candide, but her take. I say, “Vive le spectacle!”
Having recently attended a WST performance of CANDIDE then having read comments by other audience members in which the playing of the “orchestra” was criticized for sounding “ragged” and “bad,” for suffering from “uneven amplification” and “poor intonation” and for being “insufficiently rehearsed,” I was reminded of the importance of FIDELITY TO SCALE when deciding how many musicians to have in the pit. Twelve musicians make for a chamber ensemble not an orchestra.
One blogger mentioned Bernstein’s “lush” score which I recall from recordings. There were memorable moments of lushness during some of very soft moments of ensemble singing, but that quality was never achieved instrumentally. To achieve a section sound with string instruments (violin, viola, cello, string bass) a minimum of three players per section is required. This production had only four string players altogether and attempted to compensate for the lack of numbers through technical wizardry. All the microphones and speakers resulted in something way too close to what I’m used to hearing at the Air and Space Museum. I found it impossible to locate any singer on stage using only my ears and some of the percussion instruments actually came out of speakers behind me.
Despite the production choices mentioned above, I found the performance compelling and I think that was due to the combination of a very strong cast and outstanding stage direction.
Robert, Apparently, the show was re-scored for thirteen instruments when “Harold Prince directed a free-wheeling single-act production, which included some new lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a thirteen-instrument orchestration by Hershy Kay.” I wonder if they used this orchestration.
I come from less background to music-theatre than some of my colleagues, but at the performance of Candide, I found myself reacting to Bernstein’s score which is fabulous. I loved the first scene. It was like a wonderful French classical painting. I found myself listening to the language throughout the show. Even though I thought the show was a little long, it certainly had a lot of variety. And although the show doesn’t feature dance choreography it achieved some wonderful moving of the ensemble around the stage. It was subtle and interesting.
The ending was lovely, it was as if they all had grown up. I was moved by the no longer young Cunegonde who’d been worn down and by Candide, who chose to offer his love to the person she was rather than to an idealized woman. The maturity we might all get to — that migth be the best of all possible worlds!
I could see it all again!
Music Theater implies a balance between the two “parts” or, if you wish a unity. Theater music means something quite different. The initial comment at the discussion following the performance spoke to honoring Bernstein, hum . . . When Shakespeare Theater took on Candide my interest peaked to see how the organization effects this balance between music and theater, this unity. The production allied them with the Goodman Theater in Chicago, a positive alliance. Goodman has a longer history than STC in producing Music Theater; the Chicago review quotes in Asides promised much.
The director Mary Zimmerman’s interest in returning to Voltaire for guidance seemed on the surface a good idea. In doing this however, much of the work and discoveries not only of Bernstein but also … a host of others, was obscured… I found the result, especially in the first act very uneven.
The overture to Canidide, as performed a the Harman Center Wednesday night was awful.
To see my full review — alongside a very different take by colleague Susan Galbraith — click here
If you come to the Washington Shakespeare Theatre hoping to see a reverential “revival” of Bernstein’s original musical, Candide, you will be startled, and some may be disappointed. By the time we get to the coloratura show stopper, “Glitter and Be Gay”, the show declares its downright iconoclasm. Instead of the soprano being fixed down front and center to show her stuff, Cunegonde starts the piece almost horizontal in a bathtub, emerges to disappear momentarily stage right behind a screen, and then proceeds to get dressed in full 18th century layers, all the while singing some of the most athletically x-treme passages in any American twentieth century musical. Here, as elsewhere, this production has chosen a Sondheim think-through-the-song approach to Bernstein’s lush score.
Despite this iconoclastic take, what we get is something quite original and in many ways a more valuable and complex Candide…
For my full review — and another by friend and colleague, Robert Darling — click here
Susan, The bathtub Cunegonde glitter routine was also seen in two other productions as I remember, and I wonder if it is noted in the stage directions. Beverly Sills disported herself thus at the New York City Opera, and certainly Erie Mills did the same directed by Peter Mark Shifter. Oddly, I happened upon a woman who recalled Erie’s performance at a Joe Shesnak event the night before we went to the WST production. With much work and effort, and despite some easy comments by the cast after the show, well done music – theater performances today often (if not usually) apply a-think-through-the-song approach. Wesley worked hard to achieve this. While it doesn’t always happen, it happens more often than not, be it the opera house or Broadway.
Joe, Great to read your thoughts. The different nature of a “Show” and a novel being very real, as you note.
Last weekend I stumbled into the Will/Ariel Durant World of Voltaire by bringing that too heavy volume home from the library. When I read the Candide section there was the entire Pangloss, gloss on his Philosophy that Mary Zimmerman dropped into Act One, scene one. At the production, that section seemed stilted. The Durand (or whoever’s ) translation was also a bit tame but, true to Voltaire. The question for those of us Music-Theater folks is whether a Show can sustain that sort of verbosity. My recent experience with it is that the Music-Theater medium requires a wider palette and means as you note. I wonder how this scene was handled by Hug WHEELER et al. I don’t seem to remember this section a so exact a replication of Voltaire.
It is very difficult to present philosophical ideas artistically. Usually, some form of declamation is necessary and it soon becomes a tiresome interruption to dramatic development. The pretext for stopping the action to exposit the ideas can be contrived, and its incongruity can make the philosophical content seem even more out of place. At the other end of the spectrum, abridging the philosophy too much can make trivialize it.
Voltaire’s Candide tackles these problems well. Its satiric form helps excuse the necessary shortcuts an artist must take in presenting philosophies. The multiple chapters enable the author to make a simple point quickly, often figuratively, and then move on before tedium sets in. And since Voltaire assumes that his audience is acquainted, to some degree, with philosophy, he can hit the high points without laying too much foundation.
Musical theater, however, expands the tools the artist has to keep the audience engaged while the ideas unfold. The overture and incidental music can set a mood. Songs break up spoken prose. Motion underscores and reinforces the spoken word. Innovative staging captures the imagination, and maintains interest during narratives that string together the vignettes.
The WST production of Candide used all of these tools very effectively, while staying largely faithful to the source. The quality of the production seemed, to my amateur eyes and ears, very high (although I must agree with Robert Darling’s criticism of the sometimes ragged sound of the orchestra).
So I as much as I loved Voltaire’s book, I loved the musical also.
for background info:
http://www.leonardbernstein.com/candide.htm