A First-Rate Cast and Savvy Staging Make
Porgy and Bess Worth Seeing Twice!

Full Disclosure: This is the sixth production of George and Ira Gershwin and DuBose and Dorothy Heyward's Porgy and Bess that I have seen; and I own three recordings of other productions, including one that my younger brother produced with John Mauceri and the Nashville Symphony.

How good is the Raleigh-based North Carolina Opera's current production of Porgy and Bess, co-produced with Charlotte's Opera Carolina and performed in English with English supertitles? It's so good that I am tempted to go back to Raleigh Memorial Auditorium at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 16th, to see it again, just for the chance to hear Kenneth Overton sing Porgy and Michelle Johnson sing Serena. These two are the equals of any others I have ever heard in those roles (and that includes William Warfield!) That said, there are no weak links in the cast. Everybody is first rate, with outstanding musical education backgrounds and experience.

When the original version of Porgy and Bess opened in 1935, George Gershwin had to search many of the African-American nightclubs for singers. (Music schools then were not recruiting anybody of color to become an opera singer.)

The North Carolina Opera and Opera Carolina's joint production of Porgy and Bess amply demonstrates the sort of entertainment that opera can be -- when there is a believable plot, combined with competent directing and acting. Modern opera is no longer about obese singers pretending to be 40 years younger than the roles that they're playing while standing in one place huffing out songs. Some of the music from this opera has endured and entered the realm of songs known by all -- "Summertime" being the principal one.

Porgy and Bess is set in the African-American community of Catfish Row in Charleston, SC, in the first third of the 20th century. The plot centers on the love of a crippled beggar, Porgy, for Bess, a beautiful young woman tormented -- and ultimately destroyed -- by her demons.

Segregation and racism is rigid fact for the inhabitants of Catfish Row, and poverty is their normal condition. Still, life with its highs and lows, its sorrows and laughter, persists in this tight community of fishermen and dock workers.

The libretto is based on the best-selling 1925 novel Porgy by the Charleston, SC writer DuBose Heyward. Young George Gershwin, already known as composer of many of America's most popular musicals, craved recognition as a classical-music composer and was casting about for an idea. Porgy and Bess was an unusual choice for a New York Jewish composer. None the less, George and his brother, Ira, contacted DuBose and Dorothy Heyward and headed South in the early 1930s to soak up the atmosphere and rhythms of life in that Southern port city. While Ira Gershwin and the Heywards wrote the libretto, George spent months wandering the city and sea island, painting watercolors of the people and places.

The genius of the libretto is the number of fully realized characters surrounding Porgy and Bess. There is the local bully Crown (played by Donovan Singletary) and his girlfriend Bess; Sportin' Life (Victor Ryan Robertson), the street-corner cocaine and liquor hustler; Jake and Clara (Kendrick Williams and Diana Thompson-Brewer), a young couple with great aspirations and dreams for their infant son; Maria (Lucia Bradford), the matriarch of Catfish Row and her fellow church-going friend Serena. Even the incidental characters of the local street merchants selling crabs, strawberries, and honey are drawn skillfully in a few strokes.

-- WARNING: This portion of the review contains SPOILERS! --

The opera starts when Serena's husband, Robbins, is killed by the drunken bully Crown during a Saturday-night crap game. Crown flees to escape the police, and Bess takes refuge in Porgy's hut.

Life with Porgy gentles Bess. She becomes part of the community and begins to gain the respect of the community. Then, during a church picnic on an offshore island, Crown reappears and spirits Bess off with him while the rest of the picnickers leave on their boat. Two days later, Bess reappears in Catfish Row, delirious with fever.

Porgy takes her in, nursing her for a week. While delirious, Bess confesses to being with Crown. Porgy forgives her, and the church ladies pray Bess back to health. Bess tells Porgy that Crown will come for her soon and that she is too much under his spell not to leave with him. Porgy tells her not to worry; he'll deal with Crown.

Soon after Bess' recovery, a hurricane strikes the city. As the residents of Catfish Row huddle in a shelter, Crown breaks in, having fled the storm from Kittiwah Island. While Crown makes fun of the frightened people, Clara peeks out of the shelter and sees her husband Jake's boat capsized in the river. Clara hands her baby to Bess and disappears into the storm to find Jake. To demonstrate his powers and strength, Crown volunteers to pursue Clara and bring her back. But ... when the storm passes Jake, Clara, and Crown are not to be found.

Life resumes on Catfish Row. Bess adores the baby that has been left in her charge, and she and Porgy are the picture of domestic bliss. Then Crown reappears, and before he can lay a hand on Bess, Porgy attacks him. Crown has not counted on Porgy's strength from using his arms and upper body to move about all his life. In the ensuing struggle, Porgy kills Crown.

When the police come to investigate Crown's murder, they take Porgy to the morgue to identify the body. Porgy is not a suspect. But superstition that the dead man's wounds will start to bleed when the murderer looks on the victim's face terrifies Porgy and Bess -- they think that he'll then be charged with Crown's murder and hanged.

In her despair, convinced Porgy will never return, Bess accepts Sportin' Life's cocaine and his promises to take her to New York and a lifetime of riches and high living.

Days later, Porgy returns, confessing that he closed his eyes when he looked on Crown's face. Then, proudly, he tells the crowd that he has returned with a special gift for Bess. The crowd goes silent and looks away. Porgy sees Serena is holding "Bess' baby." Porgy demands to know what has happened. Finally, they tell him she has run off to New York with Sportin' Life. The church women tell Porgy that Bess was never worthy of him, she will always be a low-life sinner.

Porgy will have none of it. "Where's New York?" he demands. "A thousand miles past the local custom house," he's told.

In the final scene, undeterred, Porgy takes his crutch and cart, leaving Catfish Row to find the love of his life, Bess.

-- END of SPOILERS. --

This production, like most productions of this work, has several scenes and songs cut from the original work and rightly so. Even with the cuts, from curtain up to the last applause, the run time was a bit over three hours (including an intermission.)

The sets are simple but effective, and James Meena's conducting of the Opera Orchestra does the opera justice. The music is tight and hits just the right spot between classical and pop.

I did not find the costumes particularly convincing or effective. Crown and Robbins work on the docks, loading cotton bales, but are dressed in clean clothes suitable for running a small retail business. Bess comes on in a sexy, slinky red dress -- standard in most productions; yet the next day, shows up at Robbins' funeral wearing a black dress and black hat, and in future scenes wears a pale lavender beige dress. Perhaps, she should have been carrying a suitcase in Act One, when she comes in with Crown?

In movies and plays, no matter the period portrayed, the hairstyles tend to be modern. Sorry extras, no men were wearing dreads in that era.

I cannot say I liked all of stage director Dennis Robinson's choices in directing the acting, but he does take some approaches that I have not seen before, ones I think are good alternatives to some of the more traditional stagings that I have seen.

One of the most interesting directorial choices in this production works well. In the scene in which Sportin' Life seduces Bess to come to New York with him, Victor Ryan Robertson plays him as not only sly and evil, but as fairly tipsy. In fact, the character has been directed to do so in the scene in which he sings his critique of The Bible at the church picnic "It Ain't Necessarily So," as pretty tipsy. I have not seen this approach before, and it works well -- along with Sportin' Life's lavender suit. Moreover, it does not require that the song to be turned into a dance number with this approach.

Another directorial choice -- one which I am sure made the stage managers breathe many sighs of relief -- was to omit Porgy's goat. In the novel and the original script, Porgy is pulled in a goat cart. Animals are always problematic on stage; and while a single goat on stage is not the headache that several elephants in a production of Aida might be, goat poo on stage or a goat's refusing to move on cue could have added the wrong sort of comic relief at the wrong time.

If you go ... One practical word of warning -- ladies' handbags cannot be larger than 12 inches in any dimension. Security searches smaller handbags, but larger ones are not allowed in at all and there is no facility to store them. The women are directed casually to "take their handbags back to their car and return with smaller ones." These must be regulations written by men.

George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, and DuBose and Dorothy Heyward's PORGY AND BESS (In Person at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 16th), performed in English with English supertitles, conducted by James Meena, directed by Dennis Robinson, and starring Nicole Cabell as Bess, Kenneth Overton as Porgy, Victor Ryan Robertson as Sportin' Life, Kendrick Williams as Jake, Diana Thompson-Brewer as Clara, Michelle Johnson as Serena, Donovan Singletary as Crown, and Lucia Bradford as Maria (North Carolina Opera, co-produced with Opera Carolina, in Raleigh Memorial Auditorium in the Martin Marietta Center for the Performing Arts in Raleigh). PRESENTER (North Carolina Opera of Raleigh, NC): https://www.ncopera.org/, https://www.facebook.com/NorthCarolinaOpera, https://www.instagram.com/northcarolinaopera/, https://twitter.com/NCOpera, and https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfR_1l1blvZyhsaII5MLaZw. 2022-23 SEASON: https://ncopera.org/2022-2023-season/. PRESENTER (Opera Carolina of Charlotte, NC): https://operacarolina.org/, https://www.facebook.com/operacarolina, https://www.instagram.com/operacarolina/, https://twitter.com/OperaCarolina, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opera_Carolina, and https://www.youtube.com/user/operacarolina. 2022-23 SEASON: https://operacarolina.org/the-2022-2023-season/. THE VENUE: https://www.martinmariettacenter.com/venues, https://www.facebook.com/MMCRaleigh, https://www.instagram.com/mmcraleighnc/, https://twitter.com/MMCRaleigh, and https://www.youtube.com/@MMCRaleighNC. DIRECTIONS/PARKING: https://www.martinmariettacenter.com/getting-martin-marietta-center. ACCESSIBILITY: https://www.martinmariettacenter.com/accessibility-martin-marietta-center. KNOW-BEFORE-YOU-GO INFORMATION: https://www.martinmariettacenter.com/know-before-you-go-information. ACCESSIBLE SEATING OPTIONS: Call the N.C. Opera Box Office at 919-792-3853 for accessible seating options. PORGY AND BESS (1935 Boston and 1935 Broadway Opera): https://gershwin.com/publications/porgy-and-bess/, https://opera-inside.com/porgy-and-bess-by-george-gershwin-the-opera-guide-and-synopsis/, https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-show/porgy-and-bess-7190, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Porgy-and-Bess, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porgy_and_Bess. RATING: Suggested PG-13, because some content may be in appropriate for children under age 13. TICKETS: $23.46 and up, plus taxes and fees. Click here to buy tickets. GROUP RATES (10+ tickets): Call the N.C. Opera Box Office at 919-792-3853 for group ticket prices. INFORMATION: 919-792-3853 or info@ncopera.org. PLEASE DONATE TO: North Carolina Opera and Opera Carolina.

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