Live Blog: My first night at the opera, with "Carmen"

I've been hiding a terrible secret. Though I've spent nearly my whole life immersed in the world of live theatre and film, a true thespian geek having acting in and seen countless plays, musicals, shorts, experimental pieces, and more--I have never, in my truly ancient now nearly 28 years on God's green Earth, seen an opera.

I know! A terrible oversight on my part, to be sure. And it's not that I don't like opera, or at least, what I've heard of it. But that's just it; I've only ever just heard opera and frankly it never really caught and held my attention. However, I have a sneaking suspicion that much of the appeal lies in the viewing of opera's famously colorful and larger-than-life stagings. So when Madison Opera’s manager of communications and community outreach Brian Hinrichs contacted me about taking part in their first-ever "Bloggers Night Out" at their upcoming production of George Bizet's "Carmen," I jumped at the chance to right this particular wrong.

It's a great idea, and it's also encouraging to see more entrenched institutions seeking new ways to reach wider audiences. Frankly, the more people we get interested and involved in the arts, the merrier. And I'm pleased as punch to be part of the effort!

So tonight I'm pulling out my opera glasses, changing out of the Blogger Pajamas and into my gussiest outfit, and getting ready for some no-holds-bar operatic action! And I hope you'll stick around to follow me as I marvel and ramble about all things "Carmen" and Madison Opera for an evening. If nothing else, my near complete lack of opera knowledge should provide for an entertaining train wreck of an entry.

You can also follow along with my fellow bloggers this evening:

• Maddie Greene, for Dane101.com
• Katie Vaughn, for Liberal Arts (Madison Magazine)
• Jacob Stockinger, for the Well-Tempered Ear
• Sarah Deroo, for In the Know (Brava Blogs)
• Mollie Shambeau, for Style File (Brava Blogs)

And for more information about Madison Opera (and there's one more production of "Carmen" coming up this Sunday!), check out their website, blog, and Twitter feed.

Now! On with the live blog! Check back often for updates as the show progresses. Starting around 7:15 p.m. (CST) I'll be writing before, at intermission, and at the conclusion of the event.

(All photos courtesy James Gill / Madison Opera)
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7:22 p.m.

I've just breezed into the Overture Center from an impromptu trip to Milwaukee to see a friend defend his graduate thesis (passed!). Catching my breath after battling traffic to get here on time, but everything seems to have worked out.

I would feel more out of place in my somewhat rumpled outfit and fabulous white Chucks if this wasn't Madison, but really, nothing in this town is that fancy. So I'm hopeful they won't kick me out.

Us dirty bloggers have been given a couple of tables in the main lobby where we're all sitting in a row, pecking away at our laptops, presumably all talking opera. I should probably be doing that, too, come to think of it.

Lots of well-dressed folks milling about. I'm sitting next to Dane101's Maddie Greene, who wrote an excellent behind-the-scenes piece about this production of "Carmen" that I recommend checking out here.

So I've been reading up on the show, and I'm told that there will be captions for those of us who don't speak...wait, what's this in? French, I think? Oh man, clearly I'm just terribly unprepared and unqualified for this gig, but don't tell. I've created quite the reputation for myself based on the ability to pretend I have any clue what's going on. I'd like to thank the Academy...

7:36 p.m.

Flamenco dancers! Not gonna lie: I already love dance, but add some percussion to the mix and you can be sure I'm going to love it. This particular group is Tania Tandias Flamenco & Spanish Dance, and they're quite good.

Excuse the crappy camera phone picture, but it's the limit of my technology this evening. Anyway, there's really no way to fully appreciate the dance unless you see it live. I dig how you can trace the influence of flamenco (a relative/forefather--depending on who you ask--of Celtic step dancing) and it's ilk in modern step dance and groups like Stomp. They're all related, of course, and it would take a far more knowledgeable scholar to break it all down. The important thing is that it's all fabulous, of course.

7:45 p.m.

I suspect the doors will be opening soon, and it looks like Brian and the Opera have hooked us up with pretty nice seats. But I'm still enjoying the dancers, so not going in just yet.

By the way, if you'd like a good overview of what "Carmen" is all about, take a look at this handy .pdf and read up. Basically, it's your standard story of a naughty lady tempting away several men and the drama that arises from the love triangle. Women. So life disrupting.

7:52 p.m.

Chimes! Sounds like it's time to head into the theatre. I am prepared for spectacle!

9:00 p.m.

First intermission (of two!). We've just left Carmen and poor Don Jose after an encounter wherein his attentions were turned from a painfully chaste relationship with Micaela, the young orphan girl adopted by his mother, and to the seductress gypsy woman Carmen. All because of a "charmed" flower. Men are so easy.

So far so good. It's easy to forget (or just not know in the first place) that a lot of the music from "Carmen" has permeated our popular culture. You hear pieces of it in all sorts of things--cartoons, movies, etc. And there's a reason: It's quite good. Catchy, even, if opera can be called such.

The set, on loan from another opera company (I'm blanking on the name), is gorgeous--towering walls with lovely scene painting. It's impressive without being cluttered or overdone. Much credit goes to the costumers, who've taken an enormous loaner wardrobe and tailored, trimmed, and taken in all manner of get-up for a fairly numerous cast.

The whole production, so far, seems to have come together very well. A great orchestra (the Madison Symphony Orchestra, lead by the venerable John DeMain), excellent scene and costume work, and a solid cast. The Madison Youth Choirs even got in on the action, providing the always somewhat gratituitous but adorable counterpoint to the melodrama of the adults on stage.

And I had to laugh - Carmen is one of the girls who works at a cigarette factory and, naturally, almost all of them smoke. Very un-PC, all that puffing and tobacco enjoyment. Had this been written and produced in modern times, I suspect the cigarette factory might have been replaced by, say, a solar cell manufacturing plant. Hah! The bells are chiming, back to it...

10:04 p.m.

Aaaaand second intermission. This blogging between acts is quite the high pressure gig. Don't feel there's enough time to sum up everything we've seen or thought about the performance, but in general I should say that this is quite entertaining.

The main lesson I'm taking from this story is that women are tricksy, and men are easily duped fools. Basically, a tale as old as time. But told with such flare! And plenty of soaring lyrics, dance, and color. Can't complain, really. I do appreciate the high drama and production value, and frankly, there just isn't enough of this in mainstream culture these days. Unless you count "Glee," which I do, but it's only one show after all.

Anyway, impressed overall with the main vocalists. Have to say their Carmen, Katharine Goeldner, is extremely talented. She not only has the pipes to pull off the various pieces, but a great, jaunty, assured presence befitting of her character. And Adam Diegel as silly ol' Don Jose has a beautiful voice overall (though I'm pretty sure I've heard him falter on some of the quieter notes--I don't feel quite qualified to criticize this style of singing). I even heard a few shouted "Bravos!" at the end of his solo in the last act.

But the bells chime again and we must obey. Back to the show!

11:20 p.m.

Fin! After a healthy standing ovation and my hands near falling off from the clapping, we come to the end of the show. My first opera! And it was, indeed, worth seeing. Many kudos to Madison Opera for putting together an excellent production--to the cast, crew, and everyone else behind the scenes. And I'm told they're putting this on again this Sunday, so I would certainly recommend looking into getting yourself some tickets and injecting some culture into your weekend.

My sincere thanks to Brian Hinrichs for the opportunity to see this show, and to sit in the lobby and have people look askance at me as I sit here and type away. All worth it! And it's not as though I'm not somewhat used to drawing confused glances.

Honestly, at this point I need to put some sleep between myself and the experience, and I may have more coherent thoughts on the whole thing tomorrow. Overall, however, I'll sum it up this way: Not a knock-your-socks-off type of show, but still very entertaining and professional.

And with that, I'm spent. A simple girl like me can only handle so much high drama and sung dialogue before she needs some downtime to process everything she's just witnessed. In the meantime, I intend to dream of flamenco dancers and a world where we solve our problems through song. Ah, if only.

Vote 'yes' on the Garver Arts Incubator

Election day draws near (it's April 7, in case you forgot), and in amongst the many candidate and referendum choices available to Madison residents will be a question on whether or not the city should sell the old Garver Feed Mill to Common Wealth Development. And I highly encourage you to vote 'yes' for that move.

Why? Because CWD, a non-profit organization that has done a lot of good for our community over the years, wants to transform the beautiful old--currently vacant--building into an arts incubator. They're proposing a LEED-certified renovation of the space so that it will provide much-needed, affordable studio and learning space for area artists. According to a CWD press release:

The Garver Arts Incubator will include 40 art studios. Visitors can enroll in art classes, attend performances or view a gallery while interacting with artists. A three-story atrium, indoor/outdoor café, gift shop and rooftop garden are also included in the plan. In addition, the renovation will be a sustainable development project and the building will be LEED certified.

They go on to emphasize that the center will not be paid for with city taxpayer money. Instead, "If the referendum passes, the City of Madison will sell the Garver building to Common Wealth who would retain ownership of the land through a minimum 30-year lease." Money for the project would be gotten through private funds, tax credits, and some federal assistance.

Certainly there's added appeal for me in a project like this. I'm heavily involved in the arts community, and many of my friends are artists who would likely benefit from its creation. In fact, the idea reminds me very much of the Mellwood Arts & Entertainment Center in Louisville, Kentucky. A few of my Wis-Kino comrades and I went down to Louisville to participate in their 48-hour filmmaking festival, and the final screening was held in a very nice room in the center.

It's an old, converted meat packing warehouse that now houses artist studios, a cafe, fitness center, some retail space, galleries, and teaching spaces. I remember being very impressed with the look and feel of the building, and that the city had such a great resource for its artists. The Garver Arts Incubator could be just such a space for Madison.

The main reason it's had to come up for referendum is that, "Under the city's shoreline preservation ordinance, voters must endorse the project located near Starkweather Creek before construction can begin." I'm hopeful that, based on CDW's track record of working closely with the community and paying close attention to environmental concerns, shoreline preservation will be a top priority in construction plans. They've already made plans to have "on-site storm water management and a comprehensive transportation plan that minimizes parking," which is a good start.

I encourage you to read more about it over at the CWD website. They have detailed plans and proposals available. And if it means anything to you, The Capital Times has endorsed the idea, and my own alder, Marsha Rummel, has been championing the project as well.

Vote Yes for the Garver Arts Incubator.

Wis-Kino Spring Kabaret starts tonight

It's that time again! Madison's own chapter of the International Kino micro-cinema movement, Wis-Kino, is getting ready to throw their spring 48-hour filmmaking "Kabaret" - starting tonight!

These are always a blast, and a great opportunity for both budding and experienced filmmakers alike to flex their creative muscles. Even better? There's no hefty entrance fee. You just pay to come to the screenings themselves, and the film challenge is free!

Past participants have ranged from enthusiastic grade school kids to college students to working stiffs and even some industry professionals. And if you don't have your own camera, you should come anyway just to check out some great, short, local films. You can also get involved in other projects - filmmaker's often need actors, extras, location scouts, musicians, grips, and everything in between.

Details are as follows:
WHAT: Wis-Kino Spring Kabaret ‘09
WHEN: Kick-Off Screening on Friday, March 20 at 7:00p.m. - Final Screening on Sunday, March 22 at 7:00p.m.
WHERE: Sundance Cinemas, Hilldale Mall, 430 N. Midvale Blvd, Madison, WI
COST: Kick-Off Screening is just $2, Final Screening is $5 (for everyone, including filmmakers - no extra charge to participate).

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line at Wis.Kino.Films@gmail.com or read more about Kabarets at the link above.

(Full disclosure: Yes, I'm one of the co-directors of this group, but I promise it's lots of fun!)

To give you an idea of what's been done for Wis-Kino and the 48-hour challenges in the past, check out some of these short films:

• "Drill, Baby, Drill" - by Rob Matsushita
• "Change Your Order" - by Craig Knitt & Tony Mayer
• "Gutter Love" - by Shelby Floyd & Shelby Falk
• "Status Quo" - by Justin Sprecher
• "Seeds" - by Tona Williams
• Or watch any of the Wis-Kino associated films here.
  

The horror and the gory glory

Yesterday morning, as I stumbled in to work all bleary-eyed and with the slightest hint of something pink stained along the sides of my mouth, a few people stopped to inquire about how I'd spent my Sunday. My response? "I passed several hours soaking in a pool of blood."

As you might imagine, that response earned me more than my fair share of raised eyebrows. Allow me to explain.

My friends and I like to make movies. I'm more of the dirty actor type, but fortunately I know quite a few people of the directorial persuasion and so I end up getting to be involved in several film projects. Even more amazing is that these director types that I know make actually a habit of finishing any given project, which is definitely an added bonus.

Currently, we're wrapping up "principal photography" on a new horror/dark comedy called "High School Sweethearts." It's a little something dreamed up by the twisted mind of Will Gartside, with assistance from the indomitable Rob Matsushita--the same crew that brought about 2007's horror-musical-comedy smash sensation, "Massacre! The Musical."

I worked on the soundtrack for that particular opus, but this time yours truly gets to take a turn in front of the cameras. They were even kind enough to go completely against my usual type casting by having me play the role of the ingenue. They're making me work for it, though. I've now spent more time than I'd care to recall covered in cold, sticky, fake blood. I also spent 40 minutes in near total sensory deprivation, fighting off panic attacks, to get my head cast in alginate. And through the vast majority of this, I've been duct-taped to a rickety wooden chair in a tarp-lined basement during the middle of a Wisconsin winter.

But what can I say? I love it.

Working on such extremely low-budget films can be a pretty thankless task. None of us are being paid in anything more than free food (which is a lot, considering). I don't think there's one of us who thinks being involved in this project is going to break us big in the movie world, and we're all giving up fairly copious amounts of our free time to allow our director free reign to torture us for hours on end.

So why do we do it? Because we love to create, try new things, make art we think will entertain, and probably most of all, because we enjoy working with each other. I can't stress enough how having a good crew can make or break productions like this. After all, if your director is a pompous jerk, your fellow cast members are complete nincompoops, and the guy holding the boom mic keeps hitting you in the head with it - why on Earth would you want to stick around?

In my case, I have been incredibly fortunate to find myself fallen in amongst people who do what they do because they truly love it, who treat everyone with respect, and who are very much down in the trenches with you through the whole process. They're also motivated, creative, and hard-working, which certainly helps when you're lying on a chilly cement floor, wallowing in pools of red Caro syrup and the shards of a broken flower vase, trying to look like a glassy-eyed corpse.

Jealous?

Anyway, I've put together a little photo collage to illustrate some of the shenanigans and general trials of making a low-budget film. These were all taken this Sunday, but if you'd like to see more from the whole filming process, I will be periodically uploading quite a few shots to my Flickr pool. If you're not into fake blood and the like, though, feel free to steer clear.

We took time out from shooting to practice our hair cuttery skills.

All that pink makes it hard to be intimidated...until the blood starts gushing out of the dummy.

Being horribly tortured makes my eyes go all hooey.

This may well be my favorite shot of them all. Kelly makes an excellent axe murderer.

Yep, that's me with my head between the legs of a mannequin, about to be covered in blood. Good times.

If all of that hasn't effectively scared you off from ever seeing one of the film projects I'm involved in, be sure you keep you eyes peeled this fall for the release of a DVD that will include "High School Sweethearts," its double feature, "The Girls," and a bonus in the form of "Massacre! The Musical."

Liquid Overture

News came on Friday that Madison's ivory tower of the arts, the Overture Center, was being forced to liquidate its trust fund in the name of paying off some substantial debt. Given the current state of the markets, and the 2005 refinancing deal that basically relied on them never ever going bad, I can't say that this comes as much of a surprise--to me, or to anyone else, I suspect.

It's a shame, because while I have disagreed with much of the center's business plan since its inception, I've never wished to see it fail. Which isn't to say that it will, but this new development doesn't exactly paint a pretty picture.

The lowdown:

"The liquidation of the trust fund will have no noticeable effect on the Overture Center whatsoever in the short term," said Ald. Mike Verveer, who is a member of the Madison Cultural Arts District board that runs the Overture Center. "It's not as if there will be any theaters going dark, performances being canceled, wedding receptions and other parties needing to scramble to find new spaces."

That's good to hear, but we're talking short term. The longer-term looks a little sketchier:

The liquidated fund will pay off approximately $87 million of the Overture Center's $115 million of debt, leaving W. Jerome Frautschi, the major donor for the Overture Center, the city, and the Center itself in charge of the remaining $28 million. Due to built-in firewalls that were in the city's controversial refinancing in 2005, Frautschi will pay the $2.5 million annual debt service for the next two years and the Center will use its reserve fund for the third year, but Mayor Dave Cieslewicz said the worst-case scenario for the city would be having to cover the third-year costs if the reserve fund runs dry before 2011. After 2011, the refinancing deal expires and all the parties will have to look at the remaining debt again, Cieslewicz said.

Thankfully, the city and the center have until 2011 to get their ducks in a row, and I'm hopeful that, as Mayor Dave himself says, this whole liquidation thing will spur people into serious action to make sure it doesn't come to a big taxpayer bailout (hmm, that sounds familiar). But we'll see.

My favorite part of the article, though, comes courtesy of Ald. Brenda Konkel, who makes this astute observation regarding the function of the center:

"I'm not even sure a lot of our community even particularly wanted [the Center], to tell you the truth," she said. "I think our community appreciates the arts, but we're more into local arts, and I don't think this venue that really promotes that very much."

And that's the rub. There was a lot of grumbling and protest over how the center was to be designed and used by much of the Madison community, most of which went relatively unheeded. The place payed a lot of lip service to local artists when it had its grand opening--I was even part of some of the theatre companies that were given time and space in which to perform there during the festivities*--but since then, the majority of what goes through the center seems to be national touring acts. Most of the people who attend functions there, too, seem to be coming from out of town. There's nothing inherently bad about either of those things, but Madisonians, it would appear, are more interested in local arts in more welcoming, local venues. I suspect the sterile white walls of the Overture Center are less-than appealing to many folks.

Perhaps if the center was more accommodating of local bands, artists, and functions, that would held to bring in more attendees and more cash. Perhaps not. It would, at least, make it more of a community space and not just an incongruous behemoth in the midst of otherwise homey State Street.

None of that will matter, of course, if the people who run the place can't get their financials in order. I wish them the best, honestly, because it would be nice to have the chance to transform the place into something the whole community can enjoy, and not have it become a stone around the city's neck.

*whole other story I could bitch about, but suffice to say that it wasn't the greatest experience ever.

(photo by Phil Ejercito, All Rights Reserved.)