So welcome to the Year of Our Lord 2012, and who can predict just what an uncertain future holds.
Our special treat this Christmas, was to be invited by good friends to accompany them to the performance of Gian Carlo Menotti’s one act opera - Ahmal and the Night Visitors at the Cornwall United Church, staged by a local group, Coro Dolce.
The outing was noteworthy if for no other reason that it was the first time out of the house for several weeks for the Lady Barbara, now recuperating from shoulder replacement surgery, and getting a tad testy about her infirmity now and then.
In any case, we joined a full house in the church for the final of four performances of what has come to be regarded as a Christmas classic, originally commissioned for the television program sponsored by the Hallmark card people back in 1951, and good on them.
The opera was telecast by NBC at that time, when only one of three homes in America possessed a television set. It’s difficult to imagine any American or Canadian network producing such a program these days, when reality shows in profusion pollute the airwaves, the CBC not excepted.
The dumbing down of television over the past half century is apparent. It begs no further comment from me.
But Amahl and the Night Visitors has become a classic, performed by theatrical companies all over the world each year, a testament to the composer’s genius. It is a simple, somewhat fanciful tale, but it embodies the message brought to all of us by the miracle birth of the Christ-child.
It does what all great art can do. It touches our hearts. And as the great cynic Voltaire once observed, “That which touches the heart remains in the mind forever.”
Certainly this performance will stay with me for a good long while. So will the performances of the two lead characters, Graeme Zinck in the title role as the crippled youngster Amahl, and soprano Juliana Elsinga as Amahl’s mother. Young master Zinck is quite extraordinary. He sings very well, his acting is believable, and he seems to burst with confidence at what he is doing. He is faultless as the young hero of the piece.
His great moment comes when he casts away his crutch, walks without a limp, and joins the visitors on their odyssey to the manger to present it to the newborn babe, goes to the heart of the message of Christmas.
The twist in the plot reveals its own small miracle.
Ms Elsinga is equally worthy of her casting as the other central figure in this one act operetta. Her soprano voice is crisp and clear. We hear her every note and lyric. She is wonderful as the widowed mother of the overly imaginative Amahl.
The three wise men who unexpectedly drop by for a bit of rest and nourishment on their way to see the Christ-child, are very able in their characters as Kaspar, Balthzar and Melchoir, as are the members of the shepherd’s chorus with their fine voices.
This is no raggedy-ass production.
Stage Director Terry Pratt and Music Director Carl Mathis have expertly welded a production crew of 20, a 21-member cast, and even an orchestra of 16 into a satisfying whole. The orchestra alone, I might note, is larger than that proposed for the Charlottetown Festival season in 2012.
There is great honesty in this production as well as great expertise. It shows through in every aspect of the 50 minutes it takes to tell this tale. The attention to detail in the costumes alone elevates Ahmal and the Night Visitors to an event that is well above the ordinary. The honesty shows. It burns like a beacon.
This may be an amateur production, but its standards are clearly on a professional level. So I am compelled by that inspiration, to turn that other forthcoming theatrical (sort of) event, known as the Charlottetown Festival, and its announced plans for the coming season.
I refer, specifically, to the announced intention to put on stage six singers to warble 39 (count ‘em 39) Johnny Cash songs (one after the other, without relief) in a production (?) entitled “Ring of Fire”, and pretend this is a theatrical presentation.
How many patrons will spend big bucks to hear 39 Johnny Cash songs in a row, without anything in the form of skits or sketches or dramatic interludes about the life of Mr Cash to enliven the evening - is yet to be determined.
I have me doubts.
But I want to make a positive suggestion to the board of directors at Confederation Centre of the Arts.
It is this - kill the Charlottetown Festival.
Let it go.
Bury it as a relic of a distinguished past when it ranked with Stratford and Shaw Festivals in the Canadian and international theatrical world for the originality and excellence of its productions. When it was a national theatre, making a contribution to the country. When it had a point and a purpose.
Let it go with dignity, for what it once was, instead of chopping away at the artistic integrity it once represented as the originator of Canadian musical theatre.
Call the death a casualty of the changing times, rising costs, whatever .
Blame it on the incompetence of those in charge to rise to the challenge of the mandate that launched the festival nearly 50 years ago.
If you can’t cope with the risk, if the burden is too great, get rid of it.
But quit pretending there is anything of artistic merit or theatrical worth being produced in the theatre of the national memorial to the founding fathers.
That was the idea back then, you see. A national memorial to those who put this country together that would contribute to the development of the arts in Canada.
The board of directors, by their actions and approval of what happens within Confederation Centre, obviously no longer support Mavor Moore’s great notion that the role for the Charlottetown Festival was to become a national home for indigenous musical theatre.
They somehow have been led to believe there is less risk (or no risk) in bringing in canned product from wherever they can get it. The board of directors is deluding itself (or is being deluded) to expect imported productions to save them from risk. They should have learned that $400,000 lesson last season. That’s the announced loss incurred with two canned foreign productions on the bill.
It has led to such anomalies as the current two-week shutdown and unpaid staff furlough, and the bizarre suggestion the orchestra must be reduced by one third this season to save $100,000 and keep the ticket prices down.
The lesson is - there is no such thing as no risk in the theatre business.
The corollary is - there is no greater risk in doing original Canadian productions than bringing in canned shows. The history of the Charlottetown Festival proves that case. The biggest hits have been all-Canadian original productions from start to finish.
The secret is - do something with honesty that touches the hearts of those who attend.
There is something incredibly demeaning at play when the directors of a national memorial dedicated to the arts in Canada, treat Canadian theatrical arts as second class or worse, and not worth supporting.
The Charlottetown Festival as it now exists has no point or valid artistic purpose.
It has no honesty. It stirs no sense of pride. It touches no emotions.
It is merely a marketing exercise replete with very bad marketing judgements.
Do as you will, directors, but stop calling it The Charlottetown Festival. That name used to mean something.
That’s the view from here.