Librettist Terence McNally has contended that Great Scott should not be classified as a comic opera, and indeed the issues of opera's place in American culture, and that of the arts more generally, are lurking about here. But there's no getting around the fact that the work is funny, belly-laugh funny, and not just you-know-you're-supposed-to-laugh-here funny, and composer Jake Heggie has set up the best lines with an exquisite touch. Moreover, the contrast with the pair's previous collaboration, Dead Man Walking (2000), is ...
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Librettist Terence McNally has contended that Great Scott should not be classified as a comic opera, and indeed the issues of opera's place in American culture, and that of the arts more generally, are lurking about here. But there's no getting around the fact that the work is funny, belly-laugh funny, and not just you-know-you're-supposed-to-laugh-here funny, and composer Jake Heggie has set up the best lines with an exquisite touch. Moreover, the contrast with the pair's previous collaboration, Dead Man Walking (2000), is inescapable. Great Scott is mezzo soprano Ardis Scott, returning to perform with the American Opera company that helped launch her career. The company is struggling but is kept afloat by the opera-enthusiast wife of the owner of the local professional football team, giving rise to such risible details as showing the score of the game on the supertitles screen along with the text. Scott (Joyce DiDonato, in superb form, and her fans will want this release regardless of any other...
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