(Un)expected songs: “La Bohème” at Lyric Opera and “Tell Me On a Sunday” at Theo
Pene Pati and Ailyn Pérez. Photo by Michael Brosilow.
It’s true: “La Bohème” makes for an ideal entry point into the realm of opera. Its scruffy cast of characters, living commission to commission, are perhaps more relatable to the newcomer than the larger-than-life gods and kings who tend to fill those stages. Perhaps even one can still sense the flush of discovery that Puccini’s verismo offered: the novelty of hearing music in street vendors’ spiels or some stumbling drunken chorus on the corner.
And it’s mounted frequently at any number of opera companies worldwide, so the door is almost always open. All that said, the one currently playing in Chicago does its job, takes its commission, and spends it on a pleasant (if not exactly ripping) time of it. Not that Ailyn Pérez and Pene Pati don’t take the house into confidence as the doomed lovers Mimì and Rodolfo, nor that Will Liverman doesn’t bring a certain swagger to Marcello. They hit the marks; the audience reaches for their handkerchiefs. But whether it will pump the blood and spur a longer-lasting curiosity, though, is another question.
But all the better to see it and find out, perhaps. Maybe just don’t sell the coat off your back to do so.
La Bohème runs through Apr. 12 at 20 N. Wacker Dr. For tickets or more information, please call (312) 827-5600 or visit lyricopera.org.
Dani Pike. Photo by Time Stops Photography.
Produced just before his turn toward spectacle, Andrew Lloyd Webber, with lyricist Don Black, went small-scale with “Tell Me On a Sunday” No cosmically scaled passion play, this, nor is it about the rise and fall of a regime. Instead, they tell the solo tale of a youngish woman—Emma, from a London suburb, now making her way in the States, unlucky in love and life and frequently out of her depth. A classy proto-“Fleabag”, if you will.
It’s a sturdy showcase for a performer to show off their cabaret range (caba-range?), to put across a catchy yet delicate pop score, to run the gamut from wry light comedy to stiff-upper-lip resolve in the face of heartbreak. In which case, welcome to the Theo fold, Dani Pike–you got the chops and then some.
Framed by Eleanor Kahn and Ellie Fay’s snazzily done-up boudoir, backed with a tight band (with Sophie Creutz on a particularly ripping tenor sax), and ably teed up by director Keely Vasquez, “Tell Me” makes for an ideal date night, or it could make a nice restorative for anyone feeling a little out of sorts in the world. You may fall down—and fall down a lot, at that, like Emma—but Pike’s performance offers that little glint of hope that things can work out.
Tell Me On a Sunday runs through Apr. 20 at 721 Howard St., Evanston. For tickets or more information, please call (773) 939-4101 or visit theo-u.com.
For more reviews on this or other shows, please visit theatreinchicago.com.