4 ARTS The Michigan Daily Tuesday, April 4, 1989 Mozart mirth Figaro bawdily satirical BY JILL PISONI M Susanna and you're a block- head," sang the playful lover to Fi- garo in the first few minutes of the University School of Music Opera Theatre's production,The Marriage of Figaro. Also known as The Follies of the Day, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's comic opera stays true to its title, depicting the gossip, innu- endo, and dalliance that accompany the adventures of love. With a long list of characters ranging from the amorous Count Almaviva and his jealous wife Rosina to their lovesick servants and plotting friends, Mozart weaves the tales of the chased and the chasers. He adds one complication onto an- other with surprising twists and revelations. Mozart's bawdy comedy may not have been appreciated by his aristocratic peers who felt more of a stab to their pride than a tickle to their funny bones in watching Mozart satirize their lack of morals, but the Opera Theatre's production was nothing but hilarious. The music, performed by the University Symphony Orchestra un- der the direction of Gustav Meier, was stupendous. It complemented the voices of those on stage to form an incredibly sweet, almost palpable sound. The singers achieved an in- credible range of notes and at the same time enunciated each vowel and syllable with precision. The opera was performed in English, which made something that is usually very foreign and exotic suddenly become accessible. The constantly changing alliances, the deceptions and counter- plannings, and the characters' confu- sion with the events of the day were fully appreciated in translation. The intimate size of the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre proved a benefit to the audience, allowing them to see the incredible expressiveness in the faces of those on stage. This, along with their graceful and realistic movement, which came under the stage direction of Jay Lesenger, gave the audience something to watch in- tently as well as listen to. The large and diverse cast showed the distinct personalities of the char- acters they portrayed. With the help of a traditional 18th century manor house set design and elaborate cos- tumes, wigs, and make-up, the per- formers conveyed the materialistic idiosyncrasies of the class and the Marcelina (Pamalyn Lee) looks over Bartolo's (Michael Con- stantino) shoulder in The Marriage of Figaro, an opera by Mozart once considered scandalous. style of the century. The Opera Theatre chose to pre- sent the uncut version of Mozart's satire, which meant a very long per- formance. Although the music was beautiful, the acting deftly performed, and the humor ever-present, it was difficult to sit through the four acts in four hours, even with two inter- missions. But the test of stamina was well worth the trial. The opera was a gala of intimate, sensual relationships. It examined the intricacies of male and female bondings, jealousies and de- ceptions. Nowhere else could one find incredible music, a complex storyline and such a successful satiric glimpse of human behavior. Page 8 Undefinable 'Words by Women/for Women' shows there's no definite 'female voice' in poetry BY MARIE WESAW IT would simplify things in the the cosmic universe if one could put a finger on "the female voice" in poetry in order to illustrate the differences between men and women poets. Yet the poetry reading benefit tonight for the Women's Crisis Center is bound to prove that there is no such limiting female voice in contemporary poetry. "Words by Women/for Women," created by Vince Kueter, organizer of the monthly Ann Arbor Poetry Slam, will feature about 17 women poets from different Midwestern areas. La Loca, a Los Angeles-based poet, will also be part of the benefit. What sets the benefit apart from traditional poetry readings is the as- pect of "performing" that many of the poets will bring to the reading. "Part of performance poetry means that I don't read off the paper;" com- ments Chicago poet and participant Cindy Salach, a regular in the Green Mill poetry slams. "It means that the poetry is performed from an actual character. It is not a poet reading a poem. It is more a monologue." Salach usually performs her poetry with the poetry dance band The Loufah, which she calls "poetry to dance by." Ann Arbor poet Denise Shawl also performs with a musical group, Celeste Oatmeal. Such a per- formance is part of Shawl's defintion of poetry as "how to use words for a magical effect." While many of the featured poets are considered "performance poets," Kueter notes that there are some differences in the styles of the different, geographical areas.These differences can be seen by comparing the read, ings of the Chicago and the Detroit poets. Further comparison can be made between the style of these two groups and the reading of La Loca, who is internationally acclaimed for her reading and was featured in the. 1988 Olympic Poetry Festival in Calgary. While the peformance style can allow for an easy-going attitude, some of the subject matter of the reading will be serious. Alice Fulton, a Uni-" versity professor and writer of the poetry collections Dance Script with Electric Ballerina and Palladium intends to keep the Women's Crisis Center in focus by reading "Fictions of the Feminine; Quasi-Carnal Creatures from the Cloud Decks of Venus." Fulton's poem derived from a conversation when a friend commented' that a specific rape had been "a crime of anger." "I wanted to show that rape was a crime of anger. That it wasn't about sexuality at all," com.. ments Fulton. The result was the poem which takes place in a strip joint and takes the voice of the patron, the stripper, and the owner and focuses on the power existing in the relationships between the three. Fulton, who does often focus on relationships in her poetry and ac knowledges that many other women poets do also, does not see this char- acteristic as the mark of a set woman's poetry. Instead, she acknowledges that the possible differences between what men and women write about' come from their "different cultural experiences." She points out that "if men and women were raised alike... some of the poetics would change." While "Words by Women/for Women" won't define a specifi;. "women's poetry," its collection of artists will demonstrate what Salach, believes comes through in poetry by women: "Women are proud of being women, proud of their sexuality.... They're a very strong voice in the- poetry community." WORDS BY WOMENIFOR WOMEN will take place tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Heidelberg, 215 North Main. A $10 donation suggested to benefit the Women's Crisis Center. 4 4 4 4 RC Players' farces not without humor 4 BY BETH COLQUITT RC Players' productions are always unusual - in fact, they're usually downright odd when compared with Musket/UAC's and the University Players' performances. Sometimes this is a good thing, sometimes it is not. In the case of Friday night's two farces, Mother and the Criminals and Daphne, we had both. Both plays were written by 1988 Hopwood award winners Lisa A. Wing and Louis Char- bonneau. Wing, author of Daphne, is also the winner of the Kasdan Scholarship for Creative Writing. In the case of Daphne, these awards were well- deserved. While this play may never win Tony awards on Broadway, it was a very amusing comedy. The slapstick was wonderful, and I haven't seen such a good round of mistaken identity farce in a long time. There were weak spots in the acting in Daphne. Both Daphne (Navera Durrani) and her slimy ex-boyfriend Joe (Rob Mintz) were weak in portraying a believable (or "deep") character. They lacked conviction and determination, some- thing that should have been present in both char- acters from the lines that they were speaking. Although generally wimpy, Gary (Garth Skov- gard), the put-upon new roommate, was almost a real person. All the real humor in the play really began when Lilly (Jen Weaver) walked onstage. Lilly, a confused punk who was only in Daphne's apart- ment because two people independently hired her to burglarize it for them, provided the show with dozens of slapstick/mistaken identity shots, which had the audience in hysterics. Weaver did a wonderful job as a clueless girl in an apartment full of people who were all, in her eyes, slightly crazy. Charbonneau's Mother and the Criminals, on the other hand, was saved by no such humor. It was in the same form as other RC Players pro- ductions, which have a tendency to manipulate good drama in order to get in cheap political shots. Last semester's Tartuffe was peppered with these - for example the concluding shot about President Quayle (originally Louis XIV) being the all-knowing ruler who pardons Orgon. As for Mother and the Criminals, it totally lacked substance. I suspect that the idea stemmed from a critique of the "police brutality" idea that has been pervading the campus this year. Detec- tive O'Tool, although delightfully overplayed by Marc Maier, was a character who sprang from nowhere in the context of the play. Without him, the play would have completely lacked hu- mor, but if a bland character had been substituted for his religiously fanatic character, the play would have made just as much sense. Charbon- neau got off a few needles about religious fanati- cism and its relation to the law, but the play had no other support of this criticism. In general, both plays lacked depth, although Daphne made up for this lack with laughs. DAPHNE and MOTHER AND THE CRIMI- NALS will continue playing this Thursday, Fri- day, and Saturday at 8 p.m. in the Residential College Auditorium. Tickets are $3. Read Jim Poniewozik Every The Peron Novel by Tomas Elroy Martinez Pantheon (1988) $19.95/hardcover Tomas Elroy Martinez' The Peron Novel uses Peron and his re- lationship with Argentina to masterfully debunk the myths pre- cluding a precise analysis of either. Fiction, once again, proves "truer" than history, largely because Mar- tinez is far more suspicious of his- tory - and the lies it conceals - than is the historian. His Peron, who emerges through a fantastic amalga- mation of diary entries and newspa- per clippings, of interior mono- logues and improbable flashbacks, is the wily Peron who, as Martinez phrases it, "always maintained two attitudes, two or more plans, two or more theoretical lines with respect to the Church, the army, oil, land re- form, urban guerrillas, freedom of the press." Martinez knows his subject well, having interviewed him on several occasions in the late '60s. The di- aries and journals and interviews and newspapers interspersed in his book with Peron's monologues are all genuine, all "historical." And invariably contradictory - a conse- quence, Martinez suggests, of Peron's quixotic effort to evade his- tory by confusing it. Or, as his Peron ruminates, "if there are other truths, it doesn't matter anymore. What I am telling is what will go down in History as truth." Or will it? Martinez' novel re- volves around the dramatic day of June 20, 1973, when Peron made his return to Buenos Aires. He is 78, and has less than a year to live. His mental facilities are going, and he is suffering from a series of increas- ingly serious ailments. His wife, Is- abel - destined within the year to become the first female president in all the Americas - and his spiritual advisor Lopez-Rega, Isabel's confi- dante, are increasingly telling him what to think and how to think it. Martinez' Peron is a parody of his former charismatic self, an old man IMPACT DANCE THEATRE Open Dance Classes Free!! The University of Michigan Turkish Students Association is proud to present: TURKISH CULTURAL SERIES Turkish Poetry through the Ages From the 6th century to Present Turkish political, heroic, lyric, erotic, mystical, and romantic poetry including the poetry of Sultans, Mehmet the Conqueror, and Suleyman the Magnificent. Wednesday, April 5, 1989, 8:00 p.m., Rackham West Conference Room, Free Anatolian Mysticism: Rapture and Revolution (Rumi and the Whirling Dervishes, Yunus Emre, Bektashis, and other Islamic Sects) The philosophy, poetry, and rituals of Anatolian Sufism. Documentary film: Rumi and the Whirling Dervishes Produced by Marc Mopty Winner of "The Best Short Documentary Film of Europe Award," 1981 Performance of Ney-a Turkish woodwind instrument Thursday, April 6, 1989,8:00 p.m., Rackham Amphitheater, Free in heroic raiments. Such a figure will, at best, have a difficult tim keeping the historical lions beyond the gates of his imperial mythology: As the novel progresses and the political pressures mount, Peron is increasingly unable to handle thy challenge. Martinez delves into Peron's less-than-glorious past; frustrating the old man's efforts to recreate his origins. Memories of Evita recall his consistent failure, with women - and the terror they; have inspired. Radio reports fro6; Buenos Aires underscore Peron' fading grip on a more exuberant, ex- plicitly populist youth - Argen? tines who take seriously words that Peron had erstwhile tossed out in an effort to co-opt yet another segment of the country's political forces. And at the end of the day - and the novel - we watch the people in a Buenos Aires barrio awakening to. the realization that Lopez Rega is; "herding" their beloved general, whispering the words that Peron, tired and wan, mouths in his fiist speech to the people he had once en- thralled. And, paradoxically enough, con- tinues to enthrall at novel's close. 4 For the chief enigma surrounding Peron - and Argentina - is the persistence of "the myth" despite the numerous sordid realities that have arisen to gainsay it. Peron the Novel brilliantly captures a sense of how Peronism carries this off, although Martinez, centered as his work is on the man and his legend, cannot an- swer the much more pressing ques- tion of why. Answering that4 Cnntlinhf K Wednesdays 9-1 0:30pm Union Ballroom Jazz by women for everyone - for free, no less The Women in Jazz series sponsored by Eclipse Jazz fo- cuses on an often overlooked segment of jazz - women artists. The four-part program begins tonight with Bess Bonnier, an Beginners and Intermediates W elcomell