Wooster Group's La Didone

(The Wooster Group's La Didone, with Hai-Ting Chin, right. Photo by Paula Court.)

Sat, Apr 18 - The Wooster Group's La Didone is a mash up of Francesco Cavalli's 17th century opera La Didone and a 1960s Italian sci-fi flick called Terrore nello spazio (Planet of the Vampires). The collision of opera and cheesy b-movie works unexpectedly well: it's humorous and silly, the two stories surprisingly compatible, and the style that they use to pull it all off is campy and fun.

Mezzo-soprano Hai-Ting Chin, who sang the role of Dido on the La Didone side of the show, was a big part of the reason why this performance was so engaging. Her voice was big and beautiful, her readings of the baroque music really exciting to hear. She was also deliciously melodramatic in her role as Dido, and it was fun to see her switch into the sci-fi roles when the B-movie crashed into the opera. The other singers didn't quite match her vocally (not all of them were trying to), but it wasn't so much about their vocal chops as the zaniness of the venture. They all took on the sci-fi movie corniness with an amusing seriousness.