The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 572

al Xos Angeles 3umc enna SUNDAY JUNE 5, 1964 The Status of Little League Opera: More Evidence iY BY MARTIN BERNHEIMER --r3 ill 111 6n milk 4 At the same time, it enjoyed the luxury of a quartet of singing actors (Beverly Wolff. Keardon. Patricia Brooks and Kenneth Smith'i who could bring the central characters to life. These characters were sung in one performance by students, who also served" as understudies at other times. This gave the fledgling singers a valuable and rare opportunity to work closely with established stars, and to benefit from observation of their professional skills.

As things "turned out. "Carry Nation" did not impress as an important addition to the repertory of musical Americana. It seemed hopelessly corny and cliche-ridden, despite its craftsmanship and over-all prettiness. But one could have few reservations about the performance of either the student-or the star-studded cast. It represented a happy marriage between pedagogy and professionalism a marriage that might be worth emulating in center-where operatic professionalism is still on shaky ground.

San Diego Experiment- MARILYN MICHAELS, RIGHT FOREGROUND, IN A SCENE IN 'FUNNY Time photo Hurry f'hioe Marilyn Michaels a Tunny GirF BY CECIL SMITH Had all thin The biggest question mark in the musical future of Jxs Angeles continues to be opera. The Pasadena company threatens to limp onward, possibly even forward. Rumors of projected mergers between the San Francisco Opera and local forces continue to circulate. So, for that matter, do predictions concerning special spring seasons at The Music Center and isolated performances at the Shrine. Tales are also told of the demise of the Los Angeles Opera Company, at least in its present guise.

This office has seen no official death certificate. The only fact that seems certain, for the moment at least, is that things are in a state of flux. They are also in a mess. We have a public that wants opera. We even have some forces willing to pay for it.

But we seem to have burned down some important bridges prematurely. Three weeks, of San Francisco Opera could not satisfy anyone's year-round appetite, but they were better than nothing. A misguided effort on the part of the Los Angeles Opera Company was discouraging, but it did not preclude eventual improvement. Be that as it may. it is clear that Los Angeles still has a few lessons to learn regarding operatic philosophies and techniques.

And at the moment, we can learn a good deal from efforts currently being made in other communities deprived of opera on a long-term, regular basis. The fact that valid and simulating opera performances are often offered by university workshops can be no surprise to audiences here. This season alone, we have had opportunities to see such rarities as Britten's "Albert Herring" at I'CLA and Hindemith's "Mathis der Maler" at CSC. both in splendid productions. It was at the University of Kansas, however, that we came upon a system that could give student opera both wider public appeal and deeper educational significance.

Best of Two Worlds While local opera lovers even those who complain loudest about their starvation diet stay away from UCLA and CSC in droves, the University of Kansas at Lawrence enjoyed four sold-out performances of Douglas Moore's "Cany Nation." Naturally, part of the attraction lay in the fact that the opera had been based on a historical Kansas subject and commissioned by the University for its centennial celebrations. There was an undeniable added attraction, however, in the fact that three of the performances utilized outside guest stars in the leading roles. Thus KU managed to savor the best of two operatic worlds. Being an educational institution, it could afford endless rehearsals, carefully constructed sets, well-designed costumes, and an orchestra and chorus that had both the time and the resources to make the expert professional (i.e. leadership at hand court.

pulsion that sent Tunny Girl" into stratospheric Broadway success was Barbra Streisand. When the show opened in Xew York's Winter Garden two years ago. the legend of Barbra was already kindled. Her instant stardom in "Funny Girl" seemed almost anticlimactic. Scant attention was paid to a road company which producer Hay Stark of the Broadway show turned over to Martin Tahse who had been, generally, a small-time operator putting bus-and-t ruck productions on the road.

Tahse came forth with a virtually unknown lass named Marilyn Michaels and opened "Funny Girl'" in Dallas. The result was a box-office bonanza. The engagement was sensationally successful and the most sensational thing about it, according to the notices, was the unknown Miss Michaels. Now the show that only Streisand could do had become Marilyn's. People were saying: without Michaels, you haven't a show.

In that opening night audience in Dallas was the Civic Light Opera's Edwin Lester, who once said he had no interest in "Funny Girl" without Streisand, lie became a Michaels believer and booked the production for the CLO season. He felt and with justification that there are weaknesses in the show, one the "Private Schwartz from Kockaway" number that approximates a Fanny Brice routine in the Ziegfeld Follies. When he had Bob Merrill devise some new lyrics for the number Flynn from screams of outrage from producer Stark roared across the Atlantic from London where Stark was launching the British production of "Funny Girl" (again with Streisand and a duplicate of the Broadway success i. The new lyrics were inserted when the show was in Denver but they did so little for it Please Turn to Pane 16. Column 1 One of the groat imponderable? of show business is the anatomy of success.

Failure is relatively simple to understand. There are 10,000 swami or. Broadway who can look at a show and tell you where it went wrong. But the man who can diagnose a hit and tell you where it went right is a rare bird. Take Tunny Girl," which arrives Tuesday in the Dorothy Chandler Pa i-lion of The Music Center as the second offering of the Civic Light Opera season.

This was show the boys thought they really had figured. In one word Streisand. True, it followed a pattern Broadway hail borrowed from the movies that had produced a lot of successful shows in recent years. biographical studies of the recent past. This bad worked well in such musicals as "Gypsy," "Sound of Music" and "Fiorello." It was not infallible, however.

"J.au-retle" was a crashing flop. The biographical focus of "Funny Girl" was on an almost legendary figure of recent show business Fanny Brice. Miss llricc had the proper fairy tale early life that musicals dote on not Cinderella this time but the Ugly Duckling. And there was the sort of soap opera aura that impresses the ladies of the matinees and theater clubs in Fanny's unhappy marriage to the glittering gambler Nicky Arnstein. Screenwriter Lennart, who had woven a similarly soapy biography (Ruth Ettingi into a highly successful movie musical.

Me or Leave Me," had written the script; Jule Styne and Bob Merrill had brought forth a pleasantly undistinguished score, which included the hit songs "People" and 'Don't Rain on My tlv? production was supervised by the man with the musical Midas touch, Jerome Robbins. Still, the word was that the jet pro report would have included impressions of the American premiere 01 Schocnbcrg's "Moses und Aaron." presented by Sarah Caldwell's Opera Company of Boston. The genial and unpredictable Miss Caldwell had to postpone the premiere, however. becau- of last-minute casting There is probably no opera company in America as adventurous as this one. ami one is gratified to know that the otherwise staid Bostonians are giving it the kind of support it deserves.

It is significant, too, that it was so far-out a vehicle that fell victim to the unreliability of the human throat. Had Miss Caldwell played it safe, as most of her colleagues do. with yet another "Aida" or "Carmen." finding a replacement tenor to save the show would have been no problem. Vagaries of planning would seem to be the price one must be willing to pay in return for having an anticon volitional opera company in one's midst. Nearby San Diego has an operatic tradition far shorter than Boston.

's but it cannot be denied that exciting things are beginning to happen there, too. San Diego is functioning with a policy that goes contrary to all the custo mary snob values of opera. It ignores the star system, even though relatively well-known singers are engaged for of the leading roles. It ignore? the popular opera-in-thc-original-language system, which, forces most of the audience to listen to abstract sounds in stead of following a story told with music. It ignores the possibility of throwing together a performance without sufficient rehearsals and without appropriate decor, even though other companies have proven such procedure? dc Plea.e Tura to Page Cvlumn.