Victor Cordell
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Recent Articles:
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Wozzeck Front Page
A Fine Rendering by West Edge Opera of the Atonal Masterpiece
By: - Aug 10th, 2025Downtrodden Franz Wozzeck suffers abuse from those in higher social classes and is betrayed by his common-law wife who has an affair with a Drum Major. West Edge depicts the drama of the underclass in concert with the dissonance of Alban Berg's music.
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David and Jonathan Front Page
Baroque Opera with a Modern Twist at West Edge
By: - Aug 04th, 2025Charpentier's 1688 opera celebrates the close but star-crossed friendship of Biblical hero David with Jonathan, the son of Saul, Israel's first king. Saul's resistance to God's call to step down in favor of David results in a clash between Saul and David as well as Jonathan's conflict between love and duty. Without bending the text, the West Edge twist is that David and Jonathan's relationship is carnal.
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Dolores Front Page
World Premiere at West Edge Opera Honors Distinguished Labor Leader
By: - Aug 03rd, 2025Dolores Huerta made her mark as Cesar Chavez's most trusted associate in the California grape pickers strike and boycott starting in 1965 that would result in major protections for agricultural workers. Independently, she led strikes and boycotts elsewhere, and she negotiated the contract that would end the unrest.
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Le Comte Ory Front Page
Rossini's Comedy Done Right at Merola
By: - Aug 02nd, 2025The hedonistic and opportunistic Comte Ory takes advantage of men being away at the Crusades to pursue women. Knowing that the Comtesse Adele seeks spiritual guidance, his first gambit is to disguise as a hermit, but his own page gets in the way.
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Die Walküre Front Page
A Tale of Conflicts and Betrayals
By: - Jul 28th, 2025Brünhilde's empathy for illicit lovers Siegmund and Sieglinde induces her to betray the orders of her father Wotan, the king of gods. His punishment is to reduce her to becoming a mortal. Santa Fe Opera's production excels.
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Rigoletto Front Page
Verdi's Tragic Masterpiece at Santa Fe Opera
By: - Jul 27th, 2025The jester Rigoletto vows to protect his daughter from lascivious men. Not only does he fail, but he suffers tragic consequences as a result of his attempted revenge after her abduction and abuse.
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The Turn of the Screw Front Page
Santa Fe's Excellent Production of the Ghost Story
By: - Jul 24th, 2025In this Gothic ghost tale, a young governess is charged with caring for two orphans under the guardianship of an absentee uncle. Two employees on the estate whom the governess encounters are deceased. Is she dreaming, or is their presence real? And are the children innocents, or are they possessed by the ghosts? Benjamin Britten's eerie music fits the ghost story.
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The Rake's Progress Front Page
Glimmerglass Festival's Production of Stravinsky's Opera Sparkles
By: - Jul 21st, 2025Tom Rakewell shuns regular work. His desire to make it on his wits alone plays into the hands of Nick Shadow, alias, The Devil. Willing to leave his betrothed, Anne Trulove, behind, and seduced by the attractions of London, Tom falls deeper and deeper into despair.
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The House on Mango Street Front Page
Glimmerglass's Compelling World Premiere Opera
By: - Jul 20th, 2025Forty years ago, Sandra Cisneros authored one of the world's best-selling and most influential young adult novels. Together with composer Derek Bermel, they have created an opera based on that work, telling about coming of age in a Mexican-American community in Chicago.
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Les Blancs Front Page
Oakland Theater Project's Gender Bending Take on Lorraine Hansberry
By: - Jul 16th, 2025Having settled in London, Tshembe visits his African homeland at a time of unrest. Playwright Lorraine Hansberry plumbs conflicts among natives and colonialists with various philosophies. OTP's production casts a wholly black female ensemble to portray men and women, black and white.
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Jurassiq Parq: A Musiqal Parody Front Page
A Fun Time with Raucous Theater at Oasis, San Francisco's LGBTQ Nightclub
By: - Jul 12th, 2025A spoof of the popular movie, this jukebox-musical-plus offers a great catalog of singalong pop and rock hits from the '80s and '90s along with broad and racy humor. The production values are impressive as Dr. Laura Dern and Dr. Jeff Goldblum try to save the world from the re-birth of dinosaurs.
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Constellations Front Page
Pear Theatre Innovates a Two-Hander About Multiple Realities
By: - Jul 08th, 2025Marianne, an astrophysicist, and Roland, a beekeeper, strike an unlikely relationship. In Nick Payne's original realization, two actors repeat each scene three times, each variation having its own twist and suggesting multiple realities. The Pear uses three separate couples, increasing the dynamics with each couple reflecting different aspects of their character's personality.
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The Last Goat Front Page
Central Works' Premiere About Isolation and Desire
By: - Jul 03rd, 2025On a desolate Greek island in the Bronze Age, only an older woman and her granddaughter remain. An exhausted, disheveled young man appears, claiming to have been shipwrecked. His presence prompts revelations, creates new dynamics, and imposes new decisions to be made.
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Aztlán Front Page
An Intriguing World Premiere of Luis Alfaro's Latest at Magic Theatre
By: - Jul 02nd, 2025A still young Aztlán has been released from nine years in prison but must deal with a sadistic parole officer who makes it difficult to meet parole requirements and a landlord who tries to take advantage of his vulnerability. Having been diagnosed as violent even as a pre-teen, this environment is hardly conducive to rehabilitation. Against this personal story is overlaid the myth and spirit of the Aztec empire.
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Annunciation Front Page
Word for Word's Production of Lauen Groff's Fine Short Story
By: - Jun 24th, 2025Upon college graduation, The Woman re-settles in the Golden State in hopes of finding a new happiness. In her scrounging existence, her life becomes entangled with a co-worker and her landlady. The Woman grows as she faces the challenges of life.
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Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean Jimmy Dean: A New Musical Front Page
This Cult Success as a Play and Movie Now a Musical
By: - Jun 23rd, 2025It is 1975. In the small west Texas town of McCarthy, unwed mother Mona leads a life in remembrance of the 1955 filming of "Giant" in nearby Marfa. Her claim to fame is that her son Jimmy Dean was fathered by the iconic actor James Dean while he was on location and shortly before his death. His "disciples" 20th reunion of his fatal car accident reveals friendship, conflict, and more denouement than you could shake a stick at.
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Tartuffe Front Page
Pocket Opera's Zany Production Based on the Classic Moliere Farce
By: - Jun 17th, 2025Orgon is taken in by the false piety of rapscallion Tartuffe. He wants his daughter to marry Tartuffe but arranges to make the fraudster his sole heir before the wedding occurs. Needless to say, this causes consternation and crisis to his blood family.
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Idomeneo Front Page
San Francisco Opera Brings Out the Best of Mozart's Earliest Major Opera
By: - Jun 16th, 2025Drawn from classic Greek tragedy, the King of Crete begs an indulgence from Neptune to save him from raging waters. The price is that Idomeneo is to sacrifice the first person he sees on shore. That turns out to be his son. Idomeneo deals with internal conflict throughout.
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Co-Founders Front Page
ACT's Riveting World Premiere of a Bay Area Based Hip-Hop Musical
By: - Jun 14th, 2025Esata is an ace computer coder, and Conway has a high-tech innovation that lacks code. They join forces and aspire to develop the product at an incubator in San Francisco. The narrative follows this and several other subplots in an uplifting homage to the Bay Area, and especially, a love letter to Oakland.
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La Boheme Front Page
San Francisco Opera's Record 46th Production
By: - Jun 09th, 2025In opera's most beloved work, Rodolfo and Mimi encounter love and tragedy, while Rodolfo and his three comrades share the Bohemian life of starving artists. Replete with memorable music, gentle comedy, and the inevitable death of the lead soprano, La Boheme, continues to deservedly fill opera houses almost in a class of its own.
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Murder on the Orient Express Front Page
Orinda Company Makes Good with Agatha Christie Gem
By: - Jun 08th, 2025The first-class carriage in the westbound train from Istanbul is filled with diverse travelers. One of them is drugged and stabbed to death. Hercule Poirot is on the scene and systematically solves the mystery.
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Harvey Milk Reimagined Front Page
Opera Parallele Co-Commission of Revision Hits the Mark
By: - Jun 02nd, 2025Harvey Milk became the first elected openly gay city official in the United States. Along with the notoriety, he became an icon and a victim of assassination. His story is told in a gripping revision of Stewart Wallace and Michael Korie's 1995 opera.
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Otello Front Page
West Bay Conquers Notoriously Difficult Verdi Masterpiece
By: - May 26th, 2025Many opera aficionados argue that Arrigo Boito's libretto improves on the Shakespeare source material. Machinations by Iago, one of the best developed and vile villains in literature, wreak tragedy upon Otello and Desdemona in response to Iago's being passed over for a promotion. Verdi's music is both sublime and powerful.
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The Cake Front Page
Values Clash in City Lights' Masterful Take on Fine Dramedy
By: - May 19th, 2025Jen returns to North Carolina to plan her wedding with Macy. What Jen doesn't expect is that bakery-owning, cake-maker Della, who had been Jen's proxy mother, would not want to make her wedding cake because her religion doesn't support same sex marriage. Many social issues are uncovered along the way.
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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Front Page
Seeing the World Through the Eyes of an Autistic
By: - May 17th, 2025Autistic fifteen-year-old Christopher tries to solve the mystery of the killing of a dog. Along the way, we learn about his character, his abilities, and of his relationship with his parents. A splendid production by San Francisco Playhouse brings out the strength of story.
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