Little Women of Broadway makes a colorful comeback as the season opener of Opera Nuova

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Louise May Alcott’s novel Little Women is an American icon, loved by readers since its debut in 1869. It has spawned at least seven stage versions, seven films, a plethora of television performances, including four different BBC productions and an opera by Mark Adamo.

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But it is the Broadway musical, with a score by Jason Howland, which has long been a favorite of Opera Nuova artistic director Kim Mattice Wanat.

He realized that it would be a very appropriate job to reflect the pandemic experiences, and now Opera Nuova, best known for its summer opera festival and wonderful youth professional training program, is presenting it as his first live production since arrival. of COVID-19.

A fully staged orchestral production, Little Women performs at the Maclab Center for the Performing Arts in Leduc this weekend.

A sense of hope

“I wanted something that created a sense of hope and really was an extension of what it means to embrace family in difficult times,” explained Mattice Wanat. “I felt it resonated so much with what we’ve all been through and with the fact that Beth March dies in this production. When you lose a family member, how do you carry on? Everything is in the script. It’s all in the music. “

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Mattice Wanat has assembled a cast and company of veteran young and professional Opera Nuova singers. Three actors playing the March sisters, Hannah Wigglesworth as Jo, Julia Van Dam as Meg, and Elizabeth Chamberlain as Amy, were in the same University of Alberta BFA class taught by Mattice Wanat, while the fourth, Erin Pettifor as Beth, I was in a previous BFA class.

“These three already had such a connection to each other,” said Mattice Wanat. “I knew that they could immediately create this loving energy of the sisters. Everyone told me, you know, it’s been amazing because you could immediately feel that sense of love and connection for each other. We didn’t have to build that chemistry at all. “

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More achievements

Wigglesworth has already had an exciting time during rehearsals – she received a phone call telling her she was one of 12 chosen out of 700 applications to attend the Birmingham Conservatory of the Stratford Festival for 2022.

The young Edmonton actor and songwriter Jackson Card plays Professor Bhaer and Toronto singer and actor Kael Wynn John Brooke. Kaden Forsberg, who was very entertaining as part of the Volare Tenors group at the Fringe this year, plays Laurie Laurence.

That sense of unity of cast is reinforced by an unusual aspect of this production. Two of the companies that often stay behind the scenes have roles in this show. Although she is best known as an actress, music director Ruth Alexander plays Aunt March, and Mattice Wanat, stage manager, plays Marmee March, the mother.

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“I think she is one of our treasures in this city,” says Mattice Wanat, “but I knew that she could also conduct musically. I knew it would inspire everyone else in the company. “

Rob Herriot is a regular and very familiar visitor to Edmonton, but almost always an accomplished stage manager, for both Edmonton Opera and Opera Nuova. But he’s also a fine singer and actor (some may remember him as Little Buttercup in HMS Pinafore’s 2017 winter production of Opera Nuova), and here he dons his vocal cap to play the role of Mr. Lawrence.

Peter Mills of Edmonton, a member of the Opera Nuova faculty, is the choreographer.

Beautiful place with views

Mattice Wanat has always wanted to put on a production at Leduc’s Maclab Center. “I don’t think people realize how beautiful that theater is,” he explains. “I wanted a theater where you could feel intimacy and connection with the artists on that stage where you could really feel their voices with you.

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“That is what I think people need right now. And it’s so close to Edmonton, and the parking lot is very accessible, and even though it seats 450, it feels very intimate. “

There are evening shows at 7:00 pm on Friday, October 29 and Saturday, October 30, and matinees at 1:30 pm on Saturday and Sunday, October 31. Current Covid requirements apply (proof of double vaccination or equivalent alternatives and mandatory face masks), and there is the option of live streaming the performances on Saturday night and Sunday.

Opera Nuova also has some interesting prospects for its main activities next summer. Having performed in Sherwood Park for the past several years, the company has been searching for a home in downtown Edmonton and has now found it.

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His training program and Opera Festival will now take place at MacEwan University’s Triffo Theater. The festival will start in June and the main theatrical productions in the first two weeks of July. The company has also developed partnerships with the Winspear Center and City Hall, giving young professional artists the opportunity to perform in the city center.

In the meantime, here is Little Women to welcome fully staged musical theater as we work to banish COVID-19.

“It’s the way everyone comes together to find their strength and overcome and remain useful,” says Mattice Wanat.

Or, as Louise May Alcott put it, “There is always light behind the clouds.”

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Advance

Little woman

Organization New opera

Stage director Kim Mattice Wanat

Music director Ruth Alexander

Where Maclab Center, 4308 50 St. Leduc

When October 29-31

Live broadcast Saturday October 30 (7:00 p.m.) and Sunday October 31 (1:30 p.m.)

Tickets: Tickets in person are $ 21.15 – $ 41.25 from www.Ticketpro.ca or through the New opera ; streaming links cost $ 30.

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Reference-edmontonjournal.com

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