Miscasting

What's the difference between "casting against type" and "miscasting?" Well, it's the difference between Catherine Malfitano as Kat'a Kabanov� and Thomas Hampson as Werther � that is to say, a surprise success and an anticipated failure.

Soprano Malfitano has hit the stride of her career at the age of 50, looking and singing far better than she did during her Violetta/Antonia days of the early '80s. Since her comeback as Butterfly four years ago, she has dazzled New York audiences with highly personal takes on the bitch-goddess roles of Salome and Emilia Marty. But the title character of Jan�cek's Kat'a Kabanov� seemed at the fringe of her range: could she soften her boldly theatrical style and modulate her trumpetlike voice to encompass this fragile and browbeaten small-town Russian woman?

Malfitano (heard January 13) latched onto a neurotic streak in Kat'a's behavior, a kind of desperation that drives her to commit her fatal act of adultery. Her interpretation of the heroine's wandering mind in the long final scene relied more on physical acting (her slow dance of approach and avoidance with Boris) than on vocal shading; in fact the voice by itself is not particularly rich in color. Admittedly, a softer performer with a more luminous vocal tone (say, Renee Fleming) would have been closer to the composer's intentions, but Malfitano, through sheer intelligence and will, convinced.

The balance of power in this opera was rather skewed by the contrast of Malfitano's assertive Kat'a and the reserved, almost timid Kabanicha of Eva Randov�. The veteran mezzo-soprano is, I am afraid, long past her best vocal days, and even her acting seemed casting add one diffident � certainly not ballsy enough to drive her daughter-in-law into the arms of another man!

In the supporting role of Varvara, Katerina Karn�us brought down the house with a large, exciting mezzo-soprano and a warmly natural stage presence � this young artist is headed for greatness. Her love interest was Paul Charles Clarke (Kudryjas), sweetly lyrical in his Act Two folk song. Sergei Koptchak offered a pungent characterization and a big, scary bass as the loutish Dikoj; Mark Baker and Peter Straka (Tichon and Boris) were an equally-matched pair of tenor rivals.

This revival offered the best-balanced vocal casting and perhaps the most beautiful orchestra playing of the season so far, thanks to Sir Charles Mackerras. Unlike most "legendary" figures, this conductor's work is neither bombastic nor self-serving. He puts his genius to the service of Jan�cek, coaxing from the pit and the stage a performance that is authentic and almost unbearably poetic.

Also unbearable, though rather a different reason, was Thomas Hampson's Werther. The baritone's legs looked great in his fawn-colored breeches, but that was the extent of his suitability to this role. For reasons that evidently have nothing to do with the box office, the Met revived the opera in a half-assed adaptation slapped together by Massenet for the turn-of-the-century dramatic baritone Battistini. That great artist must have realized that the various changes to the vocal line sounded wimpy and tentative, for never performed this version � in fact, when he recorded a couple of arias from this score, he ignored most of Massenet's emendations.

Thomas Hampson chose to sing the score "as written;" what's more, he's no Battistini. The American baritone's voice is "fluffy" and veiled, without any core to the tone, which means that much of the middle-voice singing was covered by the orchestra. Every note was tuned differently: a phrase might start out flat, go sharp for a note or two, and then "wow" like a tape player with weak batteries. Any attempt to sing forte turned into a vibratoless yell. He does nothing with the words, and there is no sense of tonal color in the use of the varied French vowels, so much a part of the "atmosphere" of this music.

Hampson, notoriously self-enamored in his stage deportment; was the antithesis of the hypersensitive teenaged poet -- more like Gaylord Ravenal as performed by George Clooney channeling the spirit of Jessye Norman.

Susan Graham has obviously put a lot of intelligent hard work into Charlotte. She communicates elegantly in French. The voice, though, is rather on the light side for the part, especially the heavy Act 3 outbursts like "Tu m'as dit: a No�l!" Graham's top register was clean and well-tuned, but it failed to "open out" at big moments like the "Seigneur dieu." In contrast to an intensely "specific" performer like Malfitano, Graham seemed to play it safe. In the fraught Act Three confrontation with Werther, she offered only a superficial sense of impending doom -- though, to be fair, who would not have mixed feelings about the idea of Thomas Hampson blowing his brains out?

For the rest: adequacy across the board, with Christopher Robinson (Albert) reminding us what a healthy baritone voice should sound like. Donald Runnicles kept the orchestra on a lyrical level, though that saxophone needs to be reined in a bit.

James Jorden