Which diva gets to sing “I hope you die!  I hope you die soon!  I’ll be waiting for you to die!”  If you guessed Tosca, that’s close, but it’s actually the eponymous Regina in Marc Blitzstein’s 1949 opus. 

If the lines are familiar, you probably recall hearing then spewed by Bette Davis as Regina Giddens in the 1941 film adaptation of Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, in the role created on Broadway in 1939 by Tallulah Bankhead, which serves as opera’s source.

For Regina, originally written for Broadway, Blitzstein followed the input of Hellman and producer Cheryl Crawford, making cuts suggested by the two women.  The scoring of the musical was beefed up for its opera house treatment which premiered at New York City Opera in 1953.  It was subsequently revised several times and posthumously restored to Blitzstein’s original vision.

This 1980 performance from Houston stars NYCO legend Maralin Niska (now 89), Giorgio Tozzi, Elisabeth Carron (still with us at 94), and Dan Garrard.

Blitzstein, an openly gay, Communist composer and close friend of Leonard Bernstein, was born in Philadelphia in 1905, and was beaten to death by three sailors he picked up in a bar on Martinique in 1964 at age 58.  His life and work are depicted in Tim Robbins’ 1999 film Cradle Will Rock, set in New York City in 1937 (taking its name from Blitzstein’s musical), in which he is portrayed by Hank Azaria, known to one and all from The Simpsons.

In addition to composing, he is remembered as a translator, most notably of Bertolt Brecht.  His single most famous work remains his translation and musical adaptation of Brecht and Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera which opened in 1954 at Theater de Lys (today the Lucille Lortel Theater) on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village featuring Lotte Lenya, which ran until 1961.

Marc Blitzstein: Regina

Houston Grand Opera
John DeMain, conductor
25 April 1980

Regina Giddens – Maralin Niska
Alexandra “Xan” Giddens – Jennifer Ringo
Horace Giddens – Dan Garrard
Ben Hubbard – Giorgio Tozzi
“Birdie” Hubbard – Elisabeth Carron
Leo Hubbard – Caroll Freeman
Oscar Hubbard – Rodney Stenborg
Addie – Jennifer Jones
Cal – Andrew Freierson
William Marshall – David Arlen Bankston
Jazz – Jubilant Sykes