Don Pasquale

KENTUCKY OPERA (1984)

DON PASQUALE by Gaetano Donizetti
Conductor: Bryan Balkwill
Cast: R. Havranek, F. Esham, C. Freeman, D. Everette
Production Team: F. Colavecchio (scenery), Malabar (clothes), J. Beecroft (lighting)

“…the most delightful Don Pasquale I have encountered anywhere, a sparkling production sung in a good English translation by a superior cast and handsomely produced in every respect.”
– Byron Belt, San Francisco Chronicle (April, 1984)

“With a sparkling production of Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, the Kentucky Opera enjoyed one of its greatest triumphs: exciting, fresh, a marvel of wit and style. Nicholas Muni’s staging is resourceful, emphasizing Donizetti’s humanity and humor without stooping to degrading horseplay. He makes a sculptress of Norina…and a sly visual joke when Pasquale is searching the garden. Nice touches all, as are the routines for the servants, their capers spring amusingly from the music, a most completely exhilarating show.”
– William Mootz, Opera News (June, 1984)

“…fills Whitney Hall with a blend of vocal artistry, visual beauty and some of the best staging I have seen in a comic opera anywhere, and that includes the MET, the Paris Opera and both the State Opera and the Volksoper in Vienna. It floats like an irridescent balloon, shimmering with color and hinting at magic and romance. Such a pretty toy, so lovely a bauble, that one wishes it would linger longer. With four good singers and a sympathetic conductor, the remaining ingredient needed in this Donizetti bonbon is a man of the theater to create a series of delectable stage pictures–and in Nicholas Muni the Kentucky Opera has a wonder-worker…a brilliant production.”
– F.W. Woolsey, The Louisville Times (April, 1984)

“Directed by Nicholas Muni and sung in English, this production is blessed by well-conceived comic acting with just a touch of slapstick, uncluttered staging and some fine singing.”
– Ray Cooklis, The Cincinnati Enquirer (April, 1984)