Providence, Rhode Island—Opera is not quite what comes to mind when one thinks of female empowerment but on Oct. 26 the Columbus Theatre proved that women are forces to be reckoned with, dead or alive, kicking or cooking. Opera Providence presented Bon Appétit! and The Italian Lesson, two musical monologues by American composer Lee Hoiby, as a tribute to two astonishing women of the 20th century, America's favorite French chef Julia Child and monologue extraordinaire Ruth Draper.Bon Appétit!,showcases a social icon made famous way before the likes of Emeril or the Food Network, the bubbly TV cook Julia Child. Child's coworker and friend Nancy Verde-Berr, author of Backstage with Julia: My Years with Julia Child, gave the introduction to the piece.
Verde-Berr described her friend as an impressive woman, not just in stature - Child was 6'2" with a size-12 shoe - but in the way she viewed herself, her cooking and the world. To Julia, Verde-Berr said, it was "always about the cooking."
"People always ask me what Julia thought of the 1978 "Saturday Night Live" skit that Dan Akroyd did of her," Verde-Berr went on to say. It turns out Child saw the parody and kept a video of it to show guests.
"It was always funny watching her imitate Dan Akroyd imitating her," Verde-Berr said.
In Hoiby's monologue, Child is portrayed in a comical light. Child (played by Vanessa Schukis) is no longer just the do-it-all-no-matter-what-happens chef showing Americans a thing or two about baking the "perfect French chocolate cake" - she is now a mad woman armed with an eggbeater and lots of flour for ammunition. Schukis leaves no area of the stage clean and no audience members somber in their seats.
Unfortunately, even Schukis' zestful acting and effective use of props could only make this piece semi-sweet due to a gap between score and narrative. Hoiby may have thought a word-for-word reenactment of one of Child's shows would be nice with music, but it fell just as flat as the cake Schukis pulled out of the cardboard oven on stage. In truth, this piece is only one step up from Akroyd's "SNL" impersonation, and that's only because it was followed by free chocolate cake and book-signing by Verde-Berr during intermission.
In the second production of the night, The Italian Lesson, Valerie Nicolosi was a one-woman show the audience couldn't help but watch. She brought new life to Ruth Draper's The Busy Mother, the story of a high-class lady trying to get through an Italian lesson that is continually interrupted.
Ruth Draper lived from 1884 to 1956 and introduced audiences to 60 roles and 368 "invisible" characters. English movie star Sir John Gielgud is said to have described Draper as "the greatest American performer that America has ever given us." Along those lines, Nicolosi proved to be one of the better performers Providence has seen in a while.
She brought her role and nine invisible characters to life with such ease that it seemed as though a full cast was alongside her. This opera singer not only hit the right keys, she also unlocked the imagination of the audience: Her performance was so convincing that it truly felt as though she was surrounded by a dog, three spoiled children, a manicurist, a lover, her husband, a best friend, a not-so-close friend, a certain Count Bluffsky and an Italian instructor attempting to hear her read Dante's Inferno.
© Copyright 2007 The Post - Brown Daily Herald
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