"It's Just An Opinion": "Powder Her Face" and BAM!

Thomas Ades's Powder Her Face is about the third wife, Margaret Whigham, of the 11th Duke of Argyll. Margaret -- the "Mrs Sweeney" cited in Cole Porter's You're the Top -- was a gorgeous libidinous woman. It was claimed that a head wound deprived her of her senses of taste and smell (and thus explaining her slim figure, I suppose) but made her a sexual monster, "bordering on nymphomania." Coupled with a production by the City Opera in the lovely Howard Gilman Opera House at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), what's to hate?

It was a fabulous production -- everything about it was great: singing, acting, design, lighting, costumes ... really, everything. Especially the "aria without words," which comprised of sounds elicited when a woman could be described as a "chickenhead." It was shocking and hilarious and entertaining. We wanted to see the opera again, and it established Ades as a genius in our eyes, more so than the music of The Tempest could.

Photos of the production from the City Opera site:

The spectacularly beautiful Margaret Whigham:

The "Dirty Duchess" of Argyll

City Opera did founder for a few years, and have been selling off their assets, scaling back on staff and crew, and defaulted on their lease at the Koch Theatre in Lincoln Center, adjacent to the Metropolitan Opera House. They've been renting theatres around town for one or two productions, then moving on -- and this may have been the best thing to happen to the company. They are back to producing great alternative shows with younger and less-weighty casts. Quality is top notch, all around. And although the ticketing and exchange system is clunky, they are efficient and helpful. Sigh.

And yet another subscription we're enjoying all to much and well ... if some of these sucked, we might be able to save more for retirement.