The music, performed by the nine-piece New York City chamber orchestra Newspeak, supported the unfolding drama without force-feeding emotions to the audience. The score has more than its fill of pathos and discomforting effects (especially clanging pipes), but it’s also full of mesmerizingly beautiful moments that pivot on recurring themes and motifs.
As each helicopter drop of rations becomes smaller and smaller, the family is forced to dig grass from the yard for sustenance. An army captain (soprano Cherry Duke) makes one final plea for the family to leave town, but the father refuses, sealing the fate of his family. And of the man-dog.
Things get darker for concertgoers too. Throughout the chaotic final scenes, the mother quietly dies. At one point, Lisa gently took off her mother’s clothes, exposing Breckenridge’s bare breasts. Without any water to wash the corpse, Worsham gestured to indicate that her character was urinating in a bowl. Lisa dipped a rag in the bowl and then wiped down her mother’s body. A cacophony of resonating, distorted electronic buzzing and droning slowly rose to a fevered pitch. More than a few concertgoers had to cover their ears.
It would be hard to imagine a more provocative and demanding opera than Dog Days. The roles require an unflinching stage presence from the singers, who are always onstage, always in character. The cast summoned the mental fortitude and technical prowess to bring this ominous world to life in a commanding and commendable fashion. For operaphiles who see art as an entryway into the inner workings of the human mind and as a critique of society, Dog Days is breaking new ground in the same way that Sartre’s No Exit or Picasso’s “Guernica” once did. The main difference is that Dog Days speaks directly to our times.
[box_info]Fort Worth Opera’s
Dog Days
Thru May 2 at W.E. Scott Theatre, 3505 W Lancaster Av, FW. $17-75. 877-396-7372.[/box_info]
