Making the Most of Mozart

From the Theater Vault Dept.: Back in 1984, when the University at Albany had a theater department of some standing, they offered an ambitious series of productions. Amadeus was still something of an undiscovered item until the movie came out that year, which coincided with the production described below, first in an eager advance, then in a disappointed review.

                                                                                   

PIANIST ALFRED BRENDEL, a world-class performer of Mozart's music, dismissed the hit play Amadeus quite simply: “It’s not an accurate portrait of the man. The playwright took his material from a few letters Mozart wrote to his sister, letters that were very playful, and very scatological.”

Saltzmann and Strolle in Amadeus

Much of the music world, which isn’t known for restrained opinions, has come down hard on this theatrical depiction of one of the gods of music; the recent release of the movie has fanned the flames of controversy, with the dowdy New York Times leading the pack of throat-clearers.

On the other hand, a friend of mine who has long insisted that she’d rather be boiled in oil than listen to opera confessed that the opera sequences in the film of Amadeus weren’t bad at all! That kind of influence is worth the whinnying of a dozen stuffy newspapers.

There’s no doubt that the film plays up Mozart’s manic side, and it’s that very quality that SUNYA’s Bill Leone thinks needn’t be overdone for the theater: “Mozart is a man who knew his society, he just had moments of insensitivity.” Leone is following his recent success with Shakespeare at SUNYA with a production of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus, which Leone will direct and (for half of the run) act in. Leone has described the themes of the play as ‘being about “uniqueness and irresponsibility of talent. The struggle between a man and his god.” It opens at SUNYA’s Lab Theater on Tuesday for a two-week run.

Amadeus is a fictionalized account of what’s almost certainly a fictional event: the poisoning of the young Mozart by a bitter rival composer, Antonio Sa1ieri. The play shows us, through Salieri’s eyes, Mozart’s rise in acclaim, tossing off compositions with a gift that the zealot Salieri bitterly covets.

“In the first act we feel great sympathy for Salieri – Shaffer wants us to,” says Leone. “In the second act he wants us to feel just the reverse. We should feel concern for Mozart. Mozart’s humanity comes through in his music.”

Music figures importantly in the play, with even more emphasis given in this production. Leone said that he does not use music as just a background. “We are almost hearing the music through a distorting glass,” he explained. “There are 37 sound cues for music,”

Peter Bennett will play the role of Salieri when the play opens Thursday; during the second (and final) week of its run, Leone will take over that part. Bennett recently finished directing Sylvia Sydney in the play ‘night Mother at the Pittsburgh Public Theater; he leaves in December to honor a previous commitment to direct a work at Playhouse-by-the-Sea in New Hampshire.

As Constanze, Mozart’s wife, Joyce Strolle returns to the stage at the Performing Arts Center. She has been acclaimed in several roles recently, including the title character in Strindberg’s Miss Julie, the female characters in John Brown’s Body and as one of Chekhov’s Three Sisters. She is a SUNYA graduate student, now a part-time faculty member.

William Salzmann, a senior, plays Mozart in what probably will be the last in a distinguished series of roles he has played during four years at SUNYA.

Amadeus opened at the National Theatre of Great Britain in November 1979, giving that
theater its biggest success to date. When Shaffer brought the play to this country a year later, he and director Peter Hall took the opportunity to fine-tune it.

Reflecting upon the play in a recent New York Times Magazine article, Shaffer wrote: “What I wanted to emerge clearly from the play is the obsession of a man, Salieri, who (in Salieri’s own words) was created as ‘a pair of ears and nothing else.’ His obsession became finding an absolute in music. Mozart’s incomparability lies in the absolute nature of his achievements: the best of them cannot even be slightly erased without diminishment. Of course, great art always attests to the existence of absolutes, that is why the greatest offer the largest comfort, even as temporarily it can induce the largest despair. At certain moments in art galleries, for example, we get the uneasy feeling that we are not judging perfect paintings, but that they are judging us.”

Leone’s production of Amadeus promises to be a fascinating alternative to the movie, the release of which was not known to the people who scheduled this play, but which should prove an audience incentive. Not to be overlooked is the aural treat in store: Mozart’s music will be heard as interpreted by SUNYA’s Findley Cockrell, a Mozart specialist. The elaborate costumes were designed by Lynda Salsbury, and the 18th-century movement is by Constance Valis-Hill, who directed The Eumenities for SUNYA. Amadeus opens Tuesday at 8 P.M. and will run Tuesday through Saturday for two weeks. For information or ticket reservations, call the Lab Theatre.

– Metroland Magazine, 22 November 1984

                                                                           

BAD SOUND PROVED DESTRUCTIVE in the SUNYA University Theatre Production of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus, running through Saturday at the Lab Theatre on the Albany campus. How could director William Leone allow a play that celebrates one of the greatest musical geniuses to sound so poor? This is not to take anything away from the rest of the production, which is extremely well done, but the sound is so vital that the mediocrity of it became intrusive.

Peter Bennett, who played the featured role of Salieri through last Saturday, had a sinister presence as the bitter Italian court composer; his performance would have been a smash if he could have brought a little more beauty to bear upon the words he said. He captured the character of the man splendidly, but seemed to be “methodizing” it a bit too much.

William Salzmann is outstanding as Mozart. He’s called upon to run a gamut from scatologically minded horseplay to a dignified death scene, and he does so entirely credibly. Joyce Strolle, as Constanze, also deserves praise for the range she displays.

The staging is very inventive, utilizing slide projections for backdrops and making the most of the little Lab Theatre’s stage. For the final three performances (tonight, Friday, and Saturday), Leone will take over the role of Salieri.

Toward the end of the first act, Salieri is looking through some of Mozart’s scores; we hear snatches of them even as he is realizing what this upstart can do. Strains of the Mass in C so overwhelm Salieri that he falls to the floor, senseless. With those sounds issuing from speakers no bigger than your average boom box, it’s hard to share in that majesty. Perhaps the director will understand this better when he gets onstage.

– Metroland Magazine, 6 December 1984