How invigorating it is to experience a play that is so funny and witty, utterly compelling and yet simultaneously sad, that the audience are driven to give the most heartwarming standing ovation at its conclusion. Such was the atmosphere at the opening of MASTER CLASS’ by Terrance McNally at the Ensemble Theatre.
Lucia Mastrantone gives a riveting, multi-faceted performance as Maria Callas, her comedic timing perfectly suited to playwright McNally’s razor sharp one liners. Callas gave her potent, dramatic Master Classes in opera at the Juilliard School of Arts in New York in the early 70s – a few years before her death at age 53.
We, the audience are participants in her class. Mastrantone plays the audience superbly as Callas herself would’ve done onstage singing. Teasing and mesmerising them.
The director, Liesel Badorrek, has done a sterling job shaping this sense of inclusiveness that engulfs us, and using the intimate Ensemble stage so effectively. Isabel Hudson’s set design, placing warm wooden floorboards around the piano, makes this space so right for the play. The concert hall type vented structure at the back of the stage is very effective for the striking lighting designed by Kelsey Lee.
Talented playwright, Terrence McNally, wrote the Tony award-winning MASTER CLASS in 1995. It is beautifully structured, full of mischief and humour.
Callas’ three students come out individually and are utterly tormented by her ridicule. She interrupts all of them after singing a single note. This is a great comedic tool which Badorrek and Mastrantone play up brilliantly.
The three actors/opera singers; Bridget Patterson – soprano, Matthew Reardon – tenor and Elisa Colla – soprano, are all unique and entertaining. We do get to hear a few delightful short pieces – one by Reardon and Patterson singing a swan-song of Callas’, Tosca’s “Vissi D’arte”.
Mastrantone reflects on Callas’ highs and lows in segments interspersed in the play. It’s a welcome tone change as we learn about her attachment and loss of the ‘love of her life’, Aristotle Onassis, the extremely wealthy and seemingly vulgar Greek shipping magnate. The true drama in her life.
Musical director, sound designer and pianist onstage, Maria Alfonsine and Damian de Boos-Smith, comic stage hand/cello player enrich the performance.
I strongly advise you to see MASTER CLASS. It’s a well written and beautifully performed play. It runs at the Ensemble Theatre, Kirribilli, until the 20th July, 2024.
Featured pic : Elisa Colla in MASTER CLASS. Production photography by Prudence Upton
