Porgy and Bess

Synopsis

Based on the DuBose Heyward novel Porgy and Bess tells the moving story of the cripple Porgy and the residents of Charleston's famed Catfish Row. Recognized as an American masterpiece, the story entwines pride, prejudice, pathos and passion through a jazz and blues influenced score. Porgy and Bess introduced classic Gershwin songs like Summertime, I Got Plenty of Nuttin' and It Ain't Necessarily So, as well as magnificent and enthralling choruses that stunned music and drama critics alike at its premiere in 1935.

Our Review:

10 November 2006

Porgy and Bess is the most glorious score and Trevor Nunn’s Glyndebourne production 20 years ago was simply magnificent. Yet the new “musical” version of the collaboration between George and Ira Gershwin and librettists DuBose and Dorothy Heyward at the Savoy is a disappointment. Decently sung but unconvincingly edited, the show falls between several stools, not quite opera, not exactly operatic musical. It’s a lowbrow hybrid, or highbrow lowbred.

Not until the first half-hour of the second act – the piece has been cut from three acts to two – is there any sense of musical continuity or texture, as at last we travel from the picnic on Kittiwah Island – where the coke dealer Sportin’ Life (an underpowered O-T Fagbenle) sings “It Ain’t Necessarily So” - back to Catfish Row in South Carolina, where Porgy exacts his murderous revenge on Crown for loving his woman, Bess.

The show doesn’t carry the overwhelming impact of Nunn’s Glyndebourne version,...

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Latest User Review

BLH - 27 April 2007:

I thoroughly enjoyed last nights performance. Fantastic production with excellent performances...

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