The show’s back on at Florida Grand Opera — and audiences welcomed
Almost three months after canceling its 2020-2021 season and a year after its last major in-person performance, the Florida Grand Opera will return to the stage — albeit a smaller one.
The Miami company will kick off socially distanced, in-person shows with a revised lineup featuring American composers from the 20th and 21st century. Four operas will be performed, twice each, in shows at the Miami Theater Center, 9806 NE 2nd Avenue, from January to March.
The upcoming “Season of Specials and Shorts’‘ at the 330-seat theater is world’s away from the original lineup that included “La Traviata” and Rossini’s “Otelo” at the 2,400-seat opera house inside the Adrienne Arsht Center. The company’s pivot takes into account not only the safety of performers and audiences, said Susan Danis, Florida Grand Opera director and CEO, but also the times we’re living in.
“A lot of my theory behind the operas that we picked is that they’re a slice of life,” said Danis. “The things that happen in each of them could happen in anyone’s family.”
Jack Heggies’ “Three Decembers’‘ will kick off the season on Jan. 30. The 90-minute chamber opera tells the story of a family dealing with the AIDS crisis over a span of 30 years. In February, Daron Hagen’s “New York Stories” will present three vignettes of people living in the city. March will bring a double-billing: Leonard Bernstein’s “Trouble in Tahiti,” about a young couple’s troubled marriage, and Thomas Pasatieri’s loose take on Molière with “Signor Deluso.”
Tickets for each opera are $65 per person. A three-opera subscription costs $156. Seating arrangements will take into account CDC guidelines; each party will be seated six feet apart.
Florida Grand Opera’s last big production with an audience was in January 2020 with a production of “Madama Butterfly” at the Arsht Center. Things came crashing to a halt during rehearsals in the spring as the pandemic shut down live venues. Company staff have all been working at reduced salaries since then.
“We’re pinching pennies to be able to do what we do,” Danis said.
Still, the upcoming season is a silver lining, she added, “I want people to remember things are going to go back to normal at some point, even if normal will look different.”
The operas will be complemented by a series of events and concerts held in neighborhoods throughout Miami-Dade and Broward counties. A full calendar of upcoming events and performances can be found online at fgo.org.