CHICAGO -- If you have always wanted to experience the best of opera in Chicago, now is the time to go, to see the Lyric Opera's new production of The Merry Widow. It runs through Jan. 16.
For a dinner before the event, the Lyric Opera has two restaurants. Its Bistro offers a perfect light supper, with specials and sandwiches. It doesn't take reservations. There's also a more expensive restaurant with fine dining and reservations a necessity. The Lyric also offers a parking special, at $18 in a nearby lot, a good price for downtown Chicago.
While this is a pricey holiday treat, it's one that will be remembered long after the curtain falls and the standing ovation has ended. It won't clutter the house, and no Christmas songs are involved. See the Lyric's website for more details.
For those unfamiliar with opera -- the ultimate art form of music, dance and stagecraft -- The Merry Widow is a perfect introduction. The production is flawless -- beautiful scenery, great voices and acting, comedy plus dancing. It's sung and spoken in English, and there are supertitles -- subtitles to TV fans -- for the songs as well.
And much of the music is familiar. This opera has been a part of Western culture for a century, a precursor to Broadway musicals and TV sitcoms.
The comic plot involves -- what else? -- the temptations of infidelity and spurned courtship involving money and power.
For a dinner before the event, the Lyric Opera has two restaurants. Its Bistro offers a perfect light supper, with specials and sandwiches. It doesn't take reservations. There's also a more expensive restaurant with fine dining and reservations a necessity. The Lyric also offers a parking special, at $18 in a nearby lot, a good price for downtown Chicago.
While this is a pricey holiday treat, it's one that will be remembered long after the curtain falls and the standing ovation has ended. It won't clutter the house, and no Christmas songs are involved. See the Lyric's website for more details.
-- Elaine Hopkins
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