A Wedding is a 2004 comic opera based on Robert Altman's 1978 film A Wedding and was composed by William Bolcom with a libretto written by Robert Altman and Arnold Weinstein.
Contents
Performance history
The Lyric Opera of Chicago commissioned the work, and the opera was first performed there on December 11, 2004. The premiere had stage direction by Altman and was conducted by Dennis Russell Davies. The film's 48 characters were trimmed down to 19 on stage.
Since the premiere, A Wedding has seen performances at Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music, the University of Houston's Moores School of Music, University of Nebraska's Glenn Korff School of Music, and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. It was performed by the Aspen Opera Center for the Aspen Music Festival and School's 2016 summer season.
The Music Academy of the West commissioned Bolcom to write a chamber version of the opera, with a reduced orchestration. This reorchestration received its premiere on August 8, 2008 in Santa Barbara, California.
Synopsis
Act I
Introduction. Dino and Muffin's wedding ceremony at a church in suburban Chicago.
Scene 1. Rita, the wedding organizer, gives orders to the bartenders working at the reception. A mysterious dog barks in the distance.
Scene 2. Nettie, the grandmother of the groom, has not attended the ceremony. She is in her bedroom in the family mansion. Her daughter Toni, with husband Jules, appear, followed by her other daughter Victoria with husband Luigi—the parents of the groom—and the unmarried third daughter, Diana. Jules, a physician turned art dealer, examines Nettie with a stethoscope. Victoria, too, is unwell and has missed the ceremony. Diana is in love with Randolph, the butler, who tells her that all the invited guests (some 200 of them) have sent regrets. Nettie closes her eyes and dies. Rita enters and discovers Nettie's death.
Scene 3. In the ballroom, the groom's family meets Snooks and Tulip, the parents of the bride, and their older daughter Buffy (a silent role) as well as Tulip's sister Candace. Jules is immediately attracted to Tulip.
Scene 4. The women make small talk in the powder room. Victoria's mysterious illness is mentioned again.
Scene 5. The men have drinks in the "grotto," Luigi's basement kingdom—a replica of a Roman trattoria. Snooks declines alcohol and tells the story of how he found God (or vice versa).
Scene 6. Jules and Toni in Nettie's room; Jules tells his wife that her mother needs rest.
Scene 7. In the ballroom. Enter William Williamson, the only guest at the wedding who is not a family member. It turns out that he was hired by Rita to attend the ceremony and shake everyone's hand. Jules discreetly tells Luigi that Nettie has died. The band strikes up a dance. Jules sneaks off to take care of Victoria.
Scene 8. Jules gives Victoria, a drug addict, her morphine shot.
Act II
Overture. The composer writes in the score: "The orchestra depicts a lone motorcycle coming from far away."
Scene 1. Enter Breedley, the best man who has missed the wedding because he spent the night in jail. Dino welcomes him and tells him about his predicament with Buffy.
Scene 2. In the ballroom, enter Aunt Bea (Nettie's twin sister, played by the same singer). Bea, also late for the ceremony, is an old socialist and shocks everyone with her wedding present, a painting featuring Muffin, the bride, in the nude, surrounded by factories and farms. Williamson, the hired guest, is the only one to defend the picture. Toni and Bea have a heated political argument. Then everyone heads for the cake table. Snooks wants to cover up the painting but Rita intervenes. He wants to punch her but Rita grabs his arm and bends it behind his back.
Scene 3. Breedley delivers an outrageous speech at the cake table. Immediately after, he spills the beans about Buffy's pregnancy to Candace, Tulip's sister. Tulip, who has just arrived after seeing Jules in the ladies' room, is horrified by the painting.
Scene 4. Luigi, alone in his grotto, feels homesick for Italy. Victoria enters. They reminisce about their past; Luigi doesn't get a chance to tell his wife that her mother has died.
Scene 5. Rita calls an emergency because of the appearance of a stranger, who turns out to be Donato, Luigi's brother, who speaks only Italian. Luigi, who has made a pact with his mother-in-law never to let any of his Italian relatives set foot in the house, threatens his brother with a knife. But Jules reminds him that, after Nettie's death, this pact is no longer valid. Luigi suddenly embraces his brother, who pulls a huge mortadella from a package. The two brothers sing a passionate duet in praise of Italian food, joined by the entire party.
Scene 6. Toni discovers that her mother is dead. The entire family assembles to hear the news. Aunt Bea, the last to leave the room, bumps into Mr. Williamson. They hit it off...
Orchestration
A Wedding is scored for:
Reception
Anthony Tommasini of The New York Times writes in his review: "Most composers count themselves lucky to secure even one commission from a major opera company. William Bolcom has had three in relatively quick order from one America's leading companies, the Lyric Opera of Chicago. The first resulted in the intense and gothic McTeague, of 1992. Then came A View From the Bridge in 1999, a work Mr. Bolcom described as his journey into Brooklyn verismo. On Saturday night the Lyric Opera presented the world premiere of A Wedding, adapted from Robert Altman's 1978 film. I wish I could report that the Lyric Opera's admirable faith in Mr. Bolcom, a prodigiously skilled composer, has emboldened him. But musically A Wedding plays it safe. In some ways it is the least compelling of the three works, each written with Mr. Bolcom's longtime lyricist, Arnold Weinstein, as librettist.
Film
A Wedding is a 1978 comedy film directed by Robert Altman, with an ensemble cast that included Desi Arnaz, Jr., Carol Burnett, Paul Dooley, Vittorio Gassman, Mia Farrow, Lillian Gish, Geraldine Chaplin, Howard Duff, Nina Van Pallandt, Amy Stryker, and Pat McCormick. The story is told in the trademark Altman style, with multiple plots and overlapping humorous dialogue. The story takes place in a single day during a lavish wedding that merges a nouveau riche Southern family with an established wealthy Chicago family having possible ties to organized crime.