With Benjamin Britten's "The Turn of the Screw," the Sacramento Opera flirts with a true opera rarity – the psychological horror story.
It's an opera that conductor Timm Rolek hopes will scare audience members enough to go home and sleep with the lights on.
Based on Henry James' novella of the same name, the opera, which the company performs this Friday through Feb. 26 at the Community Center Theater, tells a tale that is familiar to most film audiences.
If you've seen the 2007 psychological thriller "The Orphanage," or the 2001 Nicole Kidman vehicle "The Others," then you know the eerie territory this opera will cover.
It's a story about a governess who is entrusted with the care of two children on an isolated British country estate. All is not well on the estate, as two menacing spirits spread panic and discord between the children.
It's a good-vs.-evil story whose ending will leave its audience with plenty of questions.
"Putting on this opera is a calculated risk," said Sacramento Opera conductor and artistic director Rolek.
The opera is an example of how the company is committed to taking risks and thinking outside the box.
"We need to stretch the expectations of the company, and we need to stretch those of our audiences," he said. "This is why places like museums don't do all Picasso all the time."
The production will be the first time the company has attempted the work of Britten, arguably the best-known English composer of the 20th century and one with 14 operas to his name.
For this production, the Sacramento Opera has assembled a well-rounded cast that includes frequent Metropolitan Opera performer Emily Pulley in the role of the governess.
It's a role Pulley feels she knows well, even though she hasn't sung it yet.
"I've actually been contracted to sing this part three times," she said.
The first time she was offered the role, the show was canceled. The second time, the same company mistakenly booked the hall for the wrong weekend.
The third time, the production was terminated when its director, Colin Graham, died unexpectedly.
"I'm very glad to finally have the chance to sing it, and the people I'm getting to work with here have made it well worth the wait."
The cast includes tenor Thomas Glenn, who received critical acclaim for his portrayal of physicist Robert Wilson in the world premiere of John Adams' "Doctor Atomic" at the San Francisco Opera in 2005.
The cast also includes the strong soprano Maria Jette as Miss Jessel, and mezzo soprano Fenlon Lamb as Mrs. Grose.
Chuck Hudson will direct.
In a recent rehearsal, Pulley tore through the role with her bright and strong soprano. The role of the governess is not for the faint of heart. It demands an actress whose character is backed into a corner, and one that needs to convey a dose of creeping panic.
"This opera requires a cast and production team who will venture into some pretty scary places," said Pulley.
"My approach to such difficult roles has always been to make myself as vulnerable as possible," she said.
"I do this so that the audience will have an entryway into the story and will hopefully want to come along for the ride, however dark and dangerous it may be."
For a regional opera company, chamber operas such as "The Turn of the Screw" provide the opportunity to scale down and concentrate on musical intimacy.
But making such operas play in the confines of the cavernous Community Center Theater is not always a slam-dunk. The company proved that it can deliver on the chamber opera format with its strong and engaging 2006 production of Mozart's chamber opera "Così fan tutti."
Another challenge is that "The Turn of the Screw" demands the use of a boy treble to sing the role of young Miles. In this production, the company has cast 14-year-old Brooks Fisher of Kentfield.
"The role calls for an unchanged male voice, and these voices simply don't have projection power," said Rolek.
To solve the problem, the company decided to amplify Fisher's treble.
"Amplifying Miles raises all kinds of questions about how to make him sound equal to everyone, and not louder," he said.
To help balance out the equation, Rolek cast soprano Antoni Mendezona as Miles' sister, Flora.
"Oftentimes Flora and Miles sing in unison and in rounds," Rolek said. "So I thought it a good idea to use an adult voice who has sung in our opera chorus, and who is also short and petite as a match for Miles."
Audiences may find "The Turn of the Screw" a refreshing opera, not only for its unusual story but also for Britten's masterly use of small-scale orchestration. In the prologue and the 16 scenes that make up the opera, Britten has written music that is hauntingly clear, with stark juxtapositions between the bracing melodic lines of its mortal characters and those of its two ghosts.
Much of the music in this opera is rooted in the 12-note theme that arises near the work's opening. The variations of that recurring theme are well-known for giving this opera an eerie and claustrophobic feel.
Rolek said this production weighs on the side of the supernatural visiting tragedy upon the children, rather than blaming it on the imagination of the governess. That's because the two ghosts in this story are onstage more than in other productions, said Rolek.
"If we have done our job well," he said, " the audience will leave the theater feeling a little uneasy."
Reach arts critic Edward Ortiz at (916) 321-1071.
