New York Classical Review

Historical context in the arts is meaningful because it provides insight into the experiences that provided the raw material for any work. It also can reveal what ideas may have been possible in any given moment—think of how changes in telephone technology have effected how communications are handled in plots, and how the rotary phone and inability to record messages seem bizarre to people born in this century.

What to Wear, an opera from librettist and director Richard Foreman and composer Michael Gordon, might seem equally bizarre to audiences without their own personal context of the 20th century, much less Manhattan forty or so years ago. Playing at the BAM Harvey Theater, presented by BAM and the Prototype Festival, this is the New York premiere run of the work. Friday night’s performance was like being shot into a fun-house of cultural memories, an experience of seeing something so out of time that it made the contemporary settings of BAM’s hip Harvey Theater and the general newness of Prototype seem hopelessly square and out of step.

It took a bit of time for the disorienting spiral of What to Wear to hit, but when it did one felt the deep effect of this work. That spiral was Foreman’s point, and the confident, skilled, even gleeful performances of the ensemble produced the effect. This is technically more a staged oratorio than an opera, with the central figure Mad’line X finely sung in tandem by four principals, sopranos Sarah Frei and Sophie Delphis, mezzo-soprano Hai-Ting Chinn, and tenor Morgan Mastrangelo. Around them is a small chorus and a group of dancers—there is both constant singing and constant, detailed motion. Indie-rock musician St. Vincent is smuggled into the chorus and among the principals. The instrumental ensemble is the Bang on a Can All-Stars, conducted by the always-sharp Alan Pierson.

A synopsis might go like this: an ugly duckling (literally) is “banished from the realm of the oh so beautiful people” as the prerecorded spoken narration goes. The four principals both sing as Mad’line X and narrate what happens to her—and the duck—who through the course of each scene strives to fit into this beautiful world while also losing her looks and her style. Meanwhile, the duck seems to take on greater stature and power, before a possibly ill-fated appearance in a restaurant.

The music is more direct rock than even Gordon’s usual style, full of crunchy electric guitar and pleasingly heavy kick drum beats. His minimalist rhythms are as gripping as always, and simpler; the meters shift but aren’t mathematically complex. His vocal writing has strong, concise themes and the four principles expand into some bright, gorgeous harmonies.

Even stronger is the overall shape. With such abstract theater, the music here really tells the story, moving step by step, with only one weak scene, to a gripping climax in the penultimate “When a duck enters a fine restaurant” section, and then a mesmerizing and haunting denouement in the final “Am I still beautiful?” 

If the whole thing and effect seems inexplicable, well, it is. It can be described and is fascinating to see, and develops palpable expressive force, yet it’s not story but a series of impressions. There’s no drama, no conflict and resolution. What to Wear is an experiment in how we see with our eyes and hear with our ears and how those mix and conflict. Foreman, who died last year aged 87, was the founder and director of the Ontological-Hysterical Theater, and probably the most important figure in avant-garde theater in New York City from the late 1960s on. He and Gordon made What to Wear early this century but it had only one previous run, at CalArts twenty years ago, with an additional showcase in Massachusetts to prepare for Prototype.

What to Wear works because it’s a complete integration of words and scenes, detailed direction, marvelous sets and costumes, and Gordon’s terrific score. Foreman was responsible for all but the music. His original designs—a combination of Alice in Wonderland, Jasper Johns, post-cubist Picasso, bits of the subway and hints of hermetic mysticism—and stage movement were revived and recreated with the assistance of associate choreographer Elizabeth DeMent, associate director Rebecca Miller Kratzer, costume designer E.B. Brooks, and Michael Darling recreated the scenery. Everything is meticulous, polished, and far more fluid than one finds in typical opera productions.

What Foreman did with his method in What to Wear is open up the mind and pour in sensations that feel like his own context of New York City in the ‘80s and ‘90s. The work pulls on memories of the centrality of beauty and fashion to commerce and culture from then, of SoHo before it turned into an expensive open-air mall, where artists, supermodels, street people, and investment bankers would jostle each other on the narrow sidewalks, and the last beat poet sold used books on Spring Street. But it’s been forty years since Bright Lights, Big City was published, and the Odeon is now packed with tourists. What to Wear more than anything speaks to that time, but only in a language that those who witnessed it might be able to understand.

The beauty in the work comes out of cultural context and memory, and perhaps that’s why it has taken so long for it to appear in New York. Avant-garde theater faces immense challenges to start, and both BAM and Prototype have built a fashionable façade in front of skillful but often fundamentally conventional works. The mere appearance of What to Wear is a reminder of more adventurous days, an artistic environment less compromised by money and branding, and maybe a hint that Prototype may yet return to its own unconventional roots.

What to Wear runs through Sunday. prototypefestival.org