The End Of The Affair

Conductor: Ward Holmquist
4 STARS

Reviewer: Deborah Ground Buckner

War-torn London and its aftermath provides the setting for The End of the Affair, an opera in two acts. With music by Jake Heggie and libretto by Heather McDonald, the work is based on Graham Greene's 1951 novel of the same title. The staging by the Lyric Opera of Kansas City marked the fourth production since The End of the Affair had its premiere in Houston in 2004. The opera, performed in English, opens with Maurice (Keith Phares) singing “Wandering the Streets of London,” a melody that is both haunting and memorable; this is the music audience members will find running through their minds long after the performance is ended.

The time is 1946, post-World War II, and the set (designed by R. Keith Brumley) shows the terrible memories of the war, piles of rubble, buildings with crumbling corners. Maurice encounters an old friend, Henry (Victor Benedetti). Henry confides his concerns about the strange behavior of his wife, Sarah (Emily Pulley), who goes walking for hours at night in the rain. Henry has considered hiring a detective to determine whether she is having an affair, but he rejects the idea, throwing the detective's business card to the ground. Maurice, Sarah's former lover, has not seen her for over two years since she abruptly left a tryst with no explanation. Maurice retrieves the card and enlists the detective's aid in learning of Sarah's activities. The detective, Mr. Parkis (Robert Orth, who played the role in the Houston premiere), takes his duties seriously, adding comic relief to an otherwise somber and serious story. Parkis obtains Sarah's diary, and as Maurice reads it, the audience is taken back to 1944 to the fateful day that marked the end of the affair. Sarah and Maurice meet in his apartment and make love (in an enthusiastic performance that made this reviewer question bringing her young teen-aged children to the production). Overhead, German air raids drop bombs near the building. Maurice goes downstairs to investigate and another explosion rocks the building. He returns, bloody and dust-covered to find Sarah on her knees in prayer.

Seeing Maurice alive, Sarah leaves. It becomes evident, from her diary, she had bargained with God to end the affair if Maurice could live. Learning Sarah never stopped loving him, Maurice confronts a triangle that is no longer Henry, Sarah and Maurice, but rather Maurice, Sarah and God. Sarah seeks advice from Smythe, a Rationalist spokesman (Gerard Powers) in the hopes he might convince her there is no God and bring an end to her bargain, but without success. Sarah dies, and as the opera concludes, Henry, Parkis, Smythe, and Sarah's mother (a wonderful, comic performance by Joyce Castle who also sang the role in Seattle) proclaim Sarah a saint while Maurice believes her to have betrayed everyone. Maurice finds himself, once again, wandering the streets of London in a reprise of the opening music. Phares' rich baritone fully captures the dark moodiness of Maurice, and Pulley's vibrant soprano presents the confusion, poignancy and eventual peace of Sarah. A wonderful moment occurs as the quartet of Maurice, Henry, Smythe and Parkis blend their voices in singing of their views of Sarah.

This is the second opera for Jake Heggie, who premiered Dead Man Walking in San Francisco in 2000. Following the Houston premiere of The End of the Affair, Heggie and McDonald made extensive revisions. The opera was performed in 2004 in Madison and revised again, then presented in 2005 in Seattle. The final version has captured the darkness of Greene's novel, and leaves the audience to ponder the meaning of love and faith and the wisdom of making bargains with God.