Enemies, A Love Story
Libretto for the opera “Enemies, A Love Story,” music composed by Ben Moore, which had its world premiere at the Palm Beach Opera on February 20, 2015 after an early production at Center for Contemporary Opera. Based on the novel by I.B.Singer, the story is both farce and tragedy. It follows a Holocaust survivor who juggles three women as he searches for love and decency.
Enemies is an opera in two acts by composer Ben Moore and librettist Nahma Sandrow, based on the novel by Isaac Bashevis Singer. The work premiered at Palm Beach Opera in 2015 to critical acclaim and standing ovations. Fred Plotkin (WQXR) called it “an important new work that will find its place among those works that audiences will be moved by…”; the Wall Street Journal praised its “soaring Puccinian lines, folk tunes and klezmer melodies”; the Financial Times noted the “taut libretto” and “arresting combination of breeziness on the surface and darkness underneath”; and Edge Media Network called ‘Tamara’s Aria’ “a piece that is likely to become a permanent part in the dramatic soprano/mezzo-soprano repertory alongside ‘To This We’ve Come’ from Menotti’s ‘The Consul’ and ‘La Mamma Morta’ from Giordano’s ‘Andrea Chenier’.” In November 2018 Kentucky Opera presented a newly-revised version of the work. Both comic and tragic, Enemies tells the story of Holocaust survivor Herman Broder. He lives in post-war New York with a new wife and a secret mistress, but when the wife he thought dead returns, love and guilt create unbearable –but farcical -complications.
SETTING
New York City 1948: Coney Island, The Bronx, and Manhattan.
PALM BEACH OPERA PRODUCTION TEAM
| Conductor | David Stern |
| Director | Sam Helfrich |
| Set Design | Allen Moyer |
| Lighting | Aaron Black |
| Costumes | Kaye Voyce |
PALM BEACH OPERA PRODUCTION CAST
| Herman Broder | Daniel Okulitch |
| Tamara | Leann Sandel-Pantaleo |
| Yadwiga | Caitlin Lynch |
| Masha | Danielle Pastin |
| Shifrah Puah | Jennifer Roderer |
| Tortshiner | Philip Horst |
| Rabbi Lampert | David Kravitz |
KENTUCKY OPERA PRODUCTION TEAM
| Conductor | David Stern |
| Director | Mary Birnbaum |
| Set Design | Grace Laubacher |
| Lighting | Anshuman Bhatia |
KENTUCKY OPERA PRODUCTION CAST
| Herman Broder | Morgan Smith |
| Tamara | Catherine Martin |
| Yadwiga | Emily Albrink |
| Masha | Danielle Pastin |
| Shifrah Puah | Elizabeth Batton |
| Rabbi Lampert | Levi Hernandez |
ORCHESTRATION
- 1 flute
- 2 oboes (1st doubling English horn)
- 1 clarinet in B-flat
- 1 alto Saxophone
- 1 bassoon
- 2 horns in F
- 1 trumpet in B-flat
- 1 trombone
- Timpani
- 2 percussion
- 1 keyboard
- strings
SYNOPSIS
Act I
The curtain rises on a small Brooklyn apartment in 1948. Herman Broder, a Polish Jewish writer and intellectual, is lost in an anxious daydream until his wife, Yadwiga, rouses him. Soon Herman is singing a playful folksong as he bids her an affectionate farewell. (“Little Bird”) Yadwiga, a Polish farmer’s daughter, saved Herman from the Nazis by hiding him for years in her father’s hayloft. After the war Herman married her out of gratitude. Yadwiga believes Herman is leaving for a sales trip, but he is actually rushing to the Bronx, to the beautiful and passionate Masha, also a refugee, whom he adores. (“My Love Remembers”)
Next morning, at breakfast with Masha’s mother, Herman finds a Personals notice in the newspaper which leads him to an apartment on the Lower East Side. There he is astonished to find Tamara, his first wife, reported to have been killed in the war along with their two children. Tamara shares with him the harrowing odyssey of her escape (“Tamara’s aria”). She understands Herman all too well and after learning of Yadwiga and Masha, offers to divorce him. But the warmth of their shared history bonds the pair in spite of themselves. Meanwhile Yadwiga loyally defends her husband against nosy neighbors though, secretly believing she is pregnant, she yearns to keep him home (“Yadwiga’s Aria”). And Masha manages to convince Herman to marry her as well (in a Jewish ceremony complete with dancing). Now Herman is juggling three very different women, and cares for them all. The painful farce accelerates as Herman hides Tamara from Masha, both Tamara and Masha from Yadwiga – and all three wives from his employer, a jovial rabbi for whom he ghostwrites speeches.
Herman can seem lighthearted – protective with Yadwiga, humorous with Tamara, and romantic with Masha – but his head is full of philosophical ruminations, childhood memories, and nightmare flashbacks to the hayloft; and his heart is full of guilt. When Herman learns that Yadwiga is pregnant his sudden fear and resistance explodes into a revulsion against the entire corrupt human race – including himself. (“Lies”) He vows to leave the isolating “hayloft” of all his hidden lives and become a decent, pious man, a faithful husband to Yadwiga, and a father. The curtain falls on their domestic bliss. (“Baby Waltz”)
Act II
At the start of Act Two the three women, each in her separate apartment, sing about the future. (“Trio”) We see that Yadwiga is indeed pregnant. But past lies continue to surface, and the farce darkens as the wives, neighbors, and even the rabbi collide. Herman has managed to stay away from Masha but at last, desperate, she draws him to her apartment where, as her mother prays, she pleads her lost youth and innocence, destroyed by the war. (“Prayer”) He is hers again. Meanwhile Tamara defends Yadwiga, who feels Herman slipping away. But Herman cannot give Masha up. The entire ruse comes crashing down at the rabbi’s holiday party where Herman and Masha’s passions flare in counterpoint to a cheerful chorus praising God, life, and food. (“Miracles”)
Ultimately the lovers cannot stay apart. They plan to run away to Florida sunshine, leaving Tamara to take care of Yadwiga and the baby. However when Masha takes her mother to the hospital, leaving Herman alone to pack, he cannot go on. Longing for the past overwhelms him; before the war and the dark hayloft; back when he was a good man; further back, when he was a beloved child in an orderly world; back to the silent darkness before creation itself. Guilt-ridden and weary, he realizes that he is incapable of making a life with anyone. (“Herman’s Final Scene”) He walks out forever. Masha returns, her mother having died; she sees that he is gone and takes her own life. In the final image, Tamara and Yadwiga are together caring for the newborn child.
SAMPLING OF REVIEWS
Fred Plotkin (WQXR/ Operavore): “…The libretto, by Nahma Sandrow, was one of the most effective texts I have encountered in a long time and it has been set to music by the excellent Ben Moore. The score is melodic and atmospheric while at the same time being emotional and specific in depicting all of nuanced turns in the plot.
The cast of North American singers was, in general, outstanding, as was the work of conductor David Stern… I am convinced that this production, with its sets perfectly geared to play in other theaters, may find itself staged at numerous opera companies in America and abroad.”
Heidi Waleson (Wall Street Journal): “…Set to a deft libretto by Nahma Sandrow, Mr. Moore’s music is unabashedly tonal and accessible. He writes idiomatically and lyrically for voice, and each of the women is acutely characterized and impeccably performed….”
George Loomis (Financial Times): “…With a taut libretto by Nahma Sandrow, the opera maintains the film’s arresting combination of breeziness on the surface and darkness underneath, while giving its characters new life…”
Jack Gardner (EDGEMEDIANETWORK): “Ben Moore is one of the most well respected of the contemporary American composers….Librettist Nahama [sic] Sandrow took Isaac Bashevis Singer’s 1972 novel and turned it into a moving and effective piece of theater. Combined with Moore’s music, it made for an emotionally powerful evening. …
‘Enemies, A Love Story’ has a high likelihood of remaining in the operatic canon for a long time to come… a vocally and musically beautiful, emotionally moving performance.”
Robert Croan (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette): “Palm Beach Opera’s world premiere production of Ben Moore’s ‘Enemies, A Love Story’ was a major area event, attended by a glittering, enthusiastic crowd. Mr. Moore’s easy-to-listen-to melodic style, combined with Nahma Sandrow’s lucid libretto and a brilliant staging by Sam Helfrich… translated into immediate audience approval. This operatic ‘Enemies’ was a really good show.”