Word: delima
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...star in the forefront. In jazzier numbers, the lights displayed the members of the orchestra (all 15 of them), swinging in their tuxes; during the soupier songs, like Oscar Levant's "Blame It on My Youth" or Gershwin's "Someone to Watch Over Me," the spotlight picked out deLima, glamorous in the darkness...
...sense, there's no point in quibbling with the star's performance; nobody else that I know of could do such a show, and deLima did it well, with humor and grace. Like Winsome Brown of yesteryear (our short institutional memory allows no lasting monument to her toothy glory), she is the rare college performer who has the confidence and power to go it all alone...
Nevertheless, some observations should be made. DeLima's roles in Harvard opera have always been the grandes dames -- the Countess in "Marriage of Figaro," and in "Die Fledermaus" as well. That is to say, she has a solid operatic voice, better for power than for subtlety. (Even in this nightclub act, she wore a high-waisted Empire dress of the type made famous by Emma Thompson and Gwyneth Paltrow, an inappropriate but curiously telling choice, as if to declare that she's better suited for more aristocratic pursuits...
...What deLima did have, in abundance, was the willingness to make a show of herself, without which the whole evening would have been hopeless. She came down into the audience and pretended to berate an audience member (A plant? He bore it with too much grace not to be,) in Weill's wonderful song "I'm a Stranger Here Myself." That, incidentally, was the best performance of the night, allowing deLima to combine histrionics with an aggressive, loudish tone; in other words, to be operatic (it's no coincidence, I think, that Weill was also the only "serious" composer...
...choice of songs was largely excellent, including standards and some interesting sub-standards, like the Gershwin self-parody "Blah Blah Blah" and Leonard Bernstein's pattersong "I Can Cook Too." "Blah Blah Blah" particularly allowed deLima to camp it up, leading the audience in a sing-along while capering to the absurd lyrics. (The screen on which the lyrics were projected was a nice touch, too.) As for the four Sondheim songs, including three in a row at the end, they were not too big a price to pay for the rest -- which is saying quite...