{"id":169327,"date":"2026-02-08T15:03:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T15:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/169327\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T15:03:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T15:03:11","slug":"san-diego-operas-barber-of-seville-focuses-on-the-funny-san-diego-union-tribune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/169327\/","title":{"rendered":"San Diego Opera\u2019s \u2018Barber of Seville\u2019 focuses on the funny \u2013 San Diego Union-Tribune"},"content":{"rendered":"

Among the many reasons \u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d opera is hugely popular worldwide, here are three: Its music is instantly familiar, thanks to its usage in the 1950 Bugs Bunny cartoon \u201cRabbit of Seville.\u201d<\/a> Its story is so accessible, it\u2019s among the best operas for introducing first-timers to the art form. And, last but not least, it\u2019s funny.<\/p>\n

Chuck Hudson, the director for San Diego Opera\u2019s \u201cBarber of Seville\u201d production running Friday through next Sunday at the San Diego Civic Theatre, knows a lot about funny.<\/p>\n

\"ChuckChuck Hudson directs San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (Morgan Lee \/ Blue Photo)<\/p>\n

Besides being a prolific director of theater and operas both comedic and dramatic, he\u2019s an expert in Commedia dell\u2019Arte movement and he is one of only three Americans to have received a diploma from the Marcel Marceau International School of Mimedrama in Paris.<\/p>\n

But even with all that training and directing, Hudson says creating comedy is hard work.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of opera singers have a really difficult time with comedy because they\u2019re not trained to do things comically,\u201d said Hudson.<\/p>\n

So, as a rule, every time he directs an opera like Gioachino Rossini\u2019s \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d he brings all the performers (singers and non-singers) together in the same room to teach them a common language of style and movement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat way the ensemble in comedy have a relationship from the beginning. We\u2019re all speaking the same language,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"Mezzo-sopranoMezzo-soprano Stephanie Doche plays Rosina in San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (Rafael Clemente)<\/p>\n

For this production, Hudson is teaching the actors Italian Commedia del\u2019Arte movement, which was the style of performance popular the theater when \u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d premiered in Rome in 1816. He said it isn\u2019t slapstick, burlesque or vaudeville. It\u2019s more like the precise physical craft of actors like Marceau and Charlie Chaplin.<\/p>\n

\u201cSlapstick doesn\u2019t work stylistically for me,\u201d he said. \u201cRossini is called the champagne of music. It\u2019s light, poppy, it has verve and it\u2019s delicious. Slapstick is funny but it\u2019s not champagne. It\u2019s beer. It doesn\u2019t take a lot to laugh at that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TenorTenor Minghao Liu plays Count Almaviva in San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (San Diego Opera)<\/p>\n

Hudson, who makes his home in St. Petersburg, Fla.,\u00a0 said authenticity is also an important part of any style of live storytelling.<\/p>\n

\u201cTelling the story creatively doesn\u2019t have to be real if we\u2019re not doing realism. It doesn\u2019t need to be natural if we\u2019re not doing naturalism. But it needs to be truthful,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Hudson said he came to opera through acting, starting out as a supernumerary (a non-speaking background role) with the Houston outdoor Shakespeare festival and later with Houston Grand Opera. Because he\u2019d been a competitive gymnast before becoming an actor, he used those physical skills to perform a backflip off a table next to a soprano singing an aria in one of his first productions.<\/p>\n

\"BaritoneBaritone Dean Murphy plays Figaro in San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (San Diego Opera)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d opera was based on a 1775 play of the same name by French satirist Pierre Beaumarchais. It\u2019s the story of Rosina, the beautiful and orphaned ward of the greedy Spanish Doctor Bartolo. He keeps her under lock and key and plans to marry Rosina himself in order to get his hands on her inheritance.<\/p>\n

But Rosina has also caught the eye of the wealthy bachelor Count Almaviva, who disguises himself as a poor student to serenade Rosina from the street outside Bartolo\u2019s home in Seville. The opera is named for Figaro, the wily jack-of-all-trades (including barbering skills) who Almaviva enlists to help arrange Rosina\u2019s escape from Bartolo\u2019s home so they can marry.<\/p>\n

Hudson said the \u201cBarber\u201d story is an old one, perhaps inspired by the mythic legend of a hero rescuing maiden from a dragon, but in this case in a comedic way. He said the key figure in his production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d isn\u2019t the hero Almaviva, but the maiden Rosina.<\/p>\n

\"Bass-baritoneBass-baritone Patrick Carfizzi plays Doctor Bartolo in San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (Rafael Clemente)<\/p>\n

\u201cThis Rosina is an incredibly intelligent woman,\u201d he said. \u201cRosina is a woman trapped by these men who are using her as an economic pawn. That was the reality of that time period. This is a comedy, not a drama. How will we see this woman overcome this sitution with her smarts?\u201d<\/p>\n

Rosina will be played in the San Diego Opera production by mezzo-soprano Stephanie Doche, who played Suzuki in the company\u2019s 2024 production of \u201cMadama Butterfly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Co-starring in the production are tenor Minghao Liu as Count Almaviva and baritone Dean Murphy as Figaro, who are both making their company debuts.<\/p>\n

Bass-baritone Patrick Carfizzi, a regular performer at New York\u2019s Metropolitan Opera, will star as Dr. Bartolo. He played the same role for San Diego Opera in 2021 when the company produced a drive-in adaptation of \u201cBarber\u201d in the Pechanga Arena parking lot during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

Hudson said he enjoys working with Carfizzi, who he directed in the role of Leporello in Mozart\u2019s opera \u201cDon Giovanni.\u201d \u201cPatrick is an incredibly talented improvising actor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Bass-baritoneBass-baritone Craig Colclough plays Don Basilio in San Diego Opera\u2019s production of \u201cThe Barber of Seville,\u201d running Feb. 13-15 at the San Diego Civic Theatre. (San Diego Opera)<\/p>\n

He\u2019s also looking forward to reuniting with Craig Colclough, the bass-baritone who plays Don Basilio, the music teacher who\u2019s in on Bartolo\u2019s marriage scheme.<\/p>\n

\u201cCraig and I have done several things He created the \u2018Don Pasquale\u2019 I did at Arizona Opera and it\u2019s had nine different productions. We also created a \u2018Falstaff\u2019 together and we\u2019ve done it twice,\u201d Hudson said.<\/p>\n

The production design for San Diego Opera\u2019s \u201cBarber\u201d\u00a0 will feature new scenery, as well as costumes that were created for a 2025 production of \u201cBarber\u201d that Hudson directed at Minnesota Opera.<\/p>\n

Since \u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d is being presented over Valentine\u2019s Day weekend, San Diego Opera is offering a Valentine\u2019s special. For $22, guests can order two glasses of Prosecco and chocolate-covered strawberries for two. It can be pre-ordered in advance at tickets.sdopera.org\/3162\/3163<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018The Barber of Seville\u2019<\/p>\n

When: 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 2 p.m. next Sunday\n<\/p>\n

Where: San Diego Opera at the San Diego Civic Theatre, 1100 Third Ave., downtown<\/p>\n

Tickets: $53 to $275<\/p>\n

Phone: 619-232-7636<\/p>\n

Online: sdopera.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Among the many reasons \u201cThe Barber of Seville\u201d opera is hugely popular worldwide, here are three: Its music…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[7,7974,5196,967,181,74,84,76,75,1058,420],"class_list":{"0":"post-169327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-classical-music","10":"tag-downtown-san-diego","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-san-diego","14":"tag-san-diego-county","15":"tag-san-diego-headlines","16":"tag-san-diego-news","17":"tag-theater","18":"tag-things-to-do"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}