{"id":200704,"date":"2026-03-02T16:28:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T16:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/200704\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T16:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T16:28:08","slug":"patti-lupones-matters-of-the-heart-at-la-opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/200704\/","title":{"rendered":"Patti LuPone’s MATTERS OF THE HEART at LA Opera"},"content":{"rendered":"

\ud83c\udfad NEW! Los Angeles Theatre Newsletter<\/p>\n

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On the way to LA Opera\u2019s Patti LuPone<\/a>: Matters of the Heart, I mused over which songs she might sing. Would we hear anything from her Tony-Award-winning portrayal of Madame Rose<\/a>? Perhaps a snippet of Anything Goes? Or what about the countless iconic roles she originated in her illustrious career?<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfad NEW! Los Angeles Theatre Newsletter<\/p>\n

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I felt certain we would hear a bit of \u2018Meadowlark\u2019 and \u2018Ladies Who Lunch\u2019. To my delight and surprise, Ms. LuPone kept us on our toes, giving us renditions of songs sung by characters she would never be cast as and interpolating pop classics and standards. LuPone has woven an unexpected, eclectic musical collage that leads to two clear conclusions; she knows what sounds good in her voice and she knows how to sell a song.<\/p>\n

A highlight of the evening for me was \u2018Back to Before\u2019 from Ragtime. LuPone\u2019s image may overall be too brassy and self-assured to capture the initial slightness of Mother, but her rendition of the character\u2019s climactic understanding of how she must move forward with her life was astounding. As with many other unexpected songs\u2014 \u2018Easy to Be Hard\u2019 from Hair or \u2018A Wonderful Guy\u2019 from South Pacific\u2014initial trepidations melt away as LuPone affirms her versatility and range.<\/p>\n

It would be hard to name a performer who could lend such specificity and authenticity to Forbush\u2019s assertion, \u201cI\u2019m in love, I\u2019m in love, I\u2019m in love, I\u2019m in love, I\u2019m in love with a wonderful guy!\u201d Audience favorites included her covers of Cyndi Lauper<\/a>\u2019s \u2018Time After Time\u2019 and The Beach Boys<\/a>\u2019 \u2018God Only Knows\u2019, both of which she imbued with as much dignity and character as the more dramatic selections.<\/p>\n

The evening is rife with elegant touches. During intermission, the sumptuous bouquet of white roses on the piano are replaced by an equally-sumptuous bouquet of red roses. Above all, LuPone seems to be playing a game.<\/p>\n

Just when you think she can\u2019t tug at your heartstrings with her next selection, she sticks the landing again. Name another performer who could turn \u2018Hello, Young Lovers\u2019 from The King and I into a show stopping finale. I certainly can\u2019t. Matters of the Heart manages to be intimate and grand, capturing the range of emotions we quantify as \u2018love\u2019 and demonstrating the undeniable virtuosity of LuPone\u2019s capabilities.<\/p>\n

Reader Reviews<\/p>\n

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\"Broadway<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\ud83c\udfad NEW! Los Angeles Theatre Newsletter Get all the top news & discounts for Los Angeles & beyond.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":200705,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[48,52,51,47,50,49],"class_list":{"0":"post-200704","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-la","9":"tag-la-headlines","10":"tag-la-news","11":"tag-los-angeles","12":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","13":"tag-los-angeles-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200704","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=200704"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200704\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}