THEATER REVIEW
‘Promethean Concerto’ - Produced by: Tomorrow’s Classics Theatre Company
Reviewed by: Jeb Ladouceur
The life of Ludwig van Beethoven is one of the most widely documented among biographies of the world’s fine artists. We all know that he was born in Bonn, Germany in 1770, that he died at age 57, was a gifted pianist despite having become deaf, and that to this day, his legacy marks him as one of the most renowned and influential musical composers in history.
But we know little of the man’s complex private life … his dysfunctional family … his inner demons … or his spiritual angst. It is to these issues, and in particular to Ludwig’s undying adoration of his beloved Josephine, that Long Island author Cindi Sansone-Braff has shone her bright biographer’s light, and given us the type of incisive play the theater industry desperately needs more of.
In this world premiere of ‘Promethean Concerto’ (the play’s full title is ‘Beethoven’s Promethean Concerto in C Minor Without Opus’) Braff’s analytical lens is so probing … her observations so precise … and her dialogue so appropriately ‘musical’ in structure … that it would have been a shame to assign the delivery of these magnificent lines to a relatively unknown actor.
Or so one might think.
But let us give credit where it’s due. Partnering with Debi Toni, her multi-talented co-founder of Tomorrow’s Classics Theatre Company, Braff and angel/investor, T.J. Clemente, discovered the acting gem her play needed in the person of Michael Brinzer, a music student currently studying in New York City.
In ‘Promethean Concerto,’ Brinzer has been given the perfect vehicle to showcase his many talents. Not only is he blessed with that rare ability to command the audience’s full attention even when speaking in a near-whisper, the young man (he can’t be beyond his mid-twenties) takes to the baby grand in Act II and delivers an absolutely mesmerizing ‘Moonlight Sonata.’ Indeed, Michael’s virtuosity made everyone at the sold-out Babylon Arts Council venue gasp.
Speaking of which, one of Brinzer’s lines has to do with Beethoven’s chiding of a youngster’s piano teacher who insisted his students play until their fingers bled. “Doesn’t he know that a great virtuoso is born and not made?” Beethoven asks. The rhetorical question could have been put to those who nurtured the natural-born actor/musician Michael Brinzer.
Though ‘Promethean Concerto’ is hardly a one-man show (James Lombardi is excellent as Beethoven’s nephew Karl, and Debi Toni’s sweet soprano delivery of Beethoven’s music still resonates in my ears) the stage is Brinzer’s for most of the play’s two-hour pleasing length.
It’s my understanding that Cindi Sansone-Braff wrote this exquisite biographical drama around the turn of the century. One can only speculate on the years of theatrical triumph that certainly would have accrued to the play and its playwright had she (now well into middle age) found a Michael Brinzer to interpret her sensational script back then
Brinzer’s construal of The Maestro from Bonn would surely have become the gold standard for future actors to emulate. Because Michael … and the dialogue-rich Promethean Concerto … and of course the music of Beethoven … would all have run away with those coveted Tony Awards.
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Award-winning writer, Jeb Ladouceur is the author of a dozen novels, and his theater and book reviews appear in several major L.I. publications. His recent hit, THE GHOSTWRITERS, explores the bizarre relationship between the late Harper Lee and Truman Capote. Ladouceur’s newly completed thriller, THE SOUTHWICK INCIDENT, was introduced at the Smithtown Library on May 21st. The book involves a radicalized Yale student and his CIA pursuers. Mr. Ladouceur’s revealing website is www.JebsBooks.com