ALISONPOGORELCDIRECTOR
News & Press
"French composer Paul Dukas is generally known as a one-hit wonder, the composer of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (made famous by Mickey Mouse in “Fantasia”) and nothing else. But that’s because not enough companies tackle his wonderfully shadowy and potent opera “Ariadne and Bluebeard."
"In July, West Edge Opera rectified that situation with a magnificent production that introduced audiences to Dukas’ distinctive blend of Wagnerian harmony and eerie French symbolism."
"A rarity at West Edge: In its new venue at Oakland’s Scottish Rite Temple, the West Edge Opera company’s summer productions of “Julius Caesar” and “Coraline” earned strong reviews. But the season’s surprise hit was the seldom-staged “Ariane and Bluebeard.”
"OPERA America is pleased to announce the eighth cycle of the Robert L.B. Tobin Director-Designer Prize to four teams of creative artists. The biennial prize recognizes promising stage directors and designers for their ingenuity in bringing operatic work to life for contemporary audiences and connects these rising artists with producers who can advance their careers. The Prize is generously supported by the Tobin Theatre Arts Fund.
Alison Pogorelc, director; Ember Streshinsky, set designer; Morgan Williams, choreographer; Zhang Yu, costume designer; Avi Sheehan, lighting designer; and
Camilla Tassi, projection/video designer, for a production concept for Salome (Strauss/Hedwig Lachmann)"
"...A score of ravishing beauty and endless invention, a breathless fusion of Richard Wagner and Claude Debussy that turns this oddly gruesome fairy tale into something powerful and strange. And Sunday’s performance at the Scottish Rite Center in Oakland, dexterously staged by director Alison Pogorelc... made the best imaginable case for the work."
“A ravishing rediscovery… in director Alison Pogorelc’s fine, keenly physicalized production."
"Here, as everywhere in this superb production of an absorbing early 20th-century opera, the stars aligned in a darkly glittering sky.”
"Peak musical theater events like this one don’t come along often.”
"Beginning with Paul Dukas’ lush opera, director Alison Pogorelc delivers a gorgeous and deeply clever production—imparting her own interpretation, as well as allowing us room to choose our own. Pogorelc’s unique talent challenges us to engage—desperately needed in today’s operas."
Review: Ariane et Barbe-Bleue
"Alison Pogorelc's staging was at once bold and subtle, with a geometric scaffold serving as the castle edifice and deftly transforming into a dungeon in Liliana Duque Piñiero's set and Pamila Gray's murky, muted lighting."
"In this gracefully wrought production, West Edge left its listeners to reflect on how daunting both captivity and the path to escape it can be."
"West Edge's first-ever production of the work made its power felt in a grippingly immersive three-hour performance... it was an unqualified triumph."