Boston Globe: ‘Awakenings’ Is The Stuff of Dreams
Before we entered the Huntington Theatre on Saturday evening for the New England premiere of “Awakenings,” a new opera inspired by an episode in the life of neurologist Oliver Sacks, my plus-one — a dear friend who introduced me to Sacks’s work many years ago — warned me that he might fall asleep during the show, as he had during “Die Fledermaus,” “The Barber of Seville,” and every other opera he’d seen in his 30-some years. I told him not to worry because he probably wouldn’t be the only one.
I glanced at him several times during the performance. Invariably, his eyes were wide open. “I needed that,” he said as we pulled our coats on afterward, both of us reeling from the impact of what we had just experienced. “Awakenings” only premiered last summer at its commissioning house, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, so it may be too early to declare it a modern classic, but given the opportunity I think it will become one. I’m just disappointed that Odyssey Opera and Boston Modern Orchestra Project only mounted one performance; had there been another, I would have been telling all my friends to see it.