Like Doctor Atomic, Tobias Picker's An American Tragedy appears likely to inspire wildly varying critical and popular opinion. The fine young men of Wellsung write borderline raves; Sieglinde is impressed; Tony Tommasini praises faintly; Justin Davidson is not having it. My review will appear in the New Yorker in a couple of weeks, and personal superstition prevents me from saying more until the magazine is out. The Met has created a handsome website for the opera. The Standing Room has created a shrine to Nathan Gunn, the opera's lead. There was a phase of my life when I was unhealthily obsessed with Montgomery Clift, who played Gunn's role in A Place in the Sun; I'll try not to let this color my review. Has anyone thought of making an opera from Suddenly, Last Summer? "I've never seen an insectivorous plant before, Mrs. Venable...."
