FROM AROUND THE WORLD: BARCELONA.(Review)

In Barcelona, an exuberant cast sparked the sleek Teatro Novedades production of Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's A Little Night Music (Musica per a una nit d'estiu). The sonorous sibilants of the Catalan language sometimes made for a precarious translational fit with the music -- "A Weekend in the Country" became "Tres dias a la finca" (three days on the farm), for example. But overall, the show was intelligently staged and acted. Directed by Spanish theatrical renaissance man Mario Gas, it fully caught the bittersweet, fin-de-siecle flavor of the work, with elegant costuming and lighting, plus Jon Berrondo's effectively mobile bits of Art Nouveau-ish scenery. One could have done without the entire cast doing interminable "vogue"-like hand gestures during the orchestral opening of "Night Waltz," but otherwise Marta Carrasco's choreography kept things moving with speed and grace.

The production was a real family affair. Gas also conducted, and his wife, Vicky Pena, played Desiree; their daughter, fifteen-year-old Miranda Gas, was Desiree's daughter, Fredrika. Pena's mother, veteran stage actress Montserrat Carulla, played her onstage parent, Mme. Armfeldt.

Under Gas's sensitive conducting, the score blossomed, even with a reduced orchestra. Pena, who was recently well-received here as Mrs. Lovett in another Gas-directed Sondheim show, Sweeney Todd, delivered a high-energy, ...