David Lefkowich
Stage Director
PRESS
I' IDOMENEO
Ravinia Festival, 2012e
“Idomeneo brings CSO residency to impressive close at Ravinia.” - “...semi-staged presentation took advantage of the cozy intimacy of Ravinia’s 850-seat MartinTheatre. David Lefkowich’s minimal staging, using a few props and lighting changes to mark the various scenes, had the singers crisscrossing the stage apron in various states of emotional extremis, sometimes entering and exiting from an aisle. It was enough.”
Chicago Tribune - John von Rhein
- “Ravinia’s intimate staging proves ideal for Mozart’s Idomeneo”
- “Riveting performances from everyone on the Martin Theatre stage, deployed by director David Lefkowich, created that strong bond.”
- “This is Mozart not to be missed.”
Chicago Classical Review - Wynne Delacoma
I'm anoPAGLIACCI
“An occasion – an event worth being at.”
Star Tribune - Graydon Royce
- “Opera under the stars makes a glittering debut with Pagliacci - “A new company, Mill City Summer Opera, has created something magical with its inaugural production of Ruggiero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci. Its Thursday, July 12 debut featured one excellent artistic decision after another, the score sung and played exceptionally well, the staging full of imagination, energy and intensity.”
- “Director David Lefkowich’s cast is clearly committed to making this 19th-century landmark of operatic realism as emotionally immediate as possible. “
Pioneer Press - Rob Hubbard
- “FGO’s Roméo et Juliette was a resounding success. Lefkowich’s production (originally conceived for Minnesota Opera in 2008) introduced some ideas that modernized the story of the star-crossed lovers.”
- “Lefkowich created moments that breathed with freshness...splendid theatre.”
- “The duels and assassination of Act III were credible and effectively choreographed.”
Opera News - Jean-Francois Lejeune
- “FGO’s incarnation under the direction of David Lefkowich is an inventively staged and well-acted mounting of the stark take on the
Shakespearian classic.”
- “Playful, profound and rapturous”
- “Lefkowich’s work is one of the production’s strengths. He encourages his actors to delve fearlessly into the adolescent passion and embrace the poetic lyrics along with Gounod’s score. His visual flair is evident in crowd scenes such as the masked ball where there is always a sense of motion and the ensemble is engaged in individualized bits of business like minor figures in a crowed post-Renaissance painting. His skill as a fight arranger cones in handy in the gang clashes, and his choreographic bent employs dancers to restage the plot in slow-motion nightmares such as Romeo recalling the double killings.”
Sun Sentinel - Bill Hirschman
“...stage director David Lefkowich and his design team underscored the work’s high theatricality without veering into the merely melodramatic.
- “...The production was solid through and through, and it is a tribute to everyone involved that one of the staples of the repertoire could feel so
fresh and alive.”
Opera News - Kalen Ratzlaff
“Romantic, dramatic, ‘Tosca’ is a winner” - “A great production of "Tosca" energizes enthusiasts, and Boston Lyric Opera's version of
Puccini's dramatic classic, which opened Friday at the Shubert Theatre, will certainly send ripples of delight through the opera community. The challenge comes in matching the onstage action to the intensity of the music. "Tosca" does not meander haphazardly from aria to aria with filler music or concocted narration; Puccini wrote a work of fierce intensity, where every note counts. The singers must match that intensity with their acting, and the sets must mirror the drama. This production does, and then some.”
Boston Herald- Keith Powers
“`Tosca' opens Lyric Opera season with a high” “... when the production is as good as Boston Lyric Opera's season-opening offering at the Shubert Theatre, it's potent stuff.”
“...this production as a whole: canny enough to ride Puccini's expertise, clever enough to effectively freshen it up here and there, and capable enough to generate a satisfying dramatic kick. BLO's "Tosca" delivers the goods.”
Boston Globe - Matthew Guerrieri
IL TROVATORE
- “Rather than attempt to gloss over the plot’s more farfetched elements by overlaying it with some distracting concept, Lefkowich seemed to encourage his artists to concentrate on the music and understate the histrionics – a good solution...
Opera News - Louise T. Guinther
- “... director David Lefkowich navigated the story’s tricky waters beautifully.”
Examiner - David Weuste
- “Wisely, the director left his heroine alone, on a bare, blindingly bright stage, to commune, rivetingly, with Jochanaan’s head.”
Opera News - Larry Fuchsberg
- “Kinky, sensual and ecstatic: Minnesota Opera’s “Salome” is a 100-minute psychodrama with a grimly gorgeous and bloody finale.”
Star Tribune - Larry Fuchsberg
“...rendered with spellbinding finesse...exceptionally powerful production."
Examiner - Brad Richason
- “...this is a must-see...Director David Lefkowich is ingenuous in his use of timing, finely honed acting and farce along with the music and the surprise setting.”
- Top 5 Moments in the Arts in 2011
The Times Union - Priscilla McLean
- “...Everything about the two-act opera was superlative...”
The Daily Gazette - Geraldine Freedman
- “...the synergy...was so electric that the show carried the audience along to a prolonged ovation.”
Chicago Tribune
- “Wildy kinetic and imaginative staging by David Lefkowich”
Chicago Classical Review - Gerry Fisher