Lauren Flanigan to Star in Stephen Schwartz’s Séance on a Wet Afternoon

Soprano Lauren Flanigan will star as Myra Savage in Séance on a Wet Afternoon, featuring music and libretto by Stephen Schwartz, based on the novel by Mark McShane and screenplay by Bryan Forbes. The work will be presented as part of New York City Opera’s free VOX: Showcasing American Opera series, to be held at the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, on May 1 and 2.

The piece is about a psychic and her husband who plan an elaborate kidnapping scheme to legitimize her powers. It will also feature Jane Shaulis (Mrs. Wintry), Jennifer Zetlan (Miss Rose), Theodore Cheltsos (Mr. Bennett), Andrew Oakden (Mr. Cole), Michael Zegarski (Bill Savage), Michael Marcotte (Irish Tenor), and Jonathan Makepeace (Arthur), with members of the New York City Opera Chorus.

The series will also include Ted Hearne’s Katrina Ballads, Chandler Carter’s No Easy Walk to Freedom, Yoav Gal’s Mosheh, Gordon Beeferman and Charlotte Jackson’s The Rat Land, Christopher Cerrone’s Invisible Cities, Jonathan Dawe and Heather Raffo’s Armide, Michaela Eremiásová, Jairo Duarte-López, and Skip Battaglia’s Car Crash Opera, Anne LeBaron and Douglas Kearney’s Crescent City, and David Bruce and Alasdair Middleton’s A Bird in Your Ear.

In addition, there will be a roundtable discussion with all of the composers, moderated by Yuval Sharon and a panel discussion entitled American Opera: Past, Present, Future, to be moderated by George Steel, and feature panelists Mark Adamo, Eve Beglarian, Anne Bogart, Carlisle Floyd, and Nico Muhly.

For more information, visit www.nycopera.com.