Review: In Galas, Anthony Roth Costanzo Is the Greatest Diva

There are certain performers who take the stage and with one soul-piercing gaze, eyes flickering in the spotlight, instantly capture the attention and even love of the audience. Maria Callas was one. Anthony Roth Constanzo is another. The superstar countertenor is now playing a fabulous (in every sense) version of the Greek American prima donna in a superb revival of Charles Ludlam’s Galas at Little Island. It is not to be missed.

Ludlam, one of the most underrated (and underproduced) American playwrights, knew a great part when he saw one. The founder of the Ridiculous Theatrical Company played the title role in the 1983 original production opposite his longtime partner and protégé Everett Quinton in the role of Bruna, the trusty maid. Quinton directed and took on the lead role in a 2019 revival. Now that both men are dead, it seemed lamentably possible that their distinctively queer style of theater might disappear with them. But director Eric Ting and his cast prove that there is a new generation of ridiculous performers eager to take up the banner.

We see that from the first scene, when budding prima donna Maria Magdalena Galas (Constanzo) steps off a train in a cloud of steam. She is greeted by opera fan and brick manufacturer Giovanni Baptista Mercanteggini (Carmelita Tropicana), who is to escort her to the Verona Arena. When he inquires about her pet songbird, she responds with the girlish chuckle of a Disney princess, “Pet? No, this is my music teacher.”

Mercanteggini becomes her husband and business manager, securing an unprecedented contract from La Scala despite the personal animosity of artistic director Ghingheri (Austin Durant, sing-shouting his distaste like a constipated tenor). She’s the biggest name in opera, but Bruna (Mary Testa), once a great star herself, warns Magdalena that she is pulling her voice in two different directions, and it will eventually break.

But could she find a suitable retirement plan in shipping tycoon Aristotle Plato Socrates Odysseus (Caleb Eberhardt, exuding Mediterranean decadence)? And if so, how will she break it to her husband? Love, betrayal, and time’s fickle cruelty—it’s the stuff of operatic tragedy, but also laugh-out-loud comedy.

Constanzo easily captures the cinematic grandeur of this Ludlam leading lady, artfully filling in what Julio Torres might call the purple shading of the language. “I’ll make him crawl on his knees to me,” she swears of the faithless Ghingheri, and Constanzo’s committed intensity makes us believe it. It’s almost like he’s had that very thought before and has waited all his life to say it out loud (contrary to popular misconception, the key to performing Ludlam is emotional authenticity). It helps that he is immaculately costumed in every scene by Jackson Wiederhoeft, who has a Vogue editor’s eye for midcentury fashion. And unlike his predecessors in the role, Constanzo can actually sing much of the soprano repertoire and delights us with his renditions of “Habanera” from Carmen and “Casta Diva” from Norma during scene transitions. It’s the best Maria Callas drag act you’ll ever see or hear.

The supporting cast rises to the high bar Constanzo has set. Testa can send an audience into gales of laughter with just a glance. Erin Markey makes a strong impression with her effervescent yet quietly tragic portrayal of Athina Odysseus, the soon-to-be-abandoned first wife. Patricia Black is the embodiment of late-50s swank as socialite Hüre Von Hoyden. And Samora La Perdida commands the stage in multiple roles, most notably as the grotesquely lisping Pope Sixtus VII, whose beat face and kiss curls are reminiscent of Betty Boop. The imagined meeting of La Divina and the Vicar of Christ is a highlight of the play and recalls another Ludlam title: When Queens Collide.

Ludlam premiered all his later plays, including Galas, at his intimate underground theater on Sheridan Square, so one might suspect that an outdoor space like the Amphitheater at Little Island would be an inhospitable venue. But Mimi Lien’s pivoting runways transform the stage into an Italian villa, a papal audience chamber, and a yacht in the Aegean. Tei Blow’s sound design amplifies the voices without discarding intimacy, and Jiyoun Chang’s lighting conveys the excitement of a New Year’s performance at the Rome Opera.

Amid its drawbacks, the Amph has its advantages. I won’t soon forget the image of Constanzo standing before a pair of curtains billowing in the evening wind—Tosca on the Hudson. These are the goosebump-inducing moments for which opera queens live.

That Constanzo is a major opera star is undeniable and was long before his solo Figaro, which performed at Little Island this time last year. But with Galas, he proves that he is also a first-rate stage actor. A Broadway debut cannot be far behind.