Amadeus

Norwalk’s Tom Petrone will portray Emperor Joseph II

in the Town Players of New Canaan’s production of

Peter Shaffer’s Tony award winning play Amadeus

which opens Friday, November 4th and plays through Saturday, November 19th

at the Powerhouse Theatre in Waveny Park, New Canaan

and he will be joined by actor/set designer Eric Schultz who plays the leading role of Salieri and is living in Norwalk during Amadeus rehearsals and the run of the show

             Recreating the role of Salieri which he first performed twenty years ago, actor/scene designer Eric Schultz will play the leading role of Salieri in the opening production of the Town Players of New Canaan’s 65th season, Peter Shaffer’s Tony award winning drama Amadeus. Mr. Schultz is living in Norwalk during Amadeus rehearsals and the run of the show and will be joined by Norwalk resident Tom Petrone who will portray Emperor Joseph II of Austria. The play opens at the Powerhouse Theatre in Waveny Park, 677 South Avenue, New Canaan on Friday, November 4th and plays through November 19th.  Tickets are $20 for adults and $15 for students (through graduate school) and seniors (62).  To reserve seats, please call (203) 966-7371 or go to info@tpnc.org.

             Amadeus is a fictionalized account of composer Antonio Salieri’s corroding envy and destruction of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and a provocative work that weaves a confrontation between mediocrity and genius into a tale of breathtaking dramatic power. Mr. Schultz comes to the Town Players from Nantucket where Lynne Bolton directed him in The Book of Liz this past summer. “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:36) anchors his understanding of Salieri and his appreciation that over the two decades between Amadeus’s London première in 1979 and its 1999 Broadway revival playwright Peter Shaffer re-wrote the crucial Last Encounter scene between Salieri and Mozart six times. In the preface to the play, Mr. Shaffer explains, “They represent a huge rethinking of the whole trajectory of action concerning Salieri’s growing guilt, which I had long wanted to explore in greater depth:  a need for atonement—first broached in the earliest production with Scofield—and more and more urgently arising in the man from his realization of what he has actually done with his own self-debasing life.”

            In his first TPNC main stage show since Enchanted April, Mr. Petrone appeared as Johnny in a Stage II reading of Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, which turned out to be a One-Night Only show thanks to Hurricane Irene. Tom “loves both costume dramas that take place in the 18th century and historical movies that feature Errol Flynn and Burt Lancaster.” He has the distinction of having played Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson and Professor Moriarty in three different productions and  was awarded the 2010 Square One Subscriber Award for Best Supporting Actor for his turn in The Clearing at Square One Theatre, an historical play that takes place even earlier in mid 17th century Ireland.

            Amadeus director Lynne Bolton says that the theatrical convention of Salieri’s flashback monologues delivered to the audience helps her approach Salieri’s inner duplicity and seeming above-board helpfulness extended to Mozart. Ms. Bolton muses, “Life for Salieri, for all of us, comes down to small moments in time when we decide which road to take.”  She cites the scene when Emperor Joseph II yawns at the final curtain of The Magic Flute. “Not a genius, but brilliant, Salieri singularly understands Mozart’s genius which tortures him. He cannot reconcile the coarseness of Mozart, the man, with his music, which is the voice of angels, the voice of God. Salieri could have said, ‘Your majesty this is the most brilliant piece of music ever composed.’ Instead he takes the low road and we watch Salieri make the sinister choice to destroy Mozart.” 

             Asked, “What draws audiences to Amadeus?” Ms. Bolton responds, “We get to hear Mozart’s music and to know the man behind the music. The scenes that surround the music explain Mozart and his music.  Mozart takes his mundane, everyday life and turns it into genius music.  He makes us look at our everyday lives and hear God’s voice in our lives.  The journey of this genius moves the actors and the audience. I am also excited that the Town Players’ new sound system will give Mozart’s music and Vienna intrigue such immediacy!’

            Photo caption for Amadeus – Emperor Joseph II and Mozart:  Emperor Joseph II of Austria (Tom Petrone) looks favorably upon Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Bobby Pavia) the newest composer at his court.  Photo Credit:  Tom Hughey

            Photo Caption for Amadeus – Emperor, Opera Director and Mozart:  Count Orsini-Rosenberg, Director of the Imperial Opera (Gary Battaglia) takes an immediate dislike to Mozart (Bobby Pavia) as Emperor Joseph II (Tom Petrone), a rather jolly soul who likes fêtes and fireworks, looks on.  Photo credit:  Tom Hughey

            Photo Caption for Amadeus – von Strack, Mozart & Constanze & Salieri:  Second in command after the emperor Count von Strack (Manny Lieberman) ponders that the newly arrived to Vienna composer Mozart (Bobby Pavia), supported by his loving wife Constanze (Ammie Renée Brown), will compose comic and other operas in German, while Antonio Salieri (Eric Schultz) sees nothing but a threat to his own ascendancy.  Photo credit:  Tom Hughey