Candide
Reviewed by David Kashimba
Photo by Eric Chazankin

 The opera Candide, with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Richard Wilbur, Stephen Sondheim and John La Touche, is a lively musical comedy about a hopeless optimist. Candide (Will Hart Meyer) believes that “all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds,” but the more he encounters the real world, the more disillusioned he becomes.

In many ways Candide reminds me of a classic Polish movie that inspired the name of the rock-and-roll group The Grateful Dead. In the movie, whenever the main character has something wonderful happen to him in life, the experience is quickly devastated by a terrible death experience like war or the plague. After several of these extreme high experiences followed by the extreme lows of death, the main character learns that it’s much easier to simply be grateful for death. Or, as one of the characters in Candide says: “What to live for but to die?”

Though it may not sound like it, both the Polish movie and Candide are great comedies full of subtle ironies, lots of laughs and bawdy fun. Stage direction by Elly Lichenstein and music direction by Nina Shuman are superb and the entire cast is excellent. This is one of those shows you wish would never end. It’s a true delight.

For tickets or more information call (707) 763-8920 or visit www.cinnabartheater.org.

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