It was opera like you've never seen it — a dozen teens creating a three-minute show out of a children's book, "The Very Hungry Caterpillar."
As 13-year-old Taj Hunter wriggled across the floor as the caterpillar, the performers playing the fruits he ate took their dramatic turns at operatic death.
"Tell my mother I love her," bellowed the dying plum, who collapsed to the stage.
"Noooo. I'm too young to die!" the strawberry screamed as the caterpillar munched at her feet.
Then it was Kae Mella's turn as the ice cream cone that, as the familiar story goes, makes the caterpillar sick. Only the song of her death was less aria and more Louis Armstrong.
"Ah hope you get a BRAIN FREEEEEZE!" she sang.
Even among these teens, who are being trained in music and acting at the Lundstrum Center for the Performing Arts, opera is a little foreign. It is why the north Minneapolis center teamed up with performers and directors from Mill City Summer Opera to provide a four-session opera camp, which concluded with the "Hungry Caterpillar" opera, which the teens created and performed this week.
"We find that opera, especially for younger kids, can be incredibly overwhelming," said David Lefkowich, artistic director for the Mill City company, which is performing "The Barber of Seville" outdoors at the Mill City Museum Ruin Courtyard in Minneapolis this week.
