Post-Kennedy Center, the Washington National Opera adapts at venues across Maryland

As a Broadway and Broadway national tour alum, Ryan McCartan knows a thing or two about the logistics of performing the same show in different places.

Even so, he’s curious about what to expect next week when he stars in the the Washington National Opera’s production of “West Side Story” at two Maryland venues. The shows, at the Lyric Baltimore on May 8-10 and The Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda on May 14-15, each requires a very different set of logistics.

This was not the original plan.

The WNO announced its departure from the Kennedy Center earlier this year amid President Donald Trump’s takeover of the performing arts center and hurriedly relocated its spring shows, including the back-to-back Maryland performances.

How difficult will it be to adapt the classic musical in different spaces?

“The short answer is none of us really know,” said McCartan, who plays Tony opposite fellow Broadway star Shereen Pimentel’s Maria. Previously, McCartan starred on Broadway in “Wicked” and “Frozen,” and was later part of the national tour for the latter.

“All of us who have experience with touring, I think that’s the closest thing we can relate this to, but what we’re going to do in Baltimore and what we’re going to do in Strathmore are actually going to be slightly different,” he added.

The WNO had called the Kennedy Center home for more than half a century.

Now, the WNO splits its time between a variety of venues in D.C., Maryland and Virginia, leaving its once-stationary team to learn how to make opera productions work in a wide variety of environments.

On the road

At every new venue, the WNO has had to adjust to spaces with different measurements, technology capabilities and room for performers.

“The first question is availability, and then the second question is ‘What size is your stage and what size is your pit?’” said Chelsea Dennis, director of production for the WNO.

The first post-Kennedy Center operas, “Treemonisha” and “The Crucible,” took place earlier this spring in the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University, where the WNO first began 70 years ago. It was a full-circle story, but the WNO has grown through the decades. The venue’s orchestra pit was smaller than the one they otherwise would have used in the Kennedy Center’s Eisenhower Theater.

That meant some of the musicians had to set up in a black box theater underneath the stage, where microphones and video cameras kept them connected to the maestro’s directions and allowed them to blend with the rest of the orchestra.

“We don’t do it in opera much,” Dennis said, noting that it’s fairly typical for touring Broadway shows to execute similar logistics.

Next month’s production of “West Side Story” is the WNO’s first real foray into Maryland, where the team hopes to attract new patrons in theaters closer to their homes.

“I hope that they are going to come and welcome us with open arms,” said WNO Artistic Director Francesca Zambello. “Lots and lots of them.”

Tweaking ‘West Side Story’ for The Lyric and Strathmore

Opera stages are typically larger than standard musical theater venues or concert halls, which means the WNO’s usual strategies of designing large scenery pieces to fill the Eisenhower Theater weren’t going to work this season.

In addition to figuring out varying lighting and sound systems, the WNO needed to arrange transportation and housing for performers for five days of shows between Baltimore and North Bethesda.

“That was a major challenge for this one,” Dennis said.

A 50-musician orchestra needs space. The Lyric Baltimore has an orchestra pit, but Strathmore doesn’t — it’s designed as a concert hall, which means the orchestra is supposed to sit onstage. That doesn’t doesn’t leave much room for large, moving set pieces.

As a result, performances at Strathmore will be “semi-staged” compared to the Baltimore ones, featuring the regular costumes, lighting, props and furniture, but not the fire escapes or New York City skyline backdrops one might expect from a “West Side Story” production. The show will otherwise be staged as originally intended.

Zambello promises, in both Maryland venues, a “first-class production of this musical,” with performers at the top of their games and the WNO’s usual 50-player Kennedy Center orchestra.

“The ethos and the philosophy stay the same,” Zambello said. “People will have a full theatrical experience, but, of course, we have to prepare for two different ways of doing it. I won’t say that’s easy, but I will say that performers, once they know what they’re doing and who they are, you can drop them in a desert and they can still do it.”

The WNO will soon announce its lineup for next season, which includes seven offerings across five venues — and more logistical puzzles to solve.

The production team is up for it, Dennis said.

“They never want to say no — they always want to say, ‘What if we try this?’” she said.

And in the days before he belts out “Maria,” McCartan said he’s looking forward to putting on a great show across the Maryland line.

“Am I worried? Absolutely not.”