A Softened ‘Mahagonny’

Regarding Martin Bernheimer’s criticisms of “The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny,” as produced by the Music Center Opera (“ ‘Mahagonny’ Goes Hollywood,” Sept. 12): I was the associate producer of the 1970 production of “Mahagonny” in New York with Barbara Harris and Estelle Parsons and gifted producer-director Carmen Capalbo. He too attempted to contemporize certain elements of the opera, which resulted in injunctions, arbitration and talented people calling each other vile names.

But Carmen’s approach never attempted to pull the teeth of this marvelous work or blatantly soften and romanticize its satire and bite as does the current Dorothy Chandler Pavilion production.

I’m not necessarily a purist. But Lotte Lenya’s distinctive voice does float back to me from the bitter legal arbitration of 20 years ago: “But darling, this is the way Bertolt and Kurt wrote it!!”

CHARLES ROME SMITH

Glendale