Lemonade Opera

The three singers who had just taken their bows had to carry part of the Hansel and Gretel scenery offstage with them when the curtain went down. A carrot-haired electrician in costume flipped a few switches, then hurried onstage again. The ticket-seller looked like--and was--the girl who had sung Zerlina in Don Giovanni. It was homemade "Lemonade Opera," and though the singing and acting were occasionally weak and sugary, Manhattan was gulping it down.

Last May, a bustling young (29) voice coach, Kenneth Hieber, rounded up a group of young singers who were eager to be heard but did not have the $1,500 to put up for big-time debuts. They chipped in $25 apiece to cover costs, and, for the use of its 260-seat basement auditorium, gave the Greenwich Village Presbyterian Church a share in their company. Hieber got a veteran Broadway actor, Max Leavitt, to teach his singers how to act. Leavitt, in turn, gave the company a name. "Let's serve lemonade," he proposed, "and call it lemonade opera."

For an orchestra the company substituted two pianos. Cost of production: $49 a night for two pianists and Musical Director Hieber, all union members. By last weekend, Lemonade Opera had given 20 sell-out performances of Don Giovanni and 16 Hansel and Gretels.

Hit of the season was the witch, decked out in a grotesque sausage-shaped nose (see cut), sung by Ruth Kobart, 23, a graduate of Chicago's American Conservatory of Music. Critics thought that Lemonade Opera might have uncovered a potential star in Juilliard-trained Soprano Mary Paull, who sang Donna Anna in Don Giovanni (and who translated the operas into English).

For their $25, the Lemonaders have had more than just a hearing. Last month, they got a 400% return on their investment: $100 apiece. After they shut up shop this week, they will share another dividend.

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