TV Reviews : Bernstein Conducts His Own ‘Candide’

Leonard Bernstein wanted to be remembered as another Mahler. Unfortunately, his incredibly facile, ultimately underdeveloped talent as a composer seemed to mark him instead as another Offenbach.

When he tried to master profundity, Bernstein usually mustered banality. When he was content to be clever, witty, naughty and, perhaps, a bit funky, he could be brilliant.

The best passages in “Candide” are indeed brilliant. The worst are redundant, mawkish and/or a bit clumsy.

Encumbered with a plodding libretto concocted by too many literary chefs, this ode to Voltaire flopped on Broadway in 1956. It has undergone numerous drastic revisions in the interim, amassing a loyal cult following in the process but, we are told, never realizing the composer’s lofty goals.

In December, 1989, a fragile Bernstein traveled to London for an extended (some might say overextended), presumably definitive musical version of his comic opus. He had never conducted it before. Nine months later, on Oct. 14, 1990, he died.

Under the circumstances, this commemorative “Candide” (telecast tonight at 6 and again at 10 on A&E; cable) stands as a sad testament. It also stands, alas, as a compromised valedictory.

The drama, if it can be thus described, unfolds as a long and coy concert, with cutesy narrative recitation (written by Bernstein and John Wells) connecting the numbers. The mostly stellar cast performs with dedication, despite a flu epidemic that reportedly ravaged the entire ensemble.

Bernstein croaks his words of introduction with stoic savoir-faire. Seconding the singers, he mouths the text with relentless zeal, and conducts the London Symphony and Chorus with the choreographic brio that made him unique. Watch those hips.

The solo crew is dominated by Jerry Hadley, properly wide-eyed and sweetly lyrical in the title role, and June Anderson, fleet and virtuosic as a rather dark-voiced Cunegonde. Christa Ludwig, erstwhile mezzo-soprano diva, savors a rare camping trip as the quaint Old Lady. Nicolai Gedda, at 64, sounds heroic if a bit rusty as the Governor.

The only serious casting liability involves Adolph Green, entrusted with the cynical smirks and central patter of Pangloss/Martin. A longtime friend of Bernstein’s and a writer responsible for numerous Broadway triumphs, he tries valiantly and charmingly--if not very successfully--to impersonate a bona-fide singer.

For all its nostalgia and glamour, this “Candide” hardly represents the best of all possible operatic worlds.