Times Union Preview of THE CONSUL at Opera Saratoga

"After making his exit in the opening scene, baritone Robert Wesley Mason — aka John — sits on the side. He watches as his castmates rehearse the next one, set in the consulate and filled with people trapped in a dehumanizing stranglehold of red tape.

Talking at the break, he fights back tears. 'God, this week — you know?,' he says, eyes welling. 'You see everything on the news, with families ripped apart.' He shakes his head. Hard to escape the parallels with the U.S.-Mexican border. 'It's been on our minds the whole time. Everything. Obviously. But this, today — it's just an energy.'

Read more from the Times Union preview of the Opera Saratoga production of Menotti's The Consul here.