The conservative thesp’s selection to portray Voltaire and Pangloss is also inspired, in that Grammer’s most popular character, Dr. Bush, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Rudie-Doody Giuliani, Ben Carson and Trump, Grammer certainly has one of the finest minds of the 18th century. As one of left-leaning La La Land’s most outspoken Republicans, who endorsed wackadoodle Congresswoman Michele Bachmann for president in 2012 and also backed GOP contenders George W. It is also extremely entertaining, with a bubbly “Overture” conducted by James Conlon so enrapturing and ebullient that it’s one of those rare pieces of music which makes one glad to be alive - if only to be able to hear such joyous sounds.Ĭasting Kelsey Grammer as the French philosophe Voltaire (1894-1778) and Professor Pangloss is a sly, canny choice. Is it to attain status, wealth, glory, sexual gratification, love or what? As such, this musical adaptation, which first appeared on Broadway in 1956, is one of the most philosophical operas and operettas ever staged.

Pangloss is mocked for his perpetually excessive optimism in what he calls “in this the best of all possible worlds.”īorn out-of-wedlock to the Baron’s sister, during his globetrotting Candide - so named because “His judgment was quite honest and he was extremely simple-minded” - seeks to find out the meaning of life. Jack Swanson, Christine Ebersole, and Erin Morleyĭoctor or Professor Pangloss, who tutored Candide, et al, in “metaphysico-theologo-cosmolo-nigology” at the Baron’s castle in Thunder-ten-tronckh, is an intriguing, droll character through which Voltaire spoofs some of his fellow Age of Reason philosophers.

La opera candide