*Orgy and Bess,* Nov 7 2025

I saw Heartbeat Opera's Orgy and Bess on Nov 7, 2025.

Heartbeat is a scrappy chamber opera company here in town, I've seen a handful of their shows. Last year I saw their production of Salome which was scored for eight clarinet players and two percussionists. A fascinating experiment but not really a viable choice. Their scaled down Faust last spring was much more successful.

They do a drag extravaganza every year, a mashup of opera excerpts and pop references, heavy on the drag, heavy on camp and blue talk. I thought this was my first time seeing one of these shows but it turns out I had seen their Messy Messiah back in 2021.

https://www.divamensch.com/messy-messiah-dec-2022

The full title of this show was Orgy and Bess: Deep Throats and High Notes. It was created by Ethan Heard and Jacob Ashworth with arrangements by Heartbeat's resident genius Dan Schlosberg. The overture was the orchestra playing music from their nine previous drag shows, with video showing excerpts from those shows. The first number was tenor Bernard Holcomb in Bess drag singing "My Man's Gone Now," listed in the program as being "from the prequel to Orgy and Bess." Hilarious! Holcomb was extraordinary throughout the show, delivering the goods both as an opera singer and as a drag actor. All of the singers did that, actually. Here's Holcomb singing "Questa o quella" from Rigoletto.

But there was actually a short bit before "My Man's Gone Now." Bess came onstage wearing a red coat, a kerchief, carrying two very 1960s plastic suitcases. The orchestra played something suitably dramatic which turned on a dime to become a few lines of Holcomb singing "NYC" from Annie. Oh did I laugh.

I just did YouTube search for that number in Annie and found the most astonishing thing. One of Sutton Foster's early Broadway shows was the 1997 revival of Annie - - she played the character who does the solo in this show, a young woman with the prescient name A Star To Be. And how, girlfriend has two Tonys!

The story of the show (if I may call it a story) is that Bess has come to New York and is trying to make it. The first person she runs into is Cio-Cio San, aka Madame Butterfly, listed in the program as Miss Butterflowerdrumikadoking&saigon. She sang a medley of "Un bel di" from Butterfly, "Chop Suey" from Flower Drum Song, "We are gentlemen of Japan" from The Mikado, something from Miss Saigon, and capped off with the big finish of "Un bel di." This role was played by soprano Angela Yam. Here she is singing the Sophie part in the presentation of the rose from Der Rosenkavalier. I don't understand why anyone thinks this works as a solo when it's absolutely a duet but it's a good representation of her singing:

The dialogue between Cio-Cio San and Bess had the biggest laugh of the show. I paraphrase:

BESS: Oh the last few months have been a disaster. Porgy, he's a good man but he's got issues. And Crown, I've got history with him but he's a rough dude, things turned ugly on Kittiwah Island. And Sportin' Life, he got me hooked on coke!

CIO-CIO SAN: Wow, these white men have really put your through the ringer.

BESS: Um no girl - - all these guys I'm talking about are Black.

CIO-CIO SAN: I'm talking about the Gershwins.

[huge laughter from the audience]

BESS: The Gershwins are white...?

Cio-Cio San schooled Bess about racism. Bess's other mentor was the next to appear, Lucia from Lucia di Lammermoor, who schooled Bess about the patriarchy. I was particularly tickled that she was styled and performed as a send-up of Joan Sutherland as Lucia.

It was touching that the Sutherland Lucia still has cultural significance forty years later. This role was sung by Jamilyn Manning. Here she is singing the Queen of the Night aria in a previous Heartbeat drag show:

The fourth character was a baritone in rich old lady drag as a traditionalist opera patron. She talked about how opera was going to hell in a handbasket with every director feeling that they can do whatever they want with the classics. She shed a few tears over the great Zefferelli, which got a big laugh. This role was played by baritone John Taylor Ward. I wish I had taken a photo of him, he looked great. By the way we were encouraged to take photos and videos and post them on social media. I'm not on Facebook and am only an observer on Instagram - - does this blog count as "social media"?

Here's Ward doing a lovely job with Monteverdi:

I was thrilled to see Ortrud's Curse from Lohengrin on the program but it didn't quite deliver when sung by him, with the center of gravity moved an octave and a half lower than originally intended. I've always described Ortrud's Curse as the most exciting minute and a half in opera. Here's Evelyn Herlitzius spewing her venom:

Bess, Cio-Cio San, and Lucia all go to an orgy in Brooklyn. This subway sign showing what time your train was expected to arrive got a huge laugh:

The fifth and final character was the host of the orgy, a mezzo with a codpiece:

This role was sung by Sishel Claverie. Here she is singing a Rodrigo song:

She sang an aria from Lucrezia Borgia and was coursing with machismo. The humping at the orgy was done behind a large white piece of fabric with the five singers doing excerpts from Carmina Burana, culminating in the two sopranos scissoring while singing the "Dulcissime" solo together, in thirds.

The afterglow scene had the five of them singing a number from Rameau's Les Indes Galantes. The orgy brought out the best in Bess, she found her true, vibrant, powerful self. This moment of awakening the self-discovery was conveyed by Holcomb doing the show-stopping tenor aria "Nessun dorma," lipsynching to Aretha Franklin's rendition in the first half and then capping it off with his own glorious voice in the end. Her transformation was heightened by an onstage costume change to this amazing outfit:

The postlude had the five characters all meeting up a few months later in Fire Island, leading to them singing a luscious arrangement of "Summertime."

I will definitely never miss this show again! Heartbeat is doing two other productions this season, pared-down versions of the 19th century Massenet opera Manon and the mid-20th century Barber opera Vanessa, which was a huge hit at Williamstown Theatre Festival this past summer. I'm excited for both of those, but especially for Vanessa. I love that opera to pieces.