The adjustment Hutcherson adopts for perhaps 75% or 80% of Joe’s music is a shaded croon no pure crooner could sustain. It is consistently in tune and on the line, with a hint of husk on it that could almost be Belafonte’s slightly leaky phonation. When his voice descends far enough, as at (to give us an operatic reference point) “Oui, je le vois, mon village” in the second phrase of the duet with Cindy Lou/Micaëla, we hear the settled, warm tone of his “natural” baritone. And at a few climactic spots, like the famous ascent to B-flat at the end of the Flower Song, he comes up with a controlled mezzo-forte full voice that many an operatic tenor would be thankful to own. At CSC, Clifton Duncan was Joe. This was a persuasively acted performance that touchingly captured the character’s sense of betrayal, and so long as the music stayed on the lyrical side (including the Flower Song) he negotiated it well enough to be expressive. He couldn’t quite surmount the singing remains of the final scene, and for the familiar reason: when he made an honest effort to “lean into” the high-lying phrases with force, not enough upper-register co-operation entered to help carry the load.

This leaves us with one CSC principal whose voice really matched his role: David Aron Damane, as boxing champion Husky Miller. This oughtn’t to puzzle us: this part is the only one that doesn’t need to cross the registral divide, though the Es and Fs of the Toreador Song (all that’s left of the singing role) are just on it and require their own measure of poise. Damane showed a fine, steady, colorful baritone that wouldn’t seem to need the mike. There was no torero elegance or erotic insinuation, but then Husky probably doesn’t float like a butterfly or dance like Sugar Ray—he just beats people up.

There’s much more that could be said of the production, but apart from stipulating that its triple-threat discipline was excellent; there were group actorly values that were welcome; and it wasn’t boring, this will have to do. This, and to ask: if Carmen Jones is here, can My Darlin’ Aïda be far behind?

Oh, yes: CSC, on the pretext of going green, has eliminated printed programs. Feel free to consult the online version or the lobby card, and if you want to know who you’re watching, you’d better do it ahead of time and jot down the names. So much for all us theatre lovers who save programs, use them for reference, etc.—it’s a reduction of services, only we can’t withhold our rent. Better idea: a really informative program (CSC’s has nothing on the work or its history, nothing to help orient the interested attendee—and they’re doing some of the world’s richest plays!), possibly even a full-season souvenir-type booklet, for which a modest charge is asked from those who want it, with all others left to their online, paper-saving devices, which will incorporate only the present bare basics. This is simply a cheat wrapped in very pale green.

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NEXT TIME, in two weeks: There are several possibilities; I’m trying to sort them out.