Passions were never in short supply in Lynn Nottage’s 2003 play “Intimate Apparel,” where loneliness, longing and hope hover in every scene. In the latest, long-in-the-making collaboration between Lincoln Center Theater and the Metropolitan Opera, those passions fly free, revealing the operatic heart of “Intimate Apparel” in a new opera adaptation of this story of a 35-year-old Black seamstress aching for love in 1905 New York.
The tight construction of the play, with its spare two-hander scenes and focus on the lives of ordinary and overlooked people, makes it a natural as a stripped-down chamber opera. It also suggests a future life among those musical companies looking for a small-scale, relatable work filled with emotional grandeur for specialized voices. Here in its Lincoln Center premiere, rich vocal talents fill Ricky Ian Gordon’s sung-through music not just…
