The Glimmerglass Festival Unveils Tour Details and Cast for Collaborative Production of HAPPY END

The Glimmerglass Festival has announced casting and tour dates for its new touring production of HAPPY END, the musical satire by Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht, and Elisabeth Hauptmann.

The project is a collaboration between The Glimmerglass Festival, Opera Saratoga, Finger Lakes Opera, and Seagle Festival. The partnership aims to expand access to opera throughout the region through a shared statewide touring model.

The production will feature 10 performances across eight venues, reaching audiences across more than 13,000 square miles of New York State.

Rob Ainsley, Artistic and General Director of Glimmerglass, will serve as music director. “Opera and musical theater have the power to connect, challenge, and inspire,” Ainsley said. “By working closely with our colleagues at Opera Saratoga, Finger Lakes Opera, and Seagle Festival, we are strengthening upstate New York's cultural ecosystem and working to ensure that high-caliber, imaginative live performance reaches audiences in Central New York and beyond — including communities that may not otherwise have the opportunity to experience this transformative art form.”

The production will be staged by Mary Birnbaum, Artistic and General Director of Opera Saratoga. “Happy End, which contains some of Kurt Weill's most memorable music, tells the story of lost souls who want to be saved despite the broken systems they uphold,” Birnbaum said. “It's an unlikely love story wrapped in a gangster comedy, set in a bar at the end of the world.”

Premiered in Berlin in 1929, HAPPY END was famously closed after only two performances. The work takes place in a Chicago speakeasy where gangsters, missionaries, and opportunists collide, exploring themes of faith, power, and morality. The score includes songs such as “Bilbao Song,” “Mandalay Song,” and “Surabaya Johnny.”

For this production, Glimmerglass Dramaturg Kelley Rourke has created a new English book using Michael Feingold’s translations of Weill’s songs, shaping the work into a 90-minute performance without intermission. The production features costumes by Márion Talán de la Rosa and set design by Tobin Ost.

Cast

The production stars Ana Karneža as The Fly. Karneža, winner of the 2024 Lotte Lenya Competition, performs the role with support from Kurt Weill Foundation for Music.

“I'm thrilled to finally work on a full Brecht/Kurt Weill production,” Karneža said. “I've performed Brecht plays and previously created concerts around Kurt Weill's music, so this piece feels like a gift for an actor like me who loves a gritty song that reaches the audience directly.”

The cast also includes Christine Taylor Price as Lieutenant Lillian Holiday, Gregory Feldmann as Bill Cracker, Lisa Marie Rogali as the Major, Jonathan Pierce Rhodes as the Governor, Bradley Bickhardt as Hannibal, Jason Zacher as Benny, Reed Gnepper as Jimmy, and Lauren Torey as Maryjane.

Tour Schedule

May 9, 2026 — Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA
May 10, 2026 — Munson, Utica, NY
May 16, 2026 — Seagle Festival, Schroon Lake, NY
May 17, 2026 — Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, Troy, NY
May 28 and 30, 2026 — Opera Saratoga, Universal Preservation Hall, Saratoga Springs, NY
May 29, 2026 — Hudson Hall, Hudson, NY
July 23, 2026 — Finger Lakes Opera, Panara Theater at Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY
July 28 and 31, 2026 — The Glimmerglass Festival Pavilion, Cooperstown, NY

Additional New York City performances are planned for fall 2026, with details to be announced.

Tickets and additional information are available through the presenting venues.