In a dramatically fantastical and musically modernistic adaptation of the Lewis Carroll classic, “Alice in Wonderland” is a work in progress…The cast provided an instrumental backdrop by playing an inventive array of bird whistles, drums, tambourines, chimes and various contraptions to produce sound effects…Moreover, during each scene whatever singers were not portraying characters became part of a background chorus, singing eerie music of long sustained and pungently atonal harmonies, mostly in high-lying registers…the impressive cast threw itself into this work…enacting scenes and even providing effects like creating images of rushing water.

Opera Review by Jeremy Eichler, The New York Times, May 2, 2005

“[Francis] Thorne and his librettist, J.D. McClatchy, have deftly transferred the dark and, yes, mesmerizing essence of this story to the operatic stage without losing its subtlety and innuendo. Their work is true to most of the original details, and the few liberties taken (Italian Black Shirts have been added to the crowd) do not get in the way. Mr. Thorne’s score is full of pungent harmony, fidgety rhythms and teeming counterpoint that course beneath the purposefully naïve lyricism of the townspeople…the music provides an effective sense of restless motion, like unconscious forces swirling beneath a calm facade.

The staging by Jason Jacobs allowed the audience in the hall on Saturday night to feel as if we, too, were among Cipolla’s ensnared spectators…Richard Cassell was a vocally robust Cipolla with ample charisma and self-possession. Justin Vickers had a sweet and mellow tenor as Mario, and Larry Small sang Herr Dorn with a rich baritone. Richard Marshall conducted the orchestra [of] this dense and demanding score.