Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel

Happily ever after has finally met its match.

Candide
Music by Leonard Bernstein / Book Adapted from Voltaire by Hugh Wheeler in a New Version by John Caird / Lyrics by Richard Wilbur with Additional Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, John Latouche, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, and Leonard Bernstein
In English with Projected English Titles
Production from The Glimmerglass Festival
Part of the Kennedy Center Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebration

Embrace a sunny outlook and everything will be OK, right? Not so in Leonard Bernstein’s funny, philosophical, and fast-paced take on Voltaire’s biting satire, which annihilates any notions of hope with its dizzying display of human depravity and catastrophic disasters. When young Candide’s marriage proposal to a baron’s daughter doesn’t quite go as planned, this naïve student of optimism is thrust into an eye-opening odyssey across lands near and far, discovering the horrors of existence at every turn.

War! Earthquakes! Slavery! Disease! Very bad things happen to very good people (and plenty of bad ones too) as a terrific ensemble cast quick-change their way through dozens of colorful characters, performing a witty and effervescent score that includes such classic tunes as “The Best of All Possible Worlds,” “Make Our Garden Grow,” and “Glitter and Be Gay.” Through all its hysterical scouring of 18th-century wickedness and woe, WNO’s first-ever production of Candide still finds a way to move and inspire with life-affirming lessons that, surprisingly, ring just as true today.

Candide: Alek Shrader
Cunégonde: Emily Pogorelc
The Old Lady: Denyce Graves
Pangloss/Voltaire: Wynn Harmon

Director: Francesca Zambello
Conductor: Nicole Paiement
Set Designer: James Noone
Costume Designer: Jennifer Moeller
Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough
Associate Director and Choreographer: Eric Sean Fogel