GETTING MEDIEVAL IN `GRENDEL' DIRECTOR TAYMOR, PUPPETEER CURRY TEAM UP FOR L.A. OPERA.

Byline: Evan Henerson Staff Writer

Getting together brings out the beast in them.

Anyone who's seen the fabulous creatures of the stage version of ``The Lion King'' knows that. And now Julie Taymor and Michael Curry are at it again with ``Grendel,'' the new opera by composer Elliot Goldenthal, premiering Saturday at the Los Angeles Opera.

Taymor is the theatrically trained, mythology-savvy director of plays, films and operas. And Curry is the art historian and sculptor with no dramatic training who nonetheless knows more than a little bit about puppets.

She lives in New York; he runs his studio in Scappoose, Ore. Both routinely undertake projects that send them all over the globe.

Taymor is the conceptualist; Curry concentrates on pragmatics and kinetics. When they get together, there the claws may come out, but they've also made some beautiful beasts together. (``The Lion King,'' by the way, will be returning to Los Angeles in November.)

``We're a good blend of necessary talents,'' says Curry. ``We're very clear with each other. There are huge arguments and then great love fests.''

``Over the years, we've started to co-design more, and we still do,'' seconds Taymor. ``I do a lot of sculpture, and he does a lot of motion. We balance each other out.''

It's been a creative partnership that has flourished from their first collaboration -- the 1992 TV film ``Fool's Fire'' -- through nine ventures, including the stage adaptation of ``The Lion King'' and several operas. When a Taymor endeavor needs a creature, Curry will invariably be enlisted to design or craft a mask, a puppet, a costume or a beast.

And there are plenty of the latter in ``Grendel,'' the new opera. They include creatures with four legs and others with two, formless beings that have risen out of the primeval ooze. There are dragons and ogres, giant war masks and miniature warriors.

With a libretto by Taymor and J.D. McClatchy, Grendel is an operatic adaptation of John Gardner's novel, which tells the legend of the medieval warrior Beowulf from the point of view of his conquest, the monster Grendel.

Taymor read Gardner's novel while a student at Oberlin College, and has been formulating ways to bring the story to the stage -- at one time considering it as a rock opera -- ever since. Curry even recalls Taymor discussing the unformed Grendel project in the late 1980s at their first meeting. Curry had seen an exhibition of Taymor's work and designs -- which frequently include costumes and puppets -- at Lincoln Center.

``I wasn't at all trying to work with her. I just wanted to meet,'' recalls Curry. ``During that first conversation, she took me through her idea for an opera called `Grendel.' I was fascinated. The piece has grown as she's grown. I'm much happier with it being done 20 years later.''

With Curry and Taymor based on opposite coasts, any collaboration necessitates a certain amount of what Taymor calls ``long-distance designing,'' no easy feat when the two artists are both hands-on.

``He's come to my place to do models, and the actual big construction is done in his studio in Oregon,'' says Taymor. ``I've gone to Oregon and sculpted in his studio to check on designs. I'd prefer it if we were in the same vicinity, but that's not the way it is anymore.''

In between meetings, sketches and photographs go flying back and forth across cyberspace. The from-the-elements palette that Taymor and set designer George Tsypin selected for ``Grendel'' meant research-oriented nature walks requiring photos of rocks, roots and earth.

Viewers will see the impulse most vividly in the costumes for the Forlorn Beasts, a group of six creatures (including Grendel's mother) 8 to 9 feet in height that are made up of sticks, roots and mud.

``They're horrific and frightening and beautiful,'' says Curry. ``I'm very intrigued to take something intended to look horrific and unformed and at the same time give it a grace. We're not showing human beings or beasts as being superior to each other.''

The title monster himself (sung by bass Eric Owens) will appear at times as an ordinary man in a tattered coat and boots, and, at others, embodied by an enormous 145-pound war mask.

The different forms Grendel and Beowulf take will require some artful use of masks and puppets, according to Curry. Miniature war puppets will fly, insectlike, at Grendel, or -- via projections -- the monster himself becomes enormous.

``How do you take a 6-foot-1-inch opera singer and let him tower over everybody else?'' Curry says. ``Our tricks with puppetry will deal with scale change. It will be like a film going in and out of long shot and close-up.''

The browns, bronzes and rust tones of ``Grendel'' will be a sharp contrast to the brightly colored birds, beasts and flora of ``The Lion King.'' Which is deliberate, says Taymor, since this is a much darker story.

``Hopefully, it will feel like you're looking at moving pictures of driftwood and chunks of clay,'' the director says. ``We have an extremely limited color palette: ochres, grays, dark blue and sandstone.''

The exception will be the dragon that appears in the second half to offer Grendel some advice. Now, plenty of operas have a dragon, but the monster designed by Curry and Taymor (and sung by mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves) figures to be remarkable.

The serpent will take up the entire stage, with a trio of singers -- ``The Dragonettes'' -- voicing the tail. When the dragon's mouth opens, Graves will be discovered sitting in a hot red chaise lounge resting on the dragon's tongue.

``That will probably be the most humorous, unique and comic moment,'' says Taymor.

Following its L.A. premiere, ``Grendel'' opens at the New York State Theatre on July 11. Taymor has a film to finish, the 1960s romance ``Across the Universe,'' while Curry's slate includes creations for ``Love,'' the newest Cirque du Soleil show in Las Vegas set to the music of the Beatles, set to open July 1, with previews beginning June 2.

Down the road, Taymor may ultimately direct a musical version of ``Spider-Man'' for Broadway. Should that or any subsequent Taymor project require his services, Curry says he'll be ready.

``I have my own career, and when our schedules overlap, I try to help from afar,'' he says. ``And she's on my `automatic list,' as we say in the business. You get to work with maybe two or three people in your life who could definitely be called a genius, and she's one of them.''

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

GRENDEL

Where: Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave., downtown L.A.

When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, June 1, 8, 14 and 17, 2 p.m. June 3 and 11.

Tickets: $30 to $205. [phone] or visit www.laopera.com.

CAPTION(S):

7 photos

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) BEAST MASTERS

Team behind 'Lion King' takes on L.A. Opera's `Grendel'

(2) The cast rehearses at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for ``Grendel,'' a new take on the Beowulf legend, premiering Saturday.

(3 -- 5) Puppeteer Michael Curry, left, director Julie Taymor and composer Elliot Goldenthal have put their heads together for the L.A. Opera's production of ``Grendel.''

(6 -- 7) Eric Owens rehearses his lead role in ``Grendel.'' Below right, Owens in full costume.

Gus Ruelas/Staff Photographer