In Review: Rosen "superb" in COT's "The Scarlet Ibis"
"Annie Rosen has been superb in virtually every local appearance she has made on the opera stage or in concert since her time as a Ryan Opera Center young artist. It was high time this greatly gifted mezzo-soprano was given a leading part, and Rosen is absolutely sensational in the challenging trousers role of Brother.
With short hair and clad in bulky overalls, Rosen was aptly androgynous and remarkably convincing as a rambunctious young boy. Onstage for virtually the entire 95-minute opera, she wholly embodied the complex persona of this conflicted older sibling: loving and supportive to Doodle as she teaches him to walk, yet at other times harsh and cruel in her sibling jealousy—calling him a “crippled runt”—and even sadistic and dangerous. Watching Rosen staring unsmiling at Doodle, one felt Brother was capable of anything in moments of anger.
Vocally, Rosen was just as outstanding, wielding her flexible voice with great skill, with powerful top notes at dramatic climaxes and singing with tender sensitivity in her final duet with Doodle."
-Chicago Classical Review
"Annie Rosen as Brother from the very opening scene is the hyperkinetic boy of her role."
-Picture this Post
"Memorable and remarkable is Annie Rosen as big Brother, challenging and subversive in a role that incarnates an athletic boy’s shallow concept of masculinity. Everything that Brother couldn’t know at the time the audience feels in his place."
-Stage and Cinema
" In the hands of Annie Rosenand Jordan Rutter, both fine actors and singers, this approach worked abundantly well, with Rutter managing to convey both the outer fragility and the inner strength of Doodle as well as the sense of “otherness” that hung over him. At the same time, Rosen was completely convincing as a boy and terrific at conveying both the “Aw, shucks!” sense of this character as well as his deeper, conflicted feelings. The two together just clicked, and they were completely believable as siblings."
-Chicago on the Aisle