Franci Neely Is Eagerly Counting Down to World Premiere of Jake Heggie’s Opera Intelligence

Houston-based retired lawyer and philanthropist Franci Neely is excited about the world premiere of Jake Heggie’s new opera,Intelligence. “It is going to be a stunner,” she says about Heggie’s 10th opera, which is making its world debut at the Houston Grand Opera October 20 and run through November 3. The work is based on the true-life story of a secretly educated enslaved woman in Richmond, Virginia, who becomes a spy for the Union troops during the American Civil War. Neely says, “It’s extraordinary.”

Heggie first met Neely when he was working on an opera commissioned by the HGO, where she was on the board. “He’s very dear to me,” says Franci Neely. “Everyone loves Jake and hits it off with him. He’s an amazing guy. Over the years, we’ve become closer. He and his husband, Curt Branom, a musical theater talent, have stayed with me in Houston and Nantucket [Massachusetts]. They’re both great.”

During one of those stays, Neely had the great fortune of getting a sneak preview of Intelligence as a work in progress. “It’s going to make huge news,” she enthuses.

She’s been a significant supporter of Heggie’s career for over a decade. “I’ve been to a number of his openings. I was at the opening season of Moby-Dick, which premiered at the Dallas Opera on April 20, 2010,” says Neely. “And this year, I’ll be at the world premiere opening of his newest opera, Intelligence.”

Who Is Jake Heggie?

Heggie is an American composer of over 300 art songs, chamber, orchestral, and choral pieces. He’s created nine full-length operas in addition to Intelligence.

“I grew up in a small town in Ohio, and Beethoven was simply my childhood hero,” stated Heggie. When he was 10 years old, his father died by suicide. “Everything in me and around me was chaos. But in Beethoven, I found support, refuge, and strength.”

Many opera aficionados consider his first opera, Dead Man Walking, based on the 1993 memoir by Sister Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic nun fighting to save a death row inmate, a 21st-century masterpiece. It will have its Metropolitan Opera House debut in New York City on Sept. 26, 2023.

“It’s about redemption, and I’m thrilled that I’ll be in New York at the opening to celebrate Jake,” says Franci Neely.

Dead Man Walking and his 2015 opera, Great Scott, have librettos by Terrence McNally, a five-time Tony award-winning playwright and librettist. Gene Scheer provided the librettos to Heggie’s other operas Moby-Dick, It’s a Wonderful Life, Two Remaining, If I Were You, and Three Decembers.

Higgie’s new creation starts an impressive opera season for the Houston-based opera house. In addition to Intelligence, the upcoming season will include Giuseppe Verdi’s Falstaff, Giacomo Puccini’s MadamaButterfly, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s DonGiovanni, Richard Wagner’s final work, Parsifal, and Francesca Zambello’s fresh staging of TheSoundofMusic.

“These are monumental works of art, whether they were gifted to us by history’s great geniuses or the most brilliant creators of the current day,” Patrick Summers, Houston Grand Opera’s music and artistic director, told Paper City magazine. “There is a journey for everyone.”

Franci Neely, Champion of the Arts

A well-done opera production sweeps the audience along on its journey. “The feelings one has through the musical instruments and the human voices, combined with the sets, create an emotion that exudes on an operatic stage,” says Neely. “That’s very appealing to me. I’ve seen so many operas that were deeply affecting.”

Neely adds, “’The first time I saw Dead Man Walking, it was incredibly touching. It presents the arguments on both sides, for and against capital punishment, for and against the death penalty. And it’s a brilliantly moving work. So I’ll be happy to celebrate its premiere at the Met with Jake.”

Billy Budd, an opera by Benjamin Britten that premiered in December 1951, is another Franci Neely favorite. “I love the novel and the opera,” says Neely. “I love what it’s speaking about, the collective versus the individual. When is the individual more important than the collective or vice versa?”

Another opera by Benjamin Britten, Peter Grimes, left a lasting impression on the philanthropist. “I saw a fantastic production of that once in Vienna,” muses Neely. “In some ways, it’s talking about the same message as Billy Budd, the individual versus the group, and the group speaks against Peter Grimes, who is sort of the outcast. It’s timely. The outcast is blamed for things he didn’t do and then shunned by the community. It’s a wonderful opera, a modern opera.”

As for classics, she’s a fan of Mozart. “I love The Marriage of Figaro. I’ve seen some great productions of The Magic Flute. Some of them are so much fun,” says Neely.

Franci Neely recommends Porgy and Bess, the English-language folk opera by American composer George Gershwin based on American writer DuBose Heyward’s novel Porgy, published in 1925. It’s a story set in the 1920s about a disabled street beggar in the Black tenements of Charleston, South Carolina. Before moving to Broadway, it premiered in September 1935 at the Emerson Colonial Theater in Boston.

“Porgy and Bess is operatic,” says Neely. It weaves blues and jazz influences into the operatic score, which produced some of the most iconic songs in American musical theater history, including “Summertime,” which has been covered by legendary singers like Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, and Janis Joplin.

Neely saw a memorable performance of it at the Metropolitan Opera. “It was incredible. It has a big chorus, so it requires a lot of money to mount it. But the results are amazing.”

Neely would love people to set aside preconceived notions about opera. She says, “I think people would be surprised at some of these new operas. At least at the Metropolitan Opera and Houston Grand Opera, there is a lot of commissioning of new work with very current, timely themes. And at least, to my knowledge, that’s attracting young people, diverse people, people who don’t necessarily have any track record with the opera.”

She offers this advice to those still on the fence about attending an opera, “Don’t be put off by the notion that you won’t get it or they’d sing in a funny way. Let yourself go and just experience something and be open to it. From teary operas to really funny operas — and there are some — go to the opera, give it a try. Don’t be intimidated. Go in, read the program notes, and give yourself a chance.”