(Photo: Mitch Jenkins)
By John von Rhein [Chicago Tribune, 19 February 2006]

"Can you take the corners off my eyes a bit?" Susan Graham asks the makeup person as she prepares for round one of her Chicago media blitz.

It's Graham's day off from Lyric Opera performances of Richard Strauss' "Der Rosenkavalier" and she has submitted to a round of "diva moments" that will soon have her wrapping her chocolate-creme mezzo-soprano around "Someone to Watch Over Me" on television and turning at least one caller to Milt Rosenberg's WGN radio show into an instant opera convert.