Approaching Mozart at home with RBG on my mind

Mozart’s Così fan tutte may be one of the most polarizing of operas to stage in our time. Relationships are mired by gender powerplays as women are tested and ridiculed by men. As a director tackling this opera for the third time here in my hometown of Pittsburgh, I am inspired by a conversation with Ruth Bader Ginsburg before my production of Rigoletto at Wolf Trap Opera just outside of Washington, DC, in 2018. An avid opera fan, the Justice told me that she didn’t like Così.

Manich with Ruth Bader Ginsburg

As I arrived to dinner, I saw a glass of white wine neatly held by a pair of crocheted black-gloved delicate hands. Ginsburg seemed so small and yet her strong presence was undeniable. She was surrounded by her guests, security detail, and some board members. 

She was looking straight at me, setting the stage for avoiding small talk and tackling the tough issues at hand. “What should I be looking for in this particular production?” She questioned me on the point I made about the psychology of the curse, and, as I was shaking, I emphasized my approach to the story which reflected Greek tragedy: does fate determine our future, or do we hasten our downfall with our decisions? 

Her gray blue eyes merely looked from me down to the floor and I couldn’t tell if it was out of approval or disappointment, a theme that would be a through-line for the next hour. 

After a brief lull, those eyes once again looked at me. “How are you handling the fact that the Duke violates her and yet she loves him?” Luckily, I was ready for this one. Wait… this was Ruth Bader Ginsburg, for the love of Zeus! I was about to defend my feminist perspective of Verdi’s iconic work with the Queen of Feminism herself?! So I testified. Ginsburg pressed, “You’ve given me the psychological reasons for her actions, but how are you going to show that?” I continued my defense with evidence.

The announcement for dinner interrupted us. I welcomed continuing the conversation, not realizing that we were assigned to the same table next to one another. 

It took a few extra minutes for me to get a plate. When it finally came, the gray blue eyes to my left surveyed the situation. “Why is yours different?” “I’m gluten free,” I replied, feeling both unashamed and like a complete cliché of my generation. Those eyes once again did that approval/disappointment thing as they returned to her plate. I wanted to defend my allergy, but what would be the point doing so with a Supreme Court Justice? She justified gluten just fine.

Her first experience at the opera was in her hometown of Brooklyn at age 11. She smiled and said, “It’s not one that you would think.” La Gioconda, a rarity. She laughed a little. 

She spoke of the African American conductor of that production, Dean Dixon, who had never been called “maestro,” a respectful term that any white conductor could expect to receive. He went on to have a long career in Europe and, in the late sixties, returned to the United States. The Justice related her microcosmic experience of him to a macrocosmic statement, “I use him as a prime example of how much this country changed in that period of time.”

As we discussed my own journey, she described the first opera to which she took her daughter: “I don’t like Così fan tutte.” That was no surprise. I struggled the first time I was asked to direct it, but I found my way. I explained my approach with the misogynist bet blowing up in the men’s face as the women make their choice in a new partner. The women come out of it liberated and the men get a taste of their own medicine. Ginsburg’s eyes didn’t leave her plate: approval/disappointment?

As I reflect upon my experience with her that night in light of her recent passing, directing Così fan tutte will echo her final words to me as dessert arrived followed by coffee: she took regular (she didn’t sleep, right?). I thanked her for the privilege of sitting with her for the past hour and for being an inspiration to all women. “I was born at the right time. I was born at a time when no one was listening to women.” 

Since no one was listening in Mozart’s time either, RBG’s dislike of Così has inspired me to reexamine our antiquated responses to the work with a fresh approach by tackling the gender politics, questioning precedents, and, above all, listening to the women.

The Awakening of the Poetic Spirit: Il Postino, the opera

Il Postino, Virginia Opera 2019

The opera adaptation of Il Postino by the brilliant Daniel Catán is a beautiful mixture of the novel by Antonio Skármeta and the 1994 film directed by Michael Radford. Like the film, the action is moved from the novel’s Chilean setting towards the end of Neruda’s life in 1969 to the fictitious Italian island of Cala di Sotto (literally “Cove Below”) in 1950 during poet Pablo Neruda’s political exile from Chile. This more innocent and distant representation of post-Mussolini and post-war Italian life replaces Neruda’s true residence in exile, Capri. The aesthetic of this production focuses on the citizens of the island as living in a time before the war, while the Chilean Neruda, in all his success and wealth, portends a new era as he sports new suits and sits on chic furniture. The iconic sound of Mario’s bike bell, the fishermen who make up the residents of the island, and the oceanside setting evoke at once movement, beauty, and the unknown. 

Mario, the postman, is in search of poetry. His only client is the famous Neruda, who he turns to for guidance in finding love with the beautiful Beatrice. She is a fiery bird who does not love easily. The three mysterious women who pepper the scenes are representative of the emotional awakening of female desire. This story is not Mario’s alone. Beatrice has an equal journey, but hers is not inspired directly by Neruda. She beholds Mario in the wake of his poetic transformation. The three women embody the aesthetic of Neruda’s passion for music that is woven into various scenes of the opera, such as tango, and therefore awaken Beatrice to Mario’s newfound confidence and sensitivity to nature, thanks to Neruda’s foreign influence.

The political implications of the island are very clear and familiar, and Cala di Sotto is used as a microcosm of upheaval in mid-century Europe. Like most political disputes, this one is deeply immersed in class structure. Mario and Beatrice come from the lower, working class seeking refuge in the dream of equality as promised by communism. Neruda is of the artist-political activist class who has achieved wealth through his success, while remembering his working class roots. The candidate di Cosimo is a wealthy democratic politician who will do whatever it takes to win an election. Neruda has his own political concerns back home in Chile. Mario and Neruda’s friendship emerges despite political chaos. The two find harmony in metaphor, which serves as an escape. And yet Mario, like the politics that have abandoned him, is abandoned by Neruda. Mario’s breakdown in Act III over Pablo’s lack of communication after his departure comes out of a realization of the class he belongs to: “What did I ever do for him?...He saw that I wasn’t a poet, and yet he treated me like a friend.”

In this production our team has worked toward achieving a sense of flow to at once express the various locations for action and the discovery of poetry. The staircase, a metaphorical wave made up of floor and roof tile finishing off with paper, is triggered with Mario’s human impetus (the bicycle) to move forward in life. Sometimes, like the ocean, it moves unexpectedly on its own as a harbinger of fate. The opera, which highlights very profoundly Neruda’s South American roots, expresses moments of heightened epiphany and beauty. This production embraces those moments as an opportunity for magical realism, as created by the novelist and friend of Neruda’s, Gabriel García Márquez. These moments express “another world,” raising the characters above the everyday. Catán’s portrayal of Neruda’s nostalgia for his homeland—the Spanish language, the fight for political change, Argentine tango—permeate the story you are about to witness. Poetry is found, tango is danced and embodied, and the real Neruda’s inspired presence washes over us like a wave. 

 y cambió bruscamente mi existencia: / and my life changed suddenly:

de mi adhesión al puro movimiento. / as I became part of its pure movement.

 USA, 2019

Armida: the free woman (the opera Armida by Haydn)

Armida is sixteenth century Italian poet Torquato Tasso’s fiery tragic heroine from his epic The Liberaton of Jerusalem, a tale that at face value is about the Crusades. Tasso’s point was not to illuminate the history of the 11thcentury, but rather to write an allegory urging Alfonso d’Este, the duke of Ferrara in Tasso’s time, to take action against the Turkish invasions of what is now northern Italy. Thus, Tasso wrote a story illuminating political concerns and peppering them with themes of fantasy, magic, female power and prowess, and, ultimately, death. His greatest achievement in the piece was the creation of a sympathetic female heroine from “the wrong side” that has provided endless inspiration for dramatists.

There are several operas that take on Armida as a main character. Monteverdi’s opera Armida abbandonata from the early 17thcentury was incomplete or lost. Jean-Baptiste Lully’s 1686 Armideis the first known opera about this fascinating woman. Handel’s 1711 work Rinaldoglorifies her power by providing what I would call one of the most fiery musical entrances ever written for a female only see her transform later into a simple, weeping broken-hearted woman. By contrast, Hadyn’s Armida, written around 70 years later, starts at the peak of the heroine’s love affair with Rinaldo and tracks her emotional downfall into hellish action as caused by his betrayal.

            Armida’s trajectory as tragic heroine is therefore unique in Haydn’s portrayal. Her magic, fueled by the myrtle tree, is central to keeping order. Her greatest power is the ability to drug warriors into a state of love-sickness as she has done with Rinaldo. With this power she can weaken armies, thereby allowing her co-dependent uncle Idreno to overtake them with his own army. She feels trapped by her duty to Idreno, and his plans to send Rinaldo to fight against his own European camp are cause for her alarm. To support Rinaldo’s efforts to ensure the security of her country means relinquishing her power of love over him and accepting his possible death in battle.

            Another fascinating aspect of Hadyn’s telling of the story is Rinaldo’s independence. As the opera progresses the seemingly weak, punch-drunk European warrior becomes autonomous. Despite being “drugged” by Armida’s powers of love, he comes to make his own decisions about his future and is torn between loyalty to his homeland and fidelity to a woman he has come to love in earnest. He transforms from manipulated lover to restored warrior for the “correct” side of the battle.

            Perhaps what draws so many to Armida’s story are the vast amounts of emotional depth that are possible in portraying this “free woman”. She is not necessarily human, certainly not a goddess, has the marks of a Queen, is a pagan magician and seductress, and, we come to discover, holds the power of hell in her hands. She is the anti-ingénue. Yet when it comes to love it is her fallibility that inspires sympathy.

Other characters in the drama help to form the communities that exist on both sides. Ubaldo is Rinaldo’s closest friend who succeeds in bringing the latter back to his sense of self. Their comrade Clotarco falls for the magical Zelmira, but sadly their love affair, although pure, is cut short when Idreno discovers Zelmira’s betrayal. 

            Like so many other pieces from this era of opera, many of the gaps in the drama can only be filled through distinct character and design choices. Our approach to Haydn’s opera combines elements from across various periods in order to establish a timeless and other worldly atmosphere. The clothing is inspired by the Byzantine era coupled with lines from the 1930’s. The human world and the magical world are separated by texture and color, yet Armida is able to disguise herself as human while she is with Rinaldo. An atmosphere of sweeping fire that has destroyed the once-beautiful palace belonging to Armida is palpable. It is a malleable space, manipulated by Armida, which can at once create obstacles, define architecture or manipulate a person’s psyche. The intact structure high above the charred earth only exists because of the power of the myrtle tree: it is the last organic feature of Armida’s world and the key to her power. She guards this treasure carefully, but in the end cannot avoid Rinaldo’s desire to destroy it. She is then faced with a decision as to whether or not she will use her final strokes of power to destroy those who defy her, even her lover. 

Australia, 2016

Rameau and Vinci: Love, Art and the Passion of Creation, Opera

Rameau’s Pigmalion, Pinchgut Opera 2017

When it comes to love, nothing is simple. At times it is unattainable, unrequited, at others it is fulfilling. It can also be heart breaking. The theme of love is potentially the most explored in all expressions of art perhaps because of its enigmatic, ephemeral charm. There is also something alluring about being in love with love, or being in love with a tortured existence that prevents a connection from being fulfilled.

The prospect of combining operas that seemingly don’t fit together was the primary challenge of this production. The central theme of love, however, permeated throughout them. I wondered how, using that theme, the characters in each of the stories could interact throughout an entire evening’s activities, culminating in a grand passionate gesture of the baroque period in which all three operas were written. What is so palpable in the operas is the emotion in the musical structure coupled with the text. The Rameau operas are not remarkably deep, but they do pose questions that were important topics of conversation and society in the 18thcentury. The Vinci Italian intermezzo is of the commedia dell’artetradition and very accessible. The play-within-a-play idea for the production was unavoidable, but it also seemed necessary to allow the pieces to be performed in earnestness so as not to diminish their beauty by our conceit.

            It struck me, as well as my design team, that a contemporary approach would be the most useful umbrella under which the pieces played. There were various iterations of our thinking, but we finally honed in on the idea of the events taking place among art works in a gallery that was in preparation for a costume gala. Love and art, which are both so central to Pigmalion, can exist so well in a room where anything can happen in one evening especially under the influence of alcohol. Within this framework we came up with a series of archetypes that could inhabit this world including a curator, white glove art installers, cleaner, guard, an academic snob, the gallery’s biggest donor along with his wife and tomboy child, and a lonely bartender by day (artist by night) who is the most awake and sensitive character in the room. These archetypes in a party and celebratory atmosphere go through various degrees of play-acting where art imitates life…and vice versa. 

            The love stories in our production are at various times tempestuous, while at the same time each individual plays the role in the improvisation for which he/she is the most suited. The wealthy donor of the gallery, a questionable man, casts himself at the center of his own event that he has funded, with which his lovely wife grapples. But the donor harbors a secret in that the academic, casting herself as a Priestess who is against his way of life, is his ex-wife. The bartender/artist connects with the academic yet fears that the connection may never bear fruit because of their class difference. The security guard admires the cheeky cleaner, and the Curator connects with the passion of the florist. The White Gloves connect with their partner on the level pride of the artistic work that they do. As the evening continues, the gallery is slowly prepared for the gala with a pit stop of an Italian play-within-a-play inspired by 19thcentury exhibition of clothing and paintings. The academic gets back at her ex-husband for starting the game of improvisation by making him play a hypochondriac in a play found in a book. Finally, the bartender/artist is able to exhibit his work for the gala, yet finds that he is passionately in love with his creation. Unknown to him, the Academic has tricks up her sleeve to reveal her own sentiments. The evening culminates in love being the central enlightening event of the gallery gala and the lives of the players are forever changed. May this approach shed new light on these pieces for you as well.

Australia, 2017

New beginnings

I took this photo on a calm evening in beautiful Puerto Rico just last week. Going into a new year feels exciting. Every time. It’s a chance to start over. A chance to make [more] dreams come true. I look forward to challenges that 2019 has in store. There are a lot of new beginnings happening this year. But instead of fear, I choose excitement and hope. Happy New Year, friends!