News roundup 9/28 Boo-opera, Obama art, comic God
September 28th, 2009 by Menachem Wecker
A Metropolitan Opera performance gets booed, in part because of “the villain’s lewd advances toward a statue of the Madonna.”
At the G-20, President Obama gave “art” gifts. The blurb explaining the symbolism is utter nonsense (like FLOTUS’ “pretty predictable” talk on art), perhaps evoking a previous Obama gift that fell short.
Idolatry is alive and well, according to Rabbi Amy Scheinerman, and it makes us think we are God, rather than just created in God’s likeness. (Though the rabbi talks about every kind of idolatry but art.)
Comic books and God: Rev. Mark Bleakley’s artistic inspirations for his stained glass.
kitty Says
The opera production didn’t got booed just because of madonna. It got booed because it was ugly, dreary and illogical. Also because opera goers are sick and tired of Eurotrash productions that ignore the wishes of composer, the words, and that put director first. Opera is not a spoken theater, opera is “prima la musica and dopo le parole” - first music, then words. The staging should enhance the experience of listening to this beautiful music, not distract from it. I am secular, ethnically Jewish and really completely irreligious, and I’d have booed this production too had I been there.
Talking about madonna. Tosca takes place in the 19th century. Do you really expect an Italian, catholic, chief of police to behave this way? At that time and place? Oh, I forgot, most people today don’t know history and have no clue about historical context.
How about the look of this church. Puccini clearly stated that action should take place in St Andrea della Valle which is a baroque church, quite beautiful. In this staging it is a dreary gray building with the painting of madonna showing a naked breast. Yet the custodian is upset on how madonna resembles some society lady - a revolutionary concept - but ignores the breast? Do these words make sense? Except for directors don’t bother reading the libretto…
Scarpia entertaining himself with prostitutes. Little problem - there is nothing in music that suggests it. this is the guy before whom “the Rome trembled”.
Then there is the whole issue of premeditation. Tosca is catholic and very religious. Her religiosity is in her words and in music. When she kills Scarpia, it is an act of desperation, an act that is in conflict with her beliefs. In this staging, she takes the knife in advance rather than in the last moment making the whole murder premeditated.
After she kills Scarpia there are some musical moments to fill up until she runs. In the traditional staging - that dates from the time of dramatic actress Sarah Bernard playing this role in a play - Tosca is in a trance: she puts candles near the body and puts crucifix on top of it: this shows her religiosity and her conflict. She says “and in front of him the whole Rome trembled”, gets out of her trance and runs away.
The producers did away with candles and crucifix - that would’ve been fine had whatever he replaced these actions with made sense. The trouble is - they didn’t. She runs to the window - does she want to finish opera an act soooner? - then she lies down on a couch and fans herself with a large fan. Is this logical? If you just kill somebody, would you just lie down in the room and rest? Her words about Rome come out of nowhere and no longer make sense.
Then the last act. In spoken theater when nobody speaks, something has to happen. Fair enough. But in opera, something is happening - the music plays. The music shows the early morning, the song of a shepherd shows life going by. This music builds up to Cavaradossi aria about life, about his love. But in this staging the soldiers are practicing mock execution during this time. It is distracting, it doesn’t correspond to music, it just doesn’t make sense. The director seems to have forgotten about “music first”. Newsflash - it is the music that is written by a genius here, it is the music that stood the test of time. Not the play.
I understand how you want to tie every event to a conflict between art and religion. But this wasn’t the case. This was part of a rebellion of American opera fans against the phenomenon known as “regietheater” or as referred in the US as Eurotrash. A few months ago, by the way, a production of Sonnambula at the Met was booed too, and there was no religious connotations there.
Oct 7th, 2009 at 1:12 pm