Tag: relationships

opera, Ades, performance, Paris, The Exterminating Angel, cast

Review: The Exterminating Angel, Opéra national de Paris

On March 2, 2024

In art, classical, film, music, opera, Paris, Reviews, theatre, voice, writing

Independence is as important to art as it is to life. In adapting from screen to stage, that autonomy takes on special significance. Audiences often expect a familiarity which has been molded by filmic elements and reinforced in the digital era by quick, easy access. Many works become little more than 2-D images made three-dimensional; designs serve to imitate cinema, not live apart from it. The expectation attached to adaptation, is a clear and present danger, if also a ripe creative possibility; x-ray vision is needed for 3D presentation. It helps to have a good partner.

Composer Thomas Ades and director Calixto Bieito use their combined powers to bring Ades’ 2016 opera The Exterminating Angel to startling, autonomous life. Based on the 1962 Luis Buñuel film classic, the new production at Opéra national de Paris is an unapologetic stage beast that takes aim at everything from religion to family to art to opera itself. It is bawdy, bold, and brilliant. Bieito skillfully navigates the imprecise nature of the plot by plumbing the depths of its various scenes and character relationships. The work depicts a group of aristocrats who gather for a late dinner party and can’t seem to (or won’t, possibly) depart from it. Rich in symbolic possibility, the opera’s Salzburg premiere was directed by the opera’s librettist, Tom Cairns, and went on to be staged in London and New York. Cairns’ staging hewed close to Buñuel’s visual palette of mid-20th century aristocratic Europe, a world of crepe dresses, statement jewelry, roller-set hair, as well as a thick wall between that high society and the outside world, which includes members of an inquisitive media, police, and a curious crowd. Bieito’s production is a different, and far more visceral vision. There are no live sheep here, and no thick wall either. Instead, members of the chorus (that raucous public on the other side of the earlier wall, here led by chorus master Ching-Lien Wu) are in the top tier of the Opéra Bastille, their voices floating out across the auditorium, a heavenly-hellish host of would-be angels, set to exterminate all within earshot.

The Exterminating Angel, Bieito, Paris, opera, Yoli

Photo: Agathe Poupeney

The production opens with a small boy holding sheep-shaped balloons wandering onstage and offering halting bleats before being joined by a priest (Régis Mengus) who whispers something close (too close) to his ear; this, we later learn, is Yoli, the son of a dinner party guest, Silvia (Claudia Boyle), who may or may not be aware of the priest’s abuses but seems determined to ignore them. Her twisted love-hate relationship with brother Francisco (Anthony Roth Costanzo) reveals a vein of wider familial abuse and reinforced silence, recurring themes within Bieito’s oeuvre. Scenes from the film are clarified with varying degrees of tension: the arrival; the ragout; the musical performances; the sister-brother fight(s); eating the sheep; the double suicide; finding water. These chapters are punctuated by highly memorable images, including the performers directly facing the audience at the arrival (echoed at the close); the ragoût consisting of two large bags of blood; the servants ducking under the table; the sheep being the guests wrapped in sheepskin rugs. Opera singer Leticia Meynar (Gloria Tronel) stands on the long wooden dining table at one point, arms aloft, holding cutlery in each hand. The table is carried by the male members of the cast around in a circle, Easter-procession style, as Ades’ score blazes out from the pit, deliciously eerie ondes Martenot included, a smouldering requiem with clear traces of Berg, Britten, Stravinsky.

Ades has tread the damnation-salvation waters previously, notably in the chamber opera Powder Her Face (1995), which explores the salacious life of Margaret Campbell, Duchess of Argyll. Music writer Alex Ross noted in a 1998 review that the work bears “a repeated sense of a beautiful mirage shattering into cold, alienated fragments.” These fragments have been enlarged within the writing of The Exterminating Angel. With the Paris iteration, they’ve also become technicolour. The depictions of not only religious ritual, but masturbation, voyeurism, defecation, self-harm, and suggested cannibalism have clear dramaturgical intent and theatrical urgency. The upright doctor of the film becomes a shambolic mess live, with a shirtless Clive Bayley joining the other cast members in shambolic disarray. Sexually voracious Lucia di Nobile (Jacquelyn Stucker) is initially elegant in a low-cut red satin dress and wavy hair; by evening’s end she is in naught but underthings, with wet hair, messy red lipstick and manic grin, looking less socialite than avenging Joker. Starlet soprano Meynar is one of the last to remove her dress (a sparkling sea-foam design) but the first to recognize the importance of the ritual that will end the group’s self-imposed situation. Performing, it turns out, is the double mirror revealing the waving man at the very back – it might be an illusion, but it’s an illusion to indulge. Indulgence also comes with a repeat of the crucifixion imagery, when the dinner party guests turn on their host, Edmundo de Nobile (Nicky Spence), blaming him for their entrapment; Nobile, as with Meynar earlier, becomes Christ-like, but the question remains: is this conviction, sacrifice, selfishness, or (quite literally) performance? What do we want as an audience – deliverance or diversion?

opera, The Exterminating Angel, Bieito, staging, crucifixion, Paris

Photo: Agathe Poupeney

In presenting the group in a range of vivid colours (costume design by Ingo Krügler) set against an all-white backdrop (set design by Anna-Sofia Kirsch), the work’s relationships as well as individual foibles are both clarified and scrutinized. This clarification of structure has a direct effect on the delivery of the work’s score and performances, which are uniformly strong. The cast handles the pitchy nature of the score with dramatic aplomb and Ades’ conducting is equally precise, whether he’s leading the work’s doomed lovers, Beatriz (Amina Edris) and Eduardo (Filipe Manu) in one of the few lyrical moments of the opera, a lewd pseudo-baptism, or the work’s haunting final call, “libera de morte aeterna et lux aeterna luceat”. The lines are a fusion of a responsory sung in the Catholic Office of the Dead and Requiem Mass, respectively, with the final lines of the Libera Me particularly applicable to Bieito’s staging:

That day, day of wrath, calamity and misery, day of great and exceeding bitterness,
When thou shalt come to judge the world by fire.

Rest eternal grant unto them, O Lord: and let light perpetual shine upon them.

The work ends with the cast standing as they began, assembled in a row downstage, staring at the audience in silence. Are they us? Are we them? The Exterminating Angel asks opera-goers to consider what we want, and expect – from entertainment, art, faith – and where and how they all meet. Let the light shine, suggests Bieito, but always remember the darkness. That’s where the ugly truth lies.

The cast of The Exterminating Angel, Opéra national de Paris, 2024. Photo: Agathe Poupeney

Top photo: Agathe Poupeney

mask woman dress painting identity secret hidden expression

Essay: “You’re Being Too Sensitive”

By Catherine Kustanczy

On December 31, 2019

In art, classical, opera, personal, writing

Earlier this week Associated Press released a year-end summation of sorts relating to the story they broke earlier this year around allegations of sexual misconduct by Placido Domingo. Reading it, I found myself sad but also frustrated – it’s depressing to see so much consistent pushback against the women who spoke out, and equally sad (if unsurprising) to note the consistent attempts to discredit them. Such actions highlight the many social and cultural divisions that must be overcome if we, as an industry are to evolve.

I wrote in a recent post about walls, and how, despite a lot of big talk on the theoretical beauty of their vanishing, the reality is that we tend to like them – what they keep in but also what they perceivably keep out. Nowhere is this more true than in the chasms that have been revealed within the classical world related to the #MeToo movement. The issue is, to my mind, larger than whether or not these women should have spoken out (though I think it’s good they did); more broadly, it points to attitudes held by many in and around the industry which dictates that women and men are “a certain way”. There’s a lot of gender-slotting into little boxes of behaviour, ones that adhere to very old-fashioned and outdated clichés. These clichés around what’s “normal” for a gender feed into a reality relating directly to power, one that can hire and fire, favor and dismiss. Some may well argue (and have, vociferously) that women should use their so-called “feminine wiles” in an industry that is so tough to break into. Why shouldn’t a woman use the gifts God gave her? Aren’t all men interested in “that sort of thing” from a woman? Such comments bring to mind an exchange I noted on social media earlier this year, in which, over the course of a lengthy thread relating to the Domingo case, one individual reiterated the belief that young women today are “too sensitive” and they should “toughen up” and “in my day we weren’t so bothered by flirtatious men.” This attitude is reflected in a quote soprano Laura Flanigan gave to AP, that “(t)he climate has always been ‘don’t tell and suck it up and deal with it.”

sculpture silence finger mouth face no words secret meditation Preault figure human

Antoine-Augustin Préault, “Silence”, 19th century. Collection: Muzeul Național de Artă al României, Bucharest. Photo: mine. Please do not reproduce without permission.

This past year I’ve frequently thought back to a memory from childhood, of a friend and I hiding in closets as tweens whenever a flirty male friend of my mother’s would visit; this man, married and with three children, would insist on kissing us at every visit. We made a kind of game of it, daring him to find us, as my mother emitted what I can only surmise now must have been vaguely embarrassed chuckles as she clattered away in the kitchen. We would mock-shriek when closet doors opened and there he would be, this man in a three-piece suit, grinning at us and then puckering up and leaning forward, as we would duck and attempt to run. Usually we weren’t successful and would have to endure cycles of his lips repeatedly on our faces and occasionally lips. We were taught to “endure” it (and that if we weren’t enjoying it, there must be something wrong with us), but in truth, neither my friend nor I found any of it fun or playful; we found this man exasperating, irritating, his attentions humiliating and annoying. We giggled in the darkness of the closet not out of good, spirits, but out of nervousness, not knowing what else, as young girls, we should do.

My mother, being pre-boomer, belonged to an era where women were indeed taught that such attentions were “normal male behaviour” and, as I grew older, I was told, in either word or gesture, that I should “use what God gave” me. My mother was part of a generation that proclaimed women should “toughen up” (especially when it came to male behaviour) and “not take everything so seriously” (I still remember her saying that, almost up to her death in 2015), and, should any hint of complaint be uttered, it was my fault for being “too sensitive.” If I had a dime for every time my mother accused me of this in the negative sense, I would indeed be wealthy. Hers was an attitude that would shape large swaths of my life, my choices, and my perceptions around power, and men, and what validation is and how it supposedly works. I wasn’t entirely surprised when, years later telling her about my own assault, I was met with a dismissive attitude and accusations that, having drank too much and worn a low-cut a dress, I had somehow “asked” for it. Every time I see a woman vehemently defending terrible male behaviour, I think of hiding in that closet, choosing that dress, my mother, and her words.

Such moments from the past year, together with the AP round-up, also make me think back to a frank discussion I had with soprano Lisette Oropesa this past autumn. Much has been made about using so-called “womanly power” and how, in the classical world, this has and continues to be a key tool to getting ahead, and staying ahead. As Oropesa put it:

I’ve seen successful women behave and talk and dress and flirt a certain way and I think to myself, why? At this point, it shouldn’t be necessary… it’s such a cheap trick. It’s low-hanging fruit! Any gorgeous woman can use it to advantage – and how many women can have careers doing that? Sure it has power, but it’s *old* feminine power.

This attitude of, “if you got it, flaunt it” makes as many gigantic assumptions as its closest sibling, “she had a choice“; first of all, why should you? To quote the song, is that all there is? Secondly, what if one doesn’t have “it”? Through choice or not, what if the “it” simply isn’t there? In many senses the lack of a societally defined “it” makes a woman, no matter how talented, entirely invisible. In an ideal world, talent would win out (and sometimes it does, but not often), but to quote my post about walls, human foibles make such idealism incredibly difficult to manifest, let alone enact. Changing attitudes in the industry means changing the way classical is both thought of, and marketed, and yes, run – which means changing the way both audiences and artists view a very specific list of things that require redefinition, starting squarely with what “it” is and why it should so matter in 2020 – or be booted out the proverbial door along with last century ideas.

painting story bible man woman arm distance attempt vulnerable power imbalance art

Alessandro Varotari (called Il Padovanino), “Susannah and the Elders” (detail), 16th-17th century. Collection: Muzeul Național de Artă al României, Bucharest. Photo: mine. Please do not reproduce without permission.

A woman coming into an industry where she can expect to be objectified (and used) sexually is de rigueur for success, where that notion of utilitarianism as it relates to the interweaving threads of success, sex, power, and identity, has no actual power– or choice. To pretend otherwise is a very convenient illusion; what a wonderful trick of the prevailing powers, to have so many, young and old, mouthing such nonsense with such wide-eyed seriousness, for so long. Secondly, there is no notion of “two consenting adults” when the playing field is not level to begin with; who’s doing the hiring and firing? Who’s propagating a continuing (outdated) framework of what “it” is? Who’s making the decisions? Why? To quote Lisette Oropesa again, “There’s this attitude of, “I went to the theater and didn’t get a boner, so it’s crap!”” A woman fortunate enough to have “it” and using “it” within a world run by those holding on to their outmoded frames is not levelling the playing field, it’s bending over to make the world seem normal. To pretend otherwise is to engage in the most intense form of cognitive dissonance, and such a willful misperception would be amusing were it not so common.

Women who speak out against this system do not deserve to be branded as harpies, or to be called “over-sensitive.” They don’t deserve to be held up as examples of “typical American overreaction” or some “Westernized” anti-male brigade. If you hate the term “woke,” fine – use “evolution” in its place. Cultural difference is understandable but sharply contrasting ideas about the female experience reveals uncomfortable truths about which environments are willing to acknowledge alternative (and perhaps more equitable) realities, and which ones are fiercely determined to stay the same.

women concert noise gossip group gathering ladies painting

Aelbert Van Der Schoor, “The Concert” (detail), 17th century. Collection: Muzeul Național de Artă al României. Photo: mine. Please do not reproduce without permission.

The intransigent adherence to so-called “tradition” in this sense (“men are like this; women are like this”), even as modern presentations and productions are simultaneously applauded, reveals a sad if unsurprisingly comfortable hypocrisy that gives a strange new meaning to the term “Old World”; I would ask such audience members to apply their same spirit of opennness to women who don’t fit the so-called “traditional” moulds of desirability, and indeed, to women who are willing to stand up and say clearly, “I don’t like this system, it’s crap, can we please make a change?” They aren’t sensitive; they’re direct. I would ask women who can’t understand such directness to kindly not use the very same brush for others’ portraits as they might use for their own; everyone requires different shading, details, application, and focus. There is no one-size-fits-all in any world, classical or otherwise. Your experience is not their experience; your time is not their time; your voice is not their voice – nor should it be.

woman face painting, thoughtful contemplative grace expression

Hans Von Aachen, “The Three Graces” (detail), 16th-17th century. Collection: Muzeul Național de Artă al României, Bucharest. Photo: mine. Please do not reproduce without permission.

And so, as 2019 comes to a close, I want to believe there is a chance for evolution in the classical world. I want to believe there is a will to use ways and means heretofore unseen. I want to believe we can all do better. Whether or not we choose such an evolution is entirely up to us. We hate to admit loving our walls, and, more than that (and especially within the classical world), we hate to admit they exist at all. Let 2020 be the time we can at least see them, and if not take them down entirely, at least remove a few pieces here and there, to let the most strange, new, beautifully sensitive and wondrously strong flowers emerge.

“You Never Get To The Bottom Of It”

By Catherine Kustanczy

On June 5, 2017

In classical, interviews, music, opera

L-R Erwin Schrott as Leporello, Ana Maria Martinez as Donna Elvira, Erin Wall as Donna Anna, Stanislas de Barbeyrac as Don Ottavio, Ildebrando D’Arcangelo as Don Giovanni. Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

Is opera misunderstood?

When asked this question in 2007, British director Graham Vick said, “Yes, in that people believe they need to be educated about opera to understand it. Those who respond to it viscerally and emotionally are the ones who understand it best.”
This is something that I deeply relate to, having grown up with, and been raised by, a woman who, though not super educated about opera, responded in highly visceral, emotional ways to what she heard, so much so that on Saturday afternoons she’d stand in the middle of aisles at the local supermarket, radio earphones tilted back and nearly falling off her head, her mouth hanging open, her palms up, listening to live broadcasts from the Met, as fellow shoppers shot her dirty looks and angled their carts around her. As a teenager, I was mortified; as an adult, I understand, even if I don’t emulate my mother’s grocery store habits. (Yet.)

Vick is a director known for his experimental approach. People have strong opinions about his work; some love and whole-heartedly applaud it, others think it’s overwrought, silly, dumbed-down. While I’ve not seen any of his work live (that will change soon, I hope), I think Vick is one of those people who considers himself something of an ambassador for the art form. His ideas around the lack of empathy in modern society, the importance of involving various communities, and visceral reactions to culture ring big bells with me and the things I believe in terms of the power of art and music.

Andrea Silvestrelli as the Commendatore
and Ildebrando D’Arcangelo as Don Giovanni.
Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

One of the most powerful of all opera experiences for me is Don Giovanni. The opera is, as many of my regular readers may note, something of a favorite; it is also, to return to my first question, one of the more misunderstood works in the operatic repertoire. Some productions I’ve seen I have outright despised; others I found entertaining (like Komische Oper’s zany, Herbert Fritsch-directed production), while yet others made me re-think the opera entirely, illuminating its female characters and challenging perceptions of its main character. So much of what I think powers Mozart’s great opera is, in fact, the attitudes we, as audiences, bring into the auditorium; like any great work of art, our own experiences (and social conditioning) color what we experience, but when it comes to Giovanni especially, these attitudes show themselves in some very revealing ways, expressed mainly as our reactions to Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, Zerlina, and of course, to the Don himself.

Lately Don Giovanni has been frequently produced, what with the remount of Robert Carsen’s celebrated 2011 production on La Scala with baritone Thomas Hampson (one of the noted interpreters of the role) and bass baritone Luca Pisaroni (whose performance as Leporello I so enjoyed in Salzburg last summer); Opera in Holland Park and Opera Lausanne also celebrated their respective openings over the weekend, Gran Teatre Liceu (Barcelona) has a production opening later this month, and Festival d’Aix-en-Provence has a production next month. Don Giovanni is on now through June 30th at San Francisco Opera as part of their Summer of Love program.What is it about this work that so continues to entrance and excite artists and audiences alike? Why does the story of an unrepentant Lothario and the various women he loves and men he angers (and murders) — all within the space of one day — continue to have a grip on popular imagination? How does the work (and its telling) change through time, and why?

When I heard director Jacopo Spirei was helming a remount of a 2011 San Francisco Opera production originally directed by fellow Italian Gabriele Lavia, I was immediately intrigued. Spirei has an impressive resume of directing work, mainly focused in Europe and the UK; he got his start working with Graham Vick, and I’ve been following his career closely the last little while. Having already directed the opera two times prior to this (including at Salzburg’s renowned Landestheater), Spirei comes by his theatrical approach honestly. He spent considerable time in his twenties in England, seeing a variety of dramatic and operatic works at the English National Opera, the Royal Shakespeare Company, and the National Theatre. Eventually he went on to work with Vick at the celebrated Glyndebourne Festival. Spirei has since directed works at the Wexford Festival in Ireland, the Royal Danish Opera, Houston Grand Opera, the Theater an der Wien (Vienna), and Teatro Comunale di Bologna, among many others. Later this year he’ll be directing the opera Falstaff (based on Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor as well as scenes from Henry IV, parts 1 and 2) at the famous Festival Verdi in Parma, Italy.

Director Jacopo Spirei. Photo: Mary Marshania

In making his debut with the San Francisco Opera, Spirei had to take the work of another director, in a production from six years ago, and make it his own. In addition to wondering what that must’ve been like, I was also curious to learn his thoughts about various characters (especially the female ones) in the opera, and what it’s been like to work with artists who come with lots of prior experience in the role. Our conversation was very wide-ranging and, at times, quite intense, if equally friendly, and very lively. Spirei definitely has his opinions, but he has what I’d call the iron-hand-in-velvet-glove approach; he doesn’t hit you over the head with ideas or proclaim decrees, but rather, contextualizes artistic and musical history, with some fun contemporary corollaries, to make truly interesting suggestions. You don’t have to agree with what he says, of course, but it’s worth ruminating on, at the very least. As I wrote in a past feature, sometimes it’s nice to be presented with new ideas on something you thought you knew very well, even if, initially, it’s a bit uncomfortable.

Owing to the wide nature of our conversation, I’ve divided our chat into two sections; expect Part 2 soon. We discuss the role of so-called “tradition” in opera, bringing the art form out of the theater, and what he meant when he recently told Newsweek that “In Italy, (opera) is all about putting on a pretty picture.” For now, here’s Spirei on Don Giovanni.

What’s it like as a director to come to a production that already exists, and to try to put your own stamp on it?I’ve never done anything like this, but it’s been fascinating, to get, somehow, the limited set of ingredients and just create a new dish, because it’s a little bit of, when you have boundaries you are forced to be a lot more creative. Sometimes the boundaries are budget, artists, all kinds of different aspects, which is incredibly fascinating and exciting. This was the real challenge, to reinvent an element already there, although the starting point (of the original) is something that intrigued me a lot.

What was the element?

The fact the mirrors were central in the original production. I find it really attractive in a way, how Giovanni is a mirror to the other characters, showing us their real sides, taking everything from them. Somehow we’ve stripped everything away, so it’s just the element and dynamic in which the characters interact with each other and Giovanni.

You’re working with people who have a lot of experience with this work, and this character.

It’s great; it’s luxury. People come with their own luggage of experience of contributions. We’ve been working in an incredibly organic way — with (conductor) Marc (Minkowski), with Ildebrando (D’Arcangelo, who sings the lead) it’s been a great time of sharing and experiencing new material and finding new angles.

What I enjoy about working with Ildebrando is that he’s an artist who comes with a lot of experience, and a lot of expertise and knowledge, but he’s completely willing to try out new things and put himself in your hands, to experiment. It’s been really exciting to have worked someone who has been so fun. We didn’t have to do all the preliminary work; we both know the material really well, so basically a glance of the eye is enough for both of us to understand which way we’re going. It’s something I’ve never experienced in my life; with a look, he understands what you’re thinking and you can communicate with him in the same way, and then steer his performance into different directions. I’ve enjoyed that immensely.

Marc is the same. I love his approach to the tempi; it’s very refreshing, (in that) it’s very new, very contemporary, especially coming from period music. He’s an expert in that, of course — Baroque and ancient music — but he brings that freshness that conductors who come from that repertoire have. This is really exciting.

In many ways Don Giovanni feels like it belongs in the 21st century; it has so much to say about humans and relationships.

Absolutely. I’ve done Giovanni three times, in three completely different settings, time-wise, period-wise, visually as well. It’s extraordinary how much Giovanni has to give. You never get to the bottom of it. One could work on this opera forever and never get tired, though you might become obsessed, and be haunted by it! It’s a phenomenal piece to study, and like every Mozart piece, it never ceases to make us understand ourselves and the times in which we live. Giovanni is the man who is not willing to pay a price for his actions, who is completely free and without boundaries, with no morals, who pushes forward and never looks back.

Erwin Schrott as Leporello and Ildebrando D’Arcangelo as Don Giovanni.
Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

What you’re saying makes me wonder, is he a symbol more than an actual man?

Yes of course, absolutely.

I’ve spoken with others who insist he is, and has to be, the latter.

Not at all! The thing is, that, if anything he is an example. What he is, is not Casanova, who is an historical figure; he’s a legend, a legendary character, and in a way, he has gone through five centuries of theater and has transformed himself every time because every century has looked at this character through their own lenses. The 18th century viewed him as a man who gets punished because he doesn’t take responsibility for his actions and follows instincts; it’s not a positive example.

The 19th century adored the element of him being against everything — but “Viva la libertà” is not a hail to freedom, it’s a hail to liberty, to do whatever you want. That’s not an altogether positive value, it’s the freedom to do whatever you like, however it pleases you, no matter what consequences it has on other people, which is the boundary of freedom. As you say, my liberty finishes when yours begins; Giovanni has none of (the awareness of consequences), so of course we’re fascinated and attracted, like we’re attracted to an abyss, or a tornado.

I feel like the women really define him in many ways in this opera; they’re all incredibly important.

In the story, that day in the life of Giovanni, he doesn’t even seduce anybody! The only woman who’s in love with him is one who was abandoned from another place and is chasing him. We know he has a lot of women only by the words of Leporello about the catalogue, which is a list he makes as he says, but… is it a collection? Are those numbers real? The great thing about Giovanni is deceit; he’s constantly deceiving us as much as he’s deceiving everyone else. With Anna of course, there are lots of different approaches to that (situation), but it starts with the rape…

… if you want to call it that; some directors think it’s questionable if that’s what it actually is; I’ve come to think it is, too.

It is questionable, but once you go through the music and what she says, and the dramatic tension of the music, the trauma is there. Had she not shouted, her father would have not turned up — her father (the Commendatore) would be alive; if she shut up and didn’t do anything and let Giovanni go ahead and do whatever he was doing, her father would still be alive. She does carry that guilt, no matter how conscientious or not-conscientious she is. That’s one element. Another is that Zerlina is seduced by the money; she says “yes!” the minute he tells her, “I have a villa and will marry you.”

You can’t forget positions in this opera; he is called “Don” for a reason, after all.

Absolutely.

I get frustrated with stagings that forget that part, and ones in which the women are victimized.

What’s fascinating is the characters also change. Elvira is a victim of Leporello and the catalogue aria, and we laugh at her until she tells us, “My God, he has betrayed me with so many women” and all of a sudden, we are with her in that pain. It’s the same moment when we find out our partners had betrayed and cheated on us. It’s so incredibly raw and so close to ourselves. One cannot simplify it into victims and non-victims; each one is a character representing an element of our personality.

… while also being a real human being: complex and nuanced.

Absolutely.

___

Here’s Part Two of our chat, in which we discuss the role of theater in a broader sense, the debate on tradition in opera presentation, and opera fashion (To dress up or not to dress up?). Enjoy!

Auld Lang Sigh

By Catherine Kustanczy

On December 31, 2015

In personal, teaching, work, writing

photo via my Instagram

At this time last year, I was laid up on a sofa, tissues at the ready, sick with the flu. My mother had gone to a nearby friend’s for the New Year’s Eve countdown, with my assurance that was fine to leave me alone; I just needed rest and relaxation, and there was nothing further she could do past the jello-making and soup-heating and tea-freshening she’d been doing for twenty-four hours.

Wrapping herself in a thick, woolly, vintage Hudson’s Bay coat, a jaunty hat, and chunky knitted scarf, she sauntered down the snowy street around 8pm, returning just after midnight, eyes watering from the cold, but her face flushed with happiness.

“I had three glasses of wine!” she marveled.

It seems incredible, thinking back on that night, how physically strong she was, how capable I was, even with the flu, and how much 2015, as it rolled further and further along, took out of us both.

There’s a belief that hardships are sent to teach us something — about ourselves, about our attitudes; we endure them as a means of hardening our survival instincts and honing our notions of identity. It’s true, I’m grateful for the lessons each year has brought me, but no year has taught me more, on so many levels and in so many ways. No year has made me more cynical and yet more curious, more angry and yet more accepting, more honest and yet more aware of the drive to deceive and the great, frightening need some have to throw a theatrical, rosy cover across motive, intention, behaviour, and character. 2015: harsh, painful, important. I’m glad it’s over.

Realizing many of my local relationships aren’t as true as I thought has been a good thing, but it’s also been a painful lesson. I’m grateful to the good souls who call to check on me, who take time to visit or meet up despite poor weather and busy schedules, who don’t make excuses but make time. I’m equally grateful to the far-off people who send good wishes via social media, who follow my updates and share my work —they’re people who engage, interact, actively encourage and communicate; they take the initiative to stay in touch. They get it. Expressions of support and basic concern over the course of this horrendous year, many from quarters I hadn’t expected, were, and remain, very moving. It’s meaningful to know there are people out there listening and watching, who take the time and energy to stay in touch despite busy lives and schedules.

photo via my Instagram

Of course, nothing beats an in-person conversation. Taking the initiative to gently, lovingly pull me out of the cave of grief I frequently (and often unconsciously) retreat into is something I cherish, and to be perfectly frank, I wish it happened more often. In years past, I would always be the one planning, producing, pulling people together. I stopped doing that in 2015; illness and death left me too exhausted and grief-stricken. When the realization recently hit that the only holiday party I attended this year was the one I threw myself, I became both troubled and curious; should I work on being more popular? Should I find an outside job? Ought I to subscribe to the hegemony of coupledom? What about me needed to change? Then I realized, as I have so often throughout 2015, that some people — many people — are, in fact, self-involved assholes. There’s no getting around that harsh, if unfortunately true, fact.

Good moments from 2015 happened in direct relation with, or as a direct result of, my work. Teaching in the early part of this year was one of the best professional experiences of my life; being around students with an abundance of energy, curiosity, and so many incredible stories and passions was a life-enriching thing, and I am greatly looking forward to returning to it. Deeply satisfying writing and reporting opportunities blossomed with CBC, Hyperallergic, Opera News and Opera Canada magazines, as well as the Toronto Symphony. Likewise, many of the best conversations, connections, and concentrations happened in and around, or because of, music and art. Good people and great moments came into my life because of shared passions. Such happenings were like shooting stars: bright, magical, brief. That is, perhaps, all they were meant to be, but their memory is beautiful, a work of art, something I go to and stare at in mute wonder.

Wonder is what shimmers around my favorite cultural things from 2015. I generally dislike “Best of/Worst of” year-end lists — to use one of my mother’s old phrases, it’s no fun looking up a dead horse’s ass — but there are certain moments that stick out: the thick, heavy lines of Basquiat’s paintings, bass baritone Philip Addis’ expression as he leaned, Brando-like, against the set of Pyramus and Thisbe, Daphne Odjig’s bright, vital colors, the way soprano Kristin Szabo and bass-baritone Stephen Hegedus looked at each other in Death and Desire, Carrol Anne Curry’s laugh. I don’t want to get too trite and say “art saved my life this year,” but, in many ways, working in and around culture, sometimes through very harsh conditions and circumstances, was the best kind of therapy. My mother worked for as long as she could; it gave her a sense of accomplishment, pride in a job well and thoroughly done. Work for her was, I realize, a necessary distraction through the horrible illnesses she faced in her fifteen years of her cancer. More than a distraction, work was a kind of beacon of security, even when the nature of the work wasn’t entirely secure; the nature of the work, and the feeling it gave her, were. I get that.

photo via my Instagram

And so, as 2016 dawns, I’m tempted to want for more: more art, more magic, more satisfying work. But as 2015 so succinctly taught me, you can’t plan for pain; you can only ride its high waves, and hope, when you get sucked under, you don’t swallow too much salt water. I didn’t emerge from that sea a tinfoil mermaid; I emerged battered, bruised, with an injured foot and a sore heart. I don’t feel strong as 2015 comes to a close; I feel different. I’m more suspicious of peoples’ motives, less tolerant of bullshit. I love my work, and the possibilities it affords. There are places I want to travel, people I want to meet, things I want to see. I wish for more sincerity. Such a desire isn’t on a timetable, unfolding precisely over the course of one year, but I suspect that it helps to stay curious, critical, controlled in reactions and devoid of drama.

2016: less assholes, more authenticity. It’s a start.

Almost (Entirely) Human

By Catherine Kustanczy

On February 7, 2014

In Non-Classical Writing, popular culture, television, writing

Lately I’ve been re-discovering the joys of television. I don’t mean sitting listlessly, mindlessly, drooling in front of the goggle-box; I mean sitting down to focus on something with good writing, good acting, meaningful themes and contemporary resonance. It also has to be a ripping good yarn.

Almost Human only came to my attention through the mass advertising campaign that welcomed its arrival on the telly in November. Its birth was delayed by some strange TV scheduling voodoo, but it came nonetheless. My initial interest was only lukewarm, to be honest. Sci-fi isn’t really my thing.

I wasn’t able to sit down and actually watch an episode until late December. “Hooked” is probably too mild a description of my consequent reaction, and it’s galling to realize the show still stands in constant danger of cancellation. It’s one of the smartest, most contemporary things to air on mainstream TV in ages. I don’t like crime programs generally, but Almost Human feels like a thing apart, providing its viewers with a very timely take on where we are now, as a society, in our relationship to and with technology, and by extension, each other. Though it takes place in 2048, the world of Almost Human is very much a world we recognize, what with the pull-and-pinch screens used everywhere, the gleaming, smooth machines people seem to carry, the sense of anywhere, anytime-access, for pretty much anything or anyone. The program seamlessly blends various facets of technology we take for granted (interactivity, connectivity, community) and spits them back in new, challenging ways that aren’t ever predictable or cliched, but rather, thought-provoking, occasionally troubling, but always illuminating.

Along with the completely cool tech-and-computer gadgetry, a big part of Almost Human‘s appeal lies in the chemistry of its leads, Karl Urban (as traumatized cop John Kennix) and Michael Ealy (as John’s partner, an outdated artificial intelligence model named Dorian). The two share a unique blend of humor, trust, angst, and innate knowingness that reaches past the immediate backstories of their respective characters; theirs is a chemistry recalling some of the great pairings of the recent and not-so-recent cultural past: Laurel and Hardy, Redford and Newman, Davis and Sarandon, Downey and Law. Urban himself says the “touchstone“for the John/Dorian relationship is the 1988 film Midnight Run, with Robert DeNiro and Charles Grodin: “There were two characters who were thrown into a situation that neither of them wanted to be in, but through the course of that movie, they learned to depend on each other and ultimately form a bond — but they still got under each other’s skin.”

Not merely two beautiful men acting out a high-tech premise, Urban and Ealy share a beguilingly human bond that is compelling and frequently very touching. Come for the robotics, the show seems to whisper, stay for the humanity.

Indeed, the show’s focus on this humanity, that lies quietly beneath the high-gloss exterior, is what elevates Almost Human from the realm of the curious and into that of brilliance. It helps that the “boss” of the operation is played by the great Lili Taylor, who also shares a wonderful chemistry with the pair. There’s an especially enjoyable frisson between her character and Urban’s, an undercurrent of respect and attraction, mixed with an enjoyable frankness and honesty. These two genuinely like each other. It’s good seeing an older woman in a position of power, not portrayed as some desperate cougar or unfeeling hard-ass, but rather, as hard-working, frequently conflicted figure who inspires great loyalty from her (almost entirely male) team, without resorting to tiresome cliches. It’s good to see Taylor’s Maldonado on mainstream TV; I want to see not only more of her, but more like her.

And, though Urban’s character is the human (his synthetic leg notwithstanding), the viewer’s empathy frequently shifts to his robotic partner. This is just as much the result of good acting as it is strong writing. Ealy’s characterization is a fascinating mix of warmth and reserve, of easy knowing and child-like awe; he is omniscient and yet awkward, close to indestructible and yet utterly vulnerable. Ealy captures these contradictions with ease and a touching gentleness. We see ourselves in Dorian, even as we identify with the John, the traumatized human trying to make sense of it, and his relationship to (and with) it. John and Dorian are two pieces of a more deep and complex whole, one that seeks to define who and what we are, as humans, in the twenty-first century. No small order, but certainly a good one –and a grand ambition — for a modern TV show.

Blending with the high-tech, sci-fi elements are classical themes and literary allusions. Last Monday’s episode had echoes of “Ozymandias”, “Kubla Khan”, Blade Runner, Stephen King’s The Two Towers, Greek mythology, and of course, Frankenstein. The nature of relationship to one’s creation is, of course, an obvious theme for a program whose entire premise is based on human/synthetic interactions. But newer episodes are probing this theme more deeply, asking questions about what it means to have awareness, to be creative, to grow up –and what it means to relate to another being, and if we can accept the price of an ever-shifting identity in an ever-shifting world, and integrate that experience with those around us who might be enduring the same thing. The latest episode also featured some fascinating allusions to post-modern feminism in the form of Gina Carano’s super-vicious assassin-robot. I keep thinking about the fact “Danica,” near the start of the episode, chose the sexy female body (after being stuck with a featureless male one), that delighted gleam in her eye as she spotted the voluptuous figure under a white canopy and later admired herself in a mirror, “wearing” the figure, as if trying on a new, perfectly-fitting dress. Robots too, it seems, have the capacity to equate sex and power, and the desire to feel the connection between the two within their own corporeal realities. “Danica” wanted to feel sexy inside, in a way that matched her power in the outside world. It was an utterly fascinating scene, one that points (again) to some very smart writing. (Bravo, Graham Roland.)

People still think of smart television as being, by and large, the bastion of HBO and AMC (and perhaps Netflix too)… but that’s changing. Let’s hope Almost Human turns the tide here, and doesn’t suffer the same fate as Firefly, another beloved FOX show cancelled too soon. If online blogs, boards, and Tumblr are any indication, there is a wild forest of dedication that’s as deep as it is wide for this program. Hey TV executives: some of us want the entrancing mish-mash of literary-come-sci-fi brilliance that mixes old and new, human and synthetic, feeling and moving, sexy and nerdy, entertaining and smart. It’s perfect. Keep going. The other side of the Wall is waiting; let’s dip a toe in — synthetic or not — and see where we go from here.

Please?

Good and Hot

By Catherine Kustanczy

On June 26, 2012

In video

The New York Times featured this lovely work by animator Gary Leib today. With a gorgeously simple sax soundtrack by Mike Hashim, the just-over two-minute video portrays city life in all its surreal splendour an sordid squalor. There’s so much going on this piece of animation that reflects life in New York in 2012: peoples’ sense of isolation mixed with a weary independence; their close relationship to pets; their love/hate relationships with nature and nurture; the dreariness of work; and the fortifying comfort of old (addictive) habits as a means of bolstering an ever-shifting identity. The animation is both whimsical and surreal, innocent and haunting – suitable for a man who created the sublimely bizarre underground comic Idiotland (gorgeous front and back covers here), and whose work I’ve enjoyed seeing in The New Yorker now for a while.

Also: viva coffee! Though I used to be a hardcore tea drinker, lately I can’t start the day without a good strong cup poured from the French press. Thank you NYT; thank you Mr. Leib; I’ll think of ravenous birds and waitresses with bottomless carafes as I take my first morning sips now.

Local Chef

By Catherine Kustanczy

On July 6, 2010

In food

Further to my last post, I’m pleased to present my chat with Chef Trevor Middleton, who’s with The Local Company in Toronto. I think you’ll find his thoughts on food, presentation, and the cultivation of relationships enlightening. Does it get my any closer to defining what “local” means in this day and age? Yes and no. See for yourself.

How would you describe yourself?

I’m a moody bastard.

Where do you source your meat?

It all comes from The Butcher Shoppe. All the meat coming through (there), you have a guarantee -you know it’s Canadian.

The biggest challenge has been getting set up with (local producers).

What about dairy?

I’ll use Mr. Dairy -they source Canadian -but I will also source artisanal stuff, like Quebec organic. And I’ll also use stuff from the street (Danforth Avenue). Sysco is a major supplier to all the restaurants. You have to use it -but I only spend about $500 a week with Sysco, whereas I spend $1400 or $1500 everywhere else. There’s a local market near here, a village market, and I drop $60-$100 a day there.

How does the word “local” relate to what you do?

It’s a conceptualized name, meant to be a local restaurant, more local to the Danforth. The food philosophy side came with me -this comes from my love and intimacy with food. I’ve done enough fine dining, … (to know) I don’t want run-of-the-mill. I don’t ever want to be known for pretty food; I want a wonderful experience. I want to feel good about myself and what I ate.

A lot of this goes to my childhood. I was raised poor and with Crohn’s disease, and I was always hungry. Because of my own disease, I have to make it work for me, I can’t use garbage. Anything processed makes me sick, and it’ll make you sick along the way too.

What is your ultimate ambition?

My end goal is to teach. I want to be teaching culinary arts within five years. Part of it is, i have a gift with mentoring the young, and taking in lost souls. If you’ve got it together, don’t talk to me. I want someone who’s a f*ck-up, that’s how I heal myself. My former dishwasher is a young man most thought was autistic, and I found out it’s just social anxiety. No one would let him do anything but wash dishes; now he cooks every dish on the menu. He doesn’t have a high school diploma, though I have him enrolled in George Brown as a mature student. He carries that passion for food through his life now.

What do you think of sensuality as it relates to the restaurant experience?

When I worked at The Boilerhouse, they had beautiful food, wonderful execution, they were the best of the best. They had high-level chefs too, but I noticed one thing within a few months, something they tried to beat out of me: they take the rustic-ness out of food. They wanted perfectly trained-out stuff. I want chunks, not perfection. Restaurants take the technique part too far; they forget food is a living thing, that it’s natural, just because it has to be pretty. i think a lot of newer chefs are in a backlash, so now there’s more comfy food again.

What’s the end goal, for you, as a chef?

It’s morphing. At the beginning, it’s like everyone: you want to be a superstar. But really, the greatest experience is to sit down, invite people to have a glass of wine, a good meal, and talk. Dining isn’t just about food, it’s about how you interact – how you interact with your world, your surroundings. I’d rather be known as someone who cooks plain, simple food, more than anything else.

Do you know the people you buy from?

I do. If I don’t come in, they go, “where have you been?” One Asian lady at the local market, she and her husband always joke with me. Once a week, because of the nature of our relations, they’ll give me a care package to take back to kitchen, I have friendly relationships with local people. There are no pretensions. But I lament not being able to drive hours out to food sources. In the past, I ordered from Echo Bay -they provide grass-fed organic beef -but that means I have to charge more, and when I do, people (customers) complain.

What’s a chef’s job?

To engender respect for agriculture. If i can’t get organic, there are companies that have ethical way of doing business. I don’t want the fancy stuff if it’s not harvested ethically or sustainably.

Local or “Local”?

By Catherine Kustanczy

On July 3, 2010

In food

Ironically or not, the term “local” has come to mean a number of things, especially when it comes to food. The word “local” is generally defined as “close by” -but in what context? And to whom?

I pondered these definitions as I took a gander recently to a farmers’ market near to where I grew up. Only one -yes, one -producer had a sign up stating where their veg & fruit comes from: Clement Farms, in Newcastle.

“I’m really glad you have that up,” I remarked to an individual guarding the cherries.

“What do you mean?” he inquired.

“Well… ” I hesitated, worried I might sound snobbish, “aren’t farmers’ markets supposed to be local?”

“I guess…”

I walked around the rows of farmers and their goods, and the whole thing struck me more as an exercise in feel-good-ism than a chance to educate people about food issues. I want my farmers’ market to be more than an outdoor produce section, and this one isn’t. It isn’t difficult to find eager local producers to be part of the market, either -numerous food groups exist and maintain active websites and online presences. Maybe I’ve been spoiled by better markets with more conscientious farmers, artisanal food producers, and super-cool suppliers.

Having bought potatoes, tomatoes, & the last of this year’s asparagus (the latter proved perfect for soup) along with cherries from Niagara (which, taste and texture-wise, definitely beat those horrible woody things from California), I walked off still thinking hard about what local means, and whether caring about its definition is the oeuvre of food snobs, or good, simple common sense.

This internal debate about “local” came up a while ago, when I had a beautiful dinner at a restaurant located in the eastern end of Toronto. The gorgeous, white-and-wood-toned room is not exactly in the most culinary astute of areas; it’s located in what we Torontonians call Greektown, meaning there’s lots of souvlaki, dolmades, and flaming feta to be had. That stretch of Danforth Avenue has experienced a kind of renaissance the last few years, as other cultural tastes moved in -you can find Thai, Indian, and vegetarian restos along with the Greek stand-byes. But fine(ish) dining, with a big dollop of Locavore? Not so much. Not until The Local Company.

From the looks of their Facebook page, it’s being promoted more as a Danforth party spot than a place you’d go for a fine, inspiring meal. But that’s just what a companion and I enjoyed a few weeks back. I wrote a review if you’re curious about the meal details. (Addendum to that: I still dream about the flavourful goat cheese appetizer and the moist deliciousness of the chicken main.) Tomorrow, I’m posting my interview with The Local Company’s chef Trevor Middleton. I think his answers will surprise and delight. That definition of “local” means a lot of things to him, mainly involving the cultivation of relationships in the immediate community, which is certainly refreshing to hear in this age of TV-star chefs and kitchen egos.

I’m still not sure what “local” means, or why it has to mean so many things to so many people, or why it’s so hard to find actual, local food in outlying areas. I’ll post more thoughts on this in the coming weeks, including Chef Jamie Kennedy‘s reactions when I asked him about it on the radio recently. In the meantime, look out for the chat with Chef Middleton a demain.

In the meantime, have a delicious Monday.

them & us & TPM

By Catherine Kustanczy

On January 16, 2009

In opera

Now here’s a neat example of the power of online media in the arts world.

Mention this blog to receive a $15 ticket for Tracy Dawson’s Them & Us, on now through January 31st. That’s for any ticket, any night, any time.

Them & Us is made up of a series of vignettes exploring the ins and outs of modern relating. By turns funny, poignant and… well, salty (the skit involving a 16-year-old propositioning her father’s business partner is one you won’t soon forget), Dawson’s work goes way past the boring “relationship drama” cliches. That can only be a good thing. And it features a quartet of awesome Canadian talent; as well as Dawson, there’s Sarah Dodd, Gray Powell, and Michael Healey (A comment about his performance I overheard at the opening: “If he were any more dry, he’d bleed sand…” True story.)

It’s cold and wintery. You’re not in Utah. So go to the theatre already.

Call the Arts Box Office (416.504.7529) or check out the TPM website.
Tell ’em Play Anon sent ya.