Operas

For her début as the new Ballet Director and Chief Choreographer of the Ballet Zürich, Cathy Marston is showing the Cellist, which she composed for the Royal Ballet in London. The ballet tells the life story of Jacqueline du Pré, cellist extraordinaire (wife of famous conductor Daniel Barenboim), struck at her prime by multiple sclerosis.

Die Zauberflöte is, in my uneducated opinion, one of the most difficult operas to bring to the stage. On top of the technical challenges it poses (which are wholly manageable for any decent opera house), die Zauberflöte is among the most frequently performed of all operas, meaning one has to wow the neophyte opera-goer—who wouldn’t risk the hefty ticket price on anything not Mozart-Wagner-Verdi—and the seasoned, binoculars-clasping, loge-supervising audience, who might get bored if something on stage comes to close to any famous production from the last 230+ years.

I need to preface this by saying that I’m not a fan of french opéra (specifically opéra lyrique, and I’m especially skeptical of Massenet). The stage is quaintly arranged, albeit a bit boring, as a pink-ish cupboard-laden kitchen, with doors opening to reveal various backgrounds as the play progresses.