'It's Familiar To All The Women In My Family:' Adapting Von Trier For The Opera
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
This week, a new opera based on the popular but controversial Lars von Trier film "Breaking The Waves" is having its world premiere at Opera Philadelphia, and the subject matter would seem to be good for the operatic treatment - sex, religion and transgression. Jeff Lunden tells us more.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
JEFF LUNDEN, BYLINE: "Breaking The Waves" is set on a remote island in Scotland where a deeply religious young woman named Bess marries a Nordic oil worker named Jan.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "BREAKING THE WAVES")
KIERA DUFFY: (As Bess McNeill, singing) His name is Jan. I did not know him. He's from the lake (ph).
LUNDEN: But circumstances conspire to take their romance and her sexual awakening to a dark, dark places. Composer Missy Mazzoli says she was drawn to the material because of its big ideas.
MISSY MAZZOLI: It's about the nature of goodness, the nature of loyalty, the nature of faith and what happens when all these things sort of contradict each other or get in the way. What do you do in that impossible situation to still be a good person?
LUNDEN: When Jan is injured in an accident on a North Sea oil rig and becomes paralyzed, he suggests that Bess have sex with other men and report back on her experiences. Von Trier's film polarized audiences and critics when it was released in 1996. Some called it misogynistic. James Darrah, who directs the opera, likes the film, but he still had one basic question for the creators.
JAMES DARRAH: Why turn this into an opera? Why do it when the film is - has such an effect on people and is incredibly potent and full of really amazing performances that are maximizing the potential of what I think good film can stir up and open dialogues about and also tell stories?
LUNDEN: The idea came from librettist Royce Vavrek, who's been a fan of the film since he was 14. He thinks the unorthodox storyline is rooted in the characters' essential goodness.
ROYCE VAVREK: Jan sets her on this journey because he wants to set her free. He doesn't want to ruin her. He believes that it's the only thing that he can do to go and allow her to live her life. He views it as a gift.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "BREAKING THE WAVES")
JOHN MOORE: (As Jan Nyman, singing) You must move on for my sake. I can hardly remember what it's like - what it's like to make love. When I forget - when I forget (unintelligible).
DUFFY: (As Bess McNeill, singing) Please don't - please don't...
VAVREK: Bess is just this unfiltered creature that seems to have just pure goodness, and all she wants is to take all of the advice, all of the ideas of her community, of her mother, of the doctor, of her husband and filter that into a good life. It's almost fatalistic.
LUNDEN: As the opera goes on, Bess gets shunned by members of her community.
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UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character, singing) There's fluid in Jan's head, affecting his brain. He's not himself, Bess.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: (As character, singing) He's up to his eyeballs in...
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character, singing) Forcing you to sleep with all these men.
LUNDEN: Composer Missy Mazzoli says, far from being a misogynistic, narrative, von Trier's story is illuminating and exaggerating, in a very theatrical way, a situation that many women find themselves in.
MAZZOLI: This feeling of being a woman in an impossible situation and feeling like you have no power and no agency and having everyone around you tell you what to do is extremely familiar. It's familiar to me. It's familiar to all the women in my family. So that is also a big part of why I was attracted to the piece is because I felt that - I wouldn't say it's a feminist piece at all. That's not it's preoccupation. But I did feel that there is an element of compassion and understanding of this very particular part of the female experience.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "BREAKING THE WAVES")
DUFFY: (As Bess McNeill, singing) (Unintelligible).
LUNDEN: Bess' love for Jan is such that he can't see she's probably mentally ill, but librettist Royce Vavrek insists that in a way she's a woman in control.
VAVREK: She believes that she has the power to cure her husband. She believes that she was the agent that brought him home. She invests in this idea that she is a very, very powerful agent in this narrative.
LUNDEN: And audiences need to stick out "Breaking The Waves" to the very end to see how that agency manifests itself. For NPR News, I'm Jeff Lunden.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "BREAKING THE WAVES")
KEIRA DUFFY AND JOHN MOORE: (As Bess McNeill and Jan Nyman, singing) Love will keep me alive.
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