Aida, as we all know, is a horrifically difficult opera to stage -- it doesn't work historically, because the chance of a military commander falling in love with a slave is more or less the same of a modern dayUS Senator falling in love with a beer can -- slaves were literally things to be used -- nobody would believe Radames falling in love with a Flintstones-style lawnmower, after all. The duty vs love angle is awesome but it's really saddled by so much heavy-handed stuff anyway (as in Zeffirelli's 2006 Scala production, splendid in its luxury and deathly in its motionlessness -- OC was there for the 12/7 premiere and for all the Alagna insanity that followed) that one might as well go nuts and shake things uppa.
A maestro of shaking opera things up, Graham Vick, has dreamed up an interesting variation for Aida: at the Bregenzer Festspiele he's imagined a huge Statue of Liberty -- well her big feet and her right hand -- as the backdrop for Aida
After all it's the same festival that's in the business to stage Tosca under a big eye, and so much more.
More, of course, after the jump.
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