(In 29 Surtitles)
Some love them, some hate them,
but if you get them wrong, they can derail an entire show
Punctuation is a delicate balance.
Many opera libretti are written in an overly punctuated style!
But the eye gets tired of endless rows of exclamatory text!
It’s exhausting!
…as is mysterious…
…line-splitting…
Some places, like the wonderful Welsh National Opera
have bilingual surtitles, but in a previous production of Carmen,
this resulted in Mercédès singing about her future husband,
who, instead of being an army chief, became an army chef
Sometimes, sitting in the surtitling box for hours,
you can go a little mad
In a stage rehearsal for Madama Butterfly,
I once briefly surtitled the Humming Chorus
It looked like this:
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I thought this was hilarious
Timing is everything. If you press the button too soon,
you have a choice:
Do you remove the title, and admit your error,
or keep the faith, and pray the singer comes in soon?
In fact, most audience members aren’t aware that there is
someone pressing a button, following the score every night
Sometimes the technology is against you.
I heard of a performance that had to stop because the titles got stuck
They read:
PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL
PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL PORTUGAL
No one ever understood why
Fact: opera singers make up new words more frequently
if they are singing in their native language
Also true: they have an uncanny habit of singing the same mistake
multiple times in rehearsal…
…and then, as soon as you change the title to match them,
they revert to the original text
(The temptation to completely change the plot of the opera
is an urge that never entirely goes away)
But on the best days, you forget you are working at all
because the orchestra sounds so astonishing
And then a singer makes you weep
with the beauty and raw emotion of their performance
And that’s when you think
What a wonderful world to be working in,
What a joy to be alive,
What a privilege to work in this extraordinary industry
And then you think…
Oh s***!
That was my cue!