In recent decades, a particular trend has taken root in opera staging: the radical recontextualization of classic works. It’s no longer unusual to see La Bohème set in an oncology ward, or Semiramide transported to a futuristic spaceship. These directorial choices, once perceived as daring exceptions, have become so frequent that they now represent a kind of new normal. To the point that if a director decides to settle Verdi’s Macbeth in Scotland, he or she is considered a “traditionalist.”
While some applaud these interpretations as innovative and refreshing, I can’t help but feel that they often miss the mark.
Why?
Because they tend to disregard the original coherence between music and text, imposing an external vision on works that were conceived with meticulous dramaturgical balance. The composers we revere – Puccini, Rossini, Mozart – knew exactly what they were doing. The time, the place, the context of each scene was not a random backdrop: it was a narrative and musical necessity.
When we uproot a character from their historical and cultural environment, we risk distorting not only the visual impact, but also the internal meaning of the opera itself.
Of course, not all operas respond the same way to a change of setting. Some works are timeless and allegorical by nature, and they lend themselves more naturally to imaginative transpositions. Think of Die Zauberflöte or Turandot: their worlds are not tied to a precise historical reality, but to dreamlike, symbolic dimensions. There, abstraction can serve the narrative. But when a libretto is deeply rooted in a specific social, cultural or political context, ignoring that context often weakens the impact of the entire work.
Wouldn’t it be more courageous to write and produce new operas, ones that truly speak to our era, our aesthetics, our dilemmas? If we want to tell a story set in space or in a cancer ward, let’s do so with newly composed music and a libretto designed for that context. That would be a genuine embrace of the present, a bold step forward for the art form.
And if we settle – let’s say – La Traviata in New York, what happens to the extremely Parisian atmosphere of this work and to the textual references to France? Do we really go so far as to change the words of the libretto, or to adapt the subtitles just to make the staging work? At what cost?
Yes, I know it guarantees more ticket sales to stage an opera by Puccini than by some unknown contemporary composer. But if we do so, let’s try to respect what Verdi wrote.
In my view, we have gradually attributed to opera directors the status of creators, when in truth they are (or should be) facilitators, or better yet, sublimators. The director’s role is deeply creative, yes, but not limitless. It is a creative act within a frame defined by the composer and librettist.
A great director doesn’t need to distort a masterpiece to make it feel relevant. Their artistry lies in revealing the essence, not in eclipsing it.
As Maria Callas once said:
“When you want to find a gesture, when you want to know how to act on stage, all you have to do is listen to the music. The composer has already taken care of that.”
I believe this holds true, now more than ever.
People enter an opera house to dream, or at least to be moved, surprised, amazed. But today, too many spectators leave feeling alienated or disappointed, sometimes even discouraged from ever returning.
I am afraid that’s not innovation.
It’s a fog drifting over the stage, blurring what was once luminous.
It has become a predictable cliché which—if it ever had a purpose—has long since exhausted it.
Let us be bold not by rewriting what already speaks to us, but by creating what has yet to be sung.