Phantom of the seas

"I'm happy to be back, but I don't know if the feeling's mutual," mulled Italian opera director Giancarlo del Monaco as he strutted back and forth at the National Center for the Performing Arts' (NCPA) cavernous workshop this week. 

As he described how he plans to sink a 10-meter-long wooden man-of-war during the finale of next month's production of The Flying Dutchman, giggles erupted among those within earshot. The 68-year-old Venetian seemed unaware that such a cinematic staging of Richard Wagner's 1843 opera would draw parallels in China with another certain love story that ends with a ship sinking into the ocean.  

"This is a drama about love, boats and water," said del Monaco, a little irked by comparisons to Titanic. "Do you want me to stage it in a bathtub? Because I can, you know," he assured.

The NCPA's recent slew of productions, much like the venue affectionately dubbed "the egg," embody the current state of opera in China: expensive, flamboyant and impressive, at least on the surface. The cashed-up opera company has spared no expense with its commissions, quickly building a repertoire meant to shock and awe the classical world into accepting it as a major player. 

So far, the "culture rush" has achieved mixed results. The opera house hit last year with Tosca (also by Del Monaco), but flopped with The Barber of Seville and a terribly bland operatic adaptation of the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) play The Orphan of Zhao, the latter of which commanded an extensive rewrite.    

The Flying Dutchman attempts to navigate the NCPA into safer waters with audiences by using multiple projectors, a gray sea backdrop of flowing silk and a towering, red-sailed ghost ship. "This is technical, expensive and difficult, but China's a great country and it deserves a great Dutchman," del Monaco told the Global Times.

Regarded by critics as Wagner's most accessible work, The Flying Dutchman tells the story of a ghostly captain cursed to sail the seas eternally unless he finds a woman willing to love him and break his curse. "The reason why directors love it is because Wagner left a lot of room for interpretation," said Giuseppe Cuccia, NCPA Opera Production Consultant. "It was [Wagner's] first real break from tradition and step toward into what later became known as the 'Wagnerian' sound." Del Monaco was more direct. "You could perform Wagner with the entire cast sitting on toilets and it would still have power," he declared.  

Instead of keeping to its staid three-act format, The Flying Dutchman will be performed true to Wagner's original without intermission, involving real-time scene transitions. It also presents a theatrical challenge for the all-Chinese cast that, with the exception of tenor Zhang Yalun, has never performed Wagner before. 

The director explained Wagner found inspiration for the opera after experiencing a near shipwreck while fleeing creditors via Riga, Prussia to London. "If the Dutchman is calm, so is the sea. But when he is angry, it swells with rage. The sea is an expression of the soul," he said. 

"There is nobody more egocentric than Wagner. He wrote himself into all his work," he added, acknowledging the German composer was notoriously nationalistic and an outspoken anti-Semite. "Wagner was a genius, but like many geniuses he was also a real son of a  b****. How do you say that in Chinese?" he laughed.    

When: April 3-8

Where: NCPA Opera Hall, 2 Chang'an Avenue, Xicheng district

Tickets: 160-680 yuan

Contact: 6655-0000