Interview with Melissa Kagen
Jason: How does this scene fit into opera as a genre?
Melissa: It’s obviously right at the cusp of opera turning into musical theatre, even though you still have full fledged operas after, it kind of bridges the gap. I feel like it’s more musical theater. What’s cool about it is that people sing in unison all the time. I feel like that’s something that doesn’t happen as often in opera and I think it makes it easier to sing. The music is pretty simple, but it has tons of accidentals. Like the version I have is mostly written in C, and you’re thinking “oh good, I’ll just play it in C” but then you can’t really play it because it’s so difficult. It’s underhandedly complicated. But I don’t want to get into the whole Musical theater purist versus opera argument, “musical theater can be complicated too.” (laughs) But basically, I think it’s a send-up of opera. No one likes any of the characters. They do what they do, but they don’t have real good motives. It’s very Brechtian. But in terms of opera, the characters are complex enough to make it interesting. The show seems really off-putting at first, but by the end you love to hate these people. I feel like in opera, there’s always one character that you like.
Jason: When you were casting, did you think about people’s voices that fell into an “opera” category or a “musical theater” category?
Melissa: I thought about them mostly in the negative. [name removed] does not have a traditional opera voice. It was really exciting because in the auditions I knew that none of the other directors wanted him for their scenes. If it had been with Musical Theater people, everybody would have wanted him because he had the best stage presence. It was mostly fitting things together. […] I was paying attention to acting more than singing. Any of them could have done the music. It’s not that hard. I was more concerned with which of them was interested, which of them was coachable.
Jason: Do you have a music director for the scene?
Melissa: No. Should I? I would like to get an accompanist, though. I could accompany, I guess, but I wouldn’t really like to. I am music directing the rehearsals. I guess I hadn’t really thought of that. We’ve just had script rehearsals. I guess that’s gonna require a rehearsal pianist. I’d better note that. (makes a note) I almost feel like having a Music Director and a Director breaks up the divide superficially and with a scene this short, I feel like one person can do both. […] That may just mean I don’t know enough what a music director does. (laughs)
Jason: Is there anything I should know before I come to a rehearsal?
Melissa: I want to do this whole thing organically. I mean, with Yeoman (sorry to bring up Yeoman again, I guess it’s the last major thing I did) it was so planned out and I had to just say “hit this point,” “experience this emotion.” I wanna do a lot of improv like we did tonight with the scene. I want the whole thing to be comfortable and I want the scene to evolve, instead of me telling them exactly what to do. It’s a much more Socratic directing than I’ve done before.
3 comments:
I think you directed this interview nicely. You managed to ask specific questions and still leave Melissa room for extended answers. One question: how did you conduct the interview in Josiah's? It's so noisy!
To answer your question, I conducted my interview in Mana's room in her New Dorm A suite.
It was easy to see your interviewee's mental involvement in the subject by reading your interview. She clearly had a lot of thoughts in response to all your questions, and you did a great job of opening up the space in your questions for her to answer freely. You even managed to remind her, by encouraging a train of thought, to get an acompanyist. You did a good job of avoiding leading questions, and allowing the reader to better understand the interviewee.
This brief excerpt brings up a lot of interesting stuff -- Melissa alludes to various established styles, value systems, and aesthetic norms in a very revealing way. By talking about vocal types, musical complexity, and characters, she begins to map the perceived distinctions between musical theater and opera. I've heard some people suggest that musical theater is just English-language opera with contemporary pop influences and larger, more diverse audiences (or that recently-composed English-language opera performed in major opera houses is indistinguishable from musical theater). I wonder what Melissa would make of these claims? And I wonder if she would be more likely to have a music director already in place if her scene were classified as opera?
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