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Babies on Stage

Posted by: stan 09:07 am EDT 03/16/14

The use of a live baby in "Doll's House" heightened the realism and made Nora's escape more compelling. In the Met's exciting "Madam Butterfly" a marionette is used for butterfly's young son -- it removed much of the poignancy of the sad, beautiful "humming" song interlude where she and her son are patiently waiting for Pinkerton to return. Later she has to hide her son from her suicide. Hide a puppet's eyes? The Mark Lamos City Opera (sigh) version more effectively used a real boy and (my) heartbreak was real.


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re: Babies on Stage

Posted by: LegitOnce 05:31 pm EDT 03/16/14
In reply to: Babies on Stage - stan 09:07 am EDT 03/16/14

The child in Madama Butterfly is supposed to be about two years old, so no matter what you do, there's a compromise involved.

You do know that when Cio-Cio-San kills herself at the end of the opera, she soprano doesn't really die? And that the tenor isn't actually enlisted in the US Navy?


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re: Babies on Stage

Posted by: Chromolume 12:29 pm EDT 03/16/14
In reply to: Babies on Stage - stan 09:07 am EDT 03/16/14

In the Met's exciting "Madam Butterfly" a marionette is used for butterfly's young son -- it removed much of the poignancy of the sad, beautiful "humming" song interlude where she and her son are patiently waiting for Pinkerton to return. Later she has to hide her son from her suicide. Hide a puppet's eyes? The Mark Lamos City Opera (sigh) version more effectively used a real boy and (my) heartbreak was real.

A lot of people (myself included) really liked the puppetry. (I wasn't sure I was going to like it, but it won me over.) But hey, we pick and choose the things on which we will and won't suspend disbelief. There are also plenty of people who wouldn't buy the fact that the singer playing Butterfly is always WAY older than 15, lol. To many of us, THAT doesn't matter so much. ;-)


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re: I'm in the "I loved the puppet in Butterfly" camp too

Posted by: Guillaume 03:46 pm EDT 03/17/14
In reply to: re: Babies on Stage - Chromolume 12:29 pm EDT 03/16/14

The night I saw it Roberto Alagna continued to interact with the puppet at the curtain call, talking to it and encouraging it to step forward for a bow. It was very endearing.


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I had the great fortune to see SLEEPING BEAUTY by

Posted by: jero 09:43 am EDT 03/16/14
In reply to: Babies on Stage - stan 09:07 am EDT 03/16/14

matthew bourne. Loved that baby...and was close enough to see its expressions.


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