Cavaradossi -
Tosca
Scarpia
1 Let's begin with Act III, the Act in which Cavaradossi will be shot, in which Tosca, realising that he is dead, will escape Scarpia's creatures by throwing herself off the battlements (of San Angelo). Expectations of something akin to a cell, where Cavaradossi will write his letter to Tosca, and a flat surface on which the execution will be staged?
2 Ah, the setting is different. Imagine a valley; or imagine a skateboard surface, a surface in the form of an ellipse which slopes down from the left to the bottom and which slopes up to the right. Notice that the bottom of the valley, of the skateboard run, rises from the front to the back. The effect is to funnel the eye to the backdrop which is visible between the two slopes, a backdrop which, in this instance, shows a swirling, starry. We are taken into the depths of the sky.
3 The Act opens to the song of the shepherd boy; Scarpia's men, his apparatchiks, enter and move up the valley floor, some to one slope, some along the bottom, some to the other slope. With their backs to the audience, they gave outwards and upwards to the great vault which is the sky. We follow their gaze; we too look to the sky.
4 And as we do, as we contemplate the infinity of space, so we are reminded of our insignificance. We are small, we may be alone, in the universe. We sense our days are long, but in the timelessness of time, they are but of the briefest. Our cares, our concerns, our quarrels, are lost in the great, wide universe.
5 What, in the previous Act, has occupied us is now seen for what it is, a passing moment of insignificance. Cavaradossi sings; the soldiers come on, in low light, and form themselves into a firing squad; the officer signals, the shots are head, Cavaradossi falls. The squad march off. Offstage, there are noises: Scarpia's body has been discovered; his men are coming in pursuit of Tosca. She runs to the edge of the known world, the top of the valley; we see her against the sky framed by the sides of the ellipse. With a backwards flip, she leaves this world, perhaps to be re-united with her lover. The sky, the universe, looks on, untouched.
6 What a difference this setting, this interpretation of Act III makes. In the familiar presentation, the Act concludes the opera by providing Cavaradossi with the opportunity to behave well as the condemned man and providing Tosca, and the opera, with the morally doubtful dramatic finale of her suicide. We can all go home. The opera has concluded. However, the new Act puts the preceding drama into an entirely new perspective. The setting prompts us to place that drama, including the events in Act II, into a universal setting. Cavaradossi, Tosca, Scarpia had their moments and are gone. So too are kings, emperors, captains of all kinds, the well-born people and the low. They too had their briefest of times and are gone. Each is a drop of water in a torrent is flowing towards the waterfall. Some drops stand out, briefly. Then all are gone. Only the sky, only the universe remains. A cold one.
Tosca
Scarpia
1 Let's begin with Act III, the Act in which Cavaradossi will be shot, in which Tosca, realising that he is dead, will escape Scarpia's creatures by throwing herself off the battlements (of San Angelo). Expectations of something akin to a cell, where Cavaradossi will write his letter to Tosca, and a flat surface on which the execution will be staged?
2 Ah, the setting is different. Imagine a valley; or imagine a skateboard surface, a surface in the form of an ellipse which slopes down from the left to the bottom and which slopes up to the right. Notice that the bottom of the valley, of the skateboard run, rises from the front to the back. The effect is to funnel the eye to the backdrop which is visible between the two slopes, a backdrop which, in this instance, shows a swirling, starry. We are taken into the depths of the sky.
3 The Act opens to the song of the shepherd boy; Scarpia's men, his apparatchiks, enter and move up the valley floor, some to one slope, some along the bottom, some to the other slope. With their backs to the audience, they gave outwards and upwards to the great vault which is the sky. We follow their gaze; we too look to the sky.
4 And as we do, as we contemplate the infinity of space, so we are reminded of our insignificance. We are small, we may be alone, in the universe. We sense our days are long, but in the timelessness of time, they are but of the briefest. Our cares, our concerns, our quarrels, are lost in the great, wide universe.
5 What, in the previous Act, has occupied us is now seen for what it is, a passing moment of insignificance. Cavaradossi sings; the soldiers come on, in low light, and form themselves into a firing squad; the officer signals, the shots are head, Cavaradossi falls. The squad march off. Offstage, there are noises: Scarpia's body has been discovered; his men are coming in pursuit of Tosca. She runs to the edge of the known world, the top of the valley; we see her against the sky framed by the sides of the ellipse. With a backwards flip, she leaves this world, perhaps to be re-united with her lover. The sky, the universe, looks on, untouched.
6 What a difference this setting, this interpretation of Act III makes. In the familiar presentation, the Act concludes the opera by providing Cavaradossi with the opportunity to behave well as the condemned man and providing Tosca, and the opera, with the morally doubtful dramatic finale of her suicide. We can all go home. The opera has concluded. However, the new Act puts the preceding drama into an entirely new perspective. The setting prompts us to place that drama, including the events in Act II, into a universal setting. Cavaradossi, Tosca, Scarpia had their moments and are gone. So too are kings, emperors, captains of all kinds, the well-born people and the low. They too had their briefest of times and are gone. Each is a drop of water in a torrent is flowing towards the waterfall. Some drops stand out, briefly. Then all are gone. Only the sky, only the universe remains. A cold one.
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