Dmitri Shostakovich's The Nose has its Metropolitan Opera premiere on March 5 at 8:00 pm, conducted by Valery Gergiev, in a visually arresting new production by artist William Kentridge that features original collage, film, sculpture, and massive projections of the artist's drawings and prints. Making his Met debut, baritone Paulo Szot performs the role of Kovalyov in the story of the Russian official who wakes one morning to discover his nose has disappeared (and taken on a higher bureaucratic rank). Based on the short story of the same name by Nikolai Gogol, the opera is what Kentridge has called an exploration of "learning from the absurd." In this production, visuals include renderings of Soviet workers, snatches of newspaper, and projections of propaganda - as well as the missing appendage in adventures ranging from delivering a speech to riding a horse.
The full creative team is making its Met debut. Set design, which features huge collages and tilted walkways, is by William Kentridge in collaboration with Sabine Theunissen. Luc de Wit is the associate director, Greta Goiris creates the costumes, and Urs Schönebaum designs the lighting. Performances of The Nose run through March 25. The cast also features Andrei Popov as the menacing Police Inspector, and Gordon Gietz in the role of the rogue Nose. Pavel Smelkov conducts the final performance.
"I always wanted to do something related to Russia in the 1920s, during the revolutionary period and its aftermath," Kentridge says, "because of my long interest in the history of modernism and in the convoluted relation of art-making to politics." In his view, the story of The Nose addresses "what constitutes a person-how singular are we and how much are we divided against ourselves. It's also about the terrors of hierarchy-how in the Russian society of the czarist era, you were in abject terror of anyone who was above you and, if you were a higher rank, you had a murderous contempt for anyone below you." Kentridge has previously staged opera for the KunstenFESTIVAL des Arts and the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels.
Coinciding with the Met premiere of The Nose is a major retrospective of the artist's work entitled William Kentridge: Five Themes, on view through May 17 at the Museum of Modern Art. The simultaneous presentation of the opera and the exhibit, together with a presentation of Kentridge's Nose-related art at the Arnold & Marie Schwartz Gallery Met, marks a significant step in the Met's plan to bridge opera and contemporary visual art. The Gallery Met exhibition, entitled Ad Hoc: Works for The Nose, features a number of charcoal drawings, including one of Shostakovich himself. Also on display is a disintegrating wooden sculpture based on this drawing, as well as Kentridge's original art for the banner that currently hangs on the Met façade. Events around town include a series of lectures and discussions. (A complete listing follows.)
The Nose, the first opera by a 22-year-old Shostakovich, written during the early years of Stalin's Soviet leadership, had its world premiere in 1930 at the Maly Theater in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad). Despite careful collaboration among the composer, director Nikolay Smolich, designer Vladimir Dmitriyev, and the conductor Samuil Samosud, the opera was quickly denounced and received only 16 performances. The opera was not performed again in the Soviet Union until 1974, in a production supervised by the composer less than one year before his death. The Met premiere of The Nose is a co-production with the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence and the Opéra National de Lyon, France.
About the Performers
Valery Gergiev made his company debut in 1994, taking the podium for Verdi's Otello. Since then, the maestro has led 18 more works here and served as principal guest conductor from 1998 to 2008. At the Met, Gergiev has particularly focused on the Russian repertory. He has conducted well-known operas such as Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov (which Gergiev will conduct in a new production next season) and Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin, as well as Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. He has also introduced Met audiences to Tchaikovsky's Mazeppa, and two Prokofiev powerhouses, War and Peace and The Gambler. Gergiev has also conducted at the Met Verdi's Don Carlo and La Traviata, three Wagner operas, Der Fliegende Hollander, Parsifal, and Die Walküre, and Richard Strauss's Salome. Gergiev is the general director and artistic director of the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. A recording of The Nose, led by Gergiev, has recently been released on the Mariinsky label.
Baritone Paulo Szot makes his Met debut in The Nose as collegiate assessor Kovalyov, the hapless bureaucrat who wakes to find his nose has disappeared from his face. Szot made his Broadway debut in 2008 as Émile De Becque in Lincoln Center Theater's revival of South Pacific, directed by Bartlett Sher. Szot won the Tony Award for his performance, and was also honored by the Drama Desk, the Outer Critics Circle, and the Theatre World Award. Szot has performed a wide range of opera roles, including Belcore in L'Elisir d'Amore, Count Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro, Escamillo in Carmen, Count des Grieux in Le Portrait de Manon, Marcello in La Bohème, and the title role of Eugene Onegin with such companies as the New York City Opera, the Boston Lyric Opera, the Palm Beach Opera, the Canadian Opera Company, the Teatro Liceu in Barcelona, the Théâtre National de Bordeaux, and Opéra Marseille.
