Will America ever see Sofia Coppola’s Traviata?
mainThe first post-Cannes release by the festival’s Best Director is a screening of the Traviata she staged at Rome Opera, a visual spectacular.
The film has a UK release on July 9.
No US release has been secured. Could that be because the Met has lockdown on all US cinema chains?
Watch the trailer.
guess what was the answer conceived for that riddle ? yes, kids – Peter Gelb 😉
Will America want to?
Take away the bold face names, Coppola and Valentino, and you couldn’t tell this production from any other at any other very good regional opera houses (which, truth be told, Rome is).
The clip shows a very static set, and aside from the usual ho-hum dance numbers, with singers doing the classic stop and bark.
Sofia is learning, hoping by the time she does her second or third, hopefully with the Met at some point, she will have learned how to adapt her cinematic style to the opera stage.
your post makes sense, at least for me …. Remembering that “La Traviata” with Elena Stikhina ( prodigy in Paris for Oneguin)- really sublime , like a good reminder this opera was composed for a beautiful dramatic soprano with the voice of a great agility and strength ( not to speak of the timbre)… lucky I am 😉 …. P.S. Valentino is expensive for sure
traviata is not yet scheduled for cinema. here in the middle of the us, we get some european opera from covent garden and some from all’opera. there is almost zero promotion or marketing. on wednesday, i noticed in the movie listings that tristan from rome was showing. i watched it with 4 other people. i had been in the theater in the last week and saw no notices. it’s an art theater house that does not show the met’s hd. i do not see how this can list when the house cannot be bothered with putting up posters. a few years ago, san francisco opera tried a hd series with the same marketing plan. it folded after a single season. twice i had the experience of watching an opera all alone.
I don’t know about the workings of showing opera from foreign countries, but I am aware that in the U.S. the Met has an exclusivity clause which forbids San Francisco Opera (and possibly all other American opera companies) from showing any of their productions in theaters showing Met videos. San Francisco Opera has had many excellent productions (all video recorded in HD), but has been forbidden to show them in any theater used by the Met (mostly the larger capacity theaters).
This to me has been extremely narrow-minded by the Met. If seeing opera performances either live or on video is intended to widen audience attendance, then this selfish, idiotic attitude by the Met is certainly out of place. It does not help opera in the least.