the juilliard school

FEB 2015

Set : Grace Laubacher
Lights: Anshuman Bhatia
Costumes: Sydney Maresca
Choreography: Adam Cates

Remembering that The Rape of Lucretia is a direct product of post-WWII Europe lends added poignancy to the deeper questions asked by the opera. What possible reason or meaning can we assign to human suffering? Is faith the antidote to atrocity? And how do we continue to live after the death of beauty? This piece was written two years before Waiting for Godot, another artistic response to living in a world that (it seemed) God had deserted. Lucretia was an experiment in form for Britten and Duncan, who framed a landmark of Roman history with a Christian sensibility and complicated it further by borrowing conventions from Greek tragedy. In Lucretia, it is theme of the cyclical nature of suffering and violence that unites these distinct storytelling and musical styles. 

The cast, designers, Mark and I have grappled with the questions Lucretia asks and what you will see is the result of these conversations. In the 509 BC plot, rape emerges out of the culture of tyranny and violence. We found it interesting that each character, by listening to some combination of their own words, their gut or their conscience, could have prevented the rape but everyone chooses to stay silent. We drew a clear parallel to college "rape culture" and spent time reading and hearing first-hand accounts of such stories. We chose to place the Chorus squarely in 2015 and gave them a very personal reason for telling the story, for needing to bear witness to the rape. Faced with an event that defies their ability to pray it away, the Chorus cycles through guilt, self-incrimination and rage, identifying with both victim and perpetrator. By witnessing the violence, the Chorus comes up with a reason to live and a way to heal: by putting their faith in a higher power and practicing Christian love.