https://stpetecatalyst.com/stephen-kings-the-shining-to-get-the-opera-tampa-treatment/
Opera is just another form of linear storytelling onstage, combining elements of theater and music.
Opera Tampa, the resident company at Tampa’s Straz Center for the Performing Arts, will tell a multi-layered story Jan. 30 and Feb. 1 that adds psychological depth, a few shocks and frights and the unique allure of pop culture to the opera stew: It’s The Shining, an adaptation of the bestselling novel by Stephen King. With music performed by The Florida Orchestra.
With Virginia baritone Robert Wesley Mason as well-meaning alcoholic Jack Torrance, in his fourth career production of the opera, and Tampa Bay soprano Susan Hellman Spatafora as his wife Wendy, Opera Tampa will turn Ferguson Hall into the scenic, snowy, scary Overlook Hotel.
Where things don’t go so well for the Torrances and their clairvoyant young son.
While director Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 movie version played up the “horror” aspects of Jack’s paranoia and eventual madness, the opera – from composer Paul Moravec and librettist Mark Campbell – aligns more closely to King’s book.
The Catalyst spoke with Moravec, winner of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for music for his chamber work “Tempest Fantasy,” about the inspiration and construction of The Shining, its initial reception by the public, and more.
St. Pete Catalyst: Both you and Mark have commented that your opera is based on the book and not the movie adaptation.
Paul Moravec: There are substantive differences. The Kubrick film’s brilliant, but it’s not what Stephen King wrote, and it’s an icy, cold, really cynical kind of movie. Which is basically Kubrick’s vibe, generally. The book is warm. In many ways, it’s a love story. It’s about love.
I think of operas as having at least three major elements: Love, death and power. And by power I mean people struggling with each other, who’s getting what they want, who isn’t, etcetera, etcetera. And that’s where the drama very often comes from. And in that respect The Shining is operatic, because all three of those elements are in the book, on steroids. It’s a very powerful, very compelling, very dramatic story.
In other words, the film took a very different approach to the story.
Exactly. You see Jack Nicholson arching his eyebrows at the beginning, right? And you think, he’s nuts, he’s crazy. And there’s nowhere to go. There’s no character arc to follow.
I read somewhere that Mr. King originally wanted Jon Voight to play that role. He has that kind of bland face that you can do anything with. You start out with a face like that, and by the end he looks like Jack Nicholson. Now, there’s something really scary happening!
Nicholson’s brilliant, he did a great job. But you see the problem in terms of storytelling.
My feeling about Jack Torrance in the book is that he’s basically a decent guy trying to do the right thing. And he’s caught in an impossible dilemma, which is to love and protect his family that he genuinely adores … and also to kill them. That’s what the Overlook is telling him to do.
And there’s a real story. There’s a real drama.
And also, you follow his descent into madness. And it’s heartbreaking. It’s just gut-wrenching.
What was the process of turning this into an opera like?
In getting the rights from Mr. King, the first thing he said was “I want to see the story. Submit a summary.” Because he wanted to make sure we weren’t doing Kubrick, right? Or just whatever. So Mark wrote up a summary, sent it to him … right away he said “OK, fine. Go ahead, but now I want to see the libretto.” So Mark sent him the first draft of the libretto, and he OK’d that like right away. And off we went.
It’s a long book! I think Mark did a fantastic job of compacting 600 pages down to, basically, a 40-page libretto.
My writing the music involves constant revisions in the libretto and the music, and we go back and forth. We revise it to get where we want.
Is there an inherent risk in adapting pop culture to this idiom? People will be looking for Nicholson saying “Here’s Johnny!” as he smashes the door with an axe (which, of course, appears only in the movie).
I’ll tell you a story about the premiere in Minnesota in 2016. It sold out; it was the biggest hit the company ever had. People were scalping tickets on eBay. How often does that happen with an opera?
So people are coming because they’re curious about The Shining, just to see what this is about, and there are a lot of first-time opera goers. A lot of kid and teenagers. They didn’t even know what an opera was – they just wanted to see The Shining.
They loved it. They just went nuts. They were smart enough to understand that this was a different medium, the rules are all different, but it’s basically telling the same story.
They felt the emotions. They felt what the characters were feeling. And they forgot that they were watching an opera.
