The original poster for the premiere of Thaïs designed by Manuel Orazi. Public domain; copied from Wikipedia.
Thaïs, where have you been all my life? Thaïs is a beautiful opera. Who knew? This epiphany resulted from my experiment listening to opera without the benefit of supertitles – the English lyric translations projected over the stage. Reading those supertitles is annoying at best. Operas mainly come in three flavors – Italian, French, and German – there are others in the modern repertoire, of course, including English. The major difficulty is that I don’t speak Italian, French, or German. The minor one is that I find that lyrics sung operatically in English can still be difficult to follow. It’s a conflict. I am grateful for the supertitles providing English translations of the lyrics in real time. However, reading the supertitles while action on the stage is progressing distracts from the drama on stage and the music, and sometimes it can be taxing to keep up. But what are you going to do? Well, consider this fact - supertitles came into use in the 1980s and only became common in the 1990s. In fact, there was considerable resistance to the use of supertitles when they were first introduced. So I thought that if it was good enough for opera goers for the first 400 years of opera, I should give watching opera the old-fashioned way a try: read the libretto in English before the opera and watch it without the supertitles. That could be an enlightening experiment, right?
In 2008, NY Times critic Anthony Tommasini wrote a delightful and highly informative 25-year perspective on the history of supertitle use. He reported that in an early reaction to supertitles, “Robert M. Jacobson, then the editor of Opera News, published by the Metropolitan Opera Guild, deplored supertitles as a “pathetic marketing grab for the fringe public,” adding that opera “is not a reading experience.”” Well, today opera is partly a reading experience and for most opera goers always has been; the reading was just done ahead of time. The use of surtitles is now essentially universal. The titles were first shown on a screen over the stage and were patented as “surtitles”. They are more commonly referred to today as supertitles even if shown on the sides of the stage; in videos, they are called subtitles and displayed at the bottom of the screen. The Metropolitan Opera has them on the back of the seats, calling them Met titles, and the Sante Fe Opera also has them on the back of the seats. The screens on backs of seats have the advantage of allowing different language formats besides English to be selected for each individual viewer; perhaps you can read the titles in English on your screen and your neighbor can select them in Spanish, if available.
So, what opera should I choose? How about using the experiment to do some research on an upcoming opera that I plan to attend? Good idea. Hmmm. Well, at the end of January, the Maryland Lyric Opera is performing Jules Massenet’s Thaïs (1894), written in French, which I have not previously seen. To answer the question who knew it was a great opera – MDLO did; after all, these people train opera singers. A quick check of the synopsis revealed Thaïs is not Wagnerian in length and has a fairly simple story to follow, only a few characters to keep track of. There is one video available for streaming on Met Opera on Demand, and a quick Google search turned up a libretto in French with an English translation for free viewing. Voila! I was in business.
Thaïs composer Jules Massenet, the most popular composer in France in the last half of the nineteenth century, is best known today for his operas Werther and Manon, both perennial favorites in the modern repertoire. Thaïs only gets performed sporadically. Why? Frankly, I’m not sure, but the reason typically given is that it is unusually demanding to sing and is reserved as a showcase for an extraordinary soprano. It has been said that opera companies don’t start by selecting Thaïs for their season and picking a soprano; they start with the soprano and then select Thaïs. In its recent history, Metropolitan Opera performed the opera in 1974 with the great Beverly Sills. Next it was performed in 2008 with diva Rene Fleming, which is the video in the Met’s collection, and then in 2017 starring ascending diva Ailyn Pérez. I had passed up on the 2017 Met Opera In Cinemas broadcast of Thaïs because I had this feeling that the opera was not that good. Wrong!
Thaïs’ librettist Louis Gallet wrote the libretto based on the Anatole France novel of the same name. He also chose to write the libretto in prose, rather than in poetry – no rhyming, a break with French tradition at the time. Thaïs has serious themes: a popular courtesan in fourth century Egypt, Thaïs, who is a follower of Venus and has lived ostentatiously and luxuriously, based on her beauty and sexual favors is faced with aging and disillusionment; a Christian ascetic, Athanael, who is devoted to his religious service is tempted by her erotic allure during his attempt to convert her to Christianity; Nicias, a lifelong friend of Athanael’s, who is wealthy and devoted to the pleasures that money can buy, provides the connection that allows the Thais/Athanael relationship to develop. Anatole France had his work placed on the Forbidden List by the Catholic Church.
In the 2008 Met production, baritone Thomas Hampson plays the fanatical Athanael opposite Ms. Fleming; this pair had also performed this opera together previously in Chicago and have a audio recording of the opera. The Met performance got good reviews, primarily because of the performers. Ms. Fleming looks radiant and slays with her singing, though maybe not with her acting. In her portrayal of the worn-down Thaïs collapsing with bleeding feet and exhaustion after a journey in the desert, she appears fresh enough to be at a picnic. Mr. Hampson sings well but communicates his religious fervor far better than his attraction to Thaïs. Tenor Michael Schade gave a very convincing portrayal of Athanael’s voluptuary friend, Nicias. Overall, the opera worked for me, though I think it is a difficult opera to stage, especially the ending. Navigating its themes in ways that fully engage the audience in the eternal conflict of spirit and flesh can become melodramatic or even unintentionally amusing. I read commentary on the opera in the Grove Book of Opera, 2 nd edition, that asserts that “the human truths of Thaïs have yet to be revealed.” Well, Maryland Lyric Opera, take your shot.
I found Massenet’s music to be wonderfully melodious and beautiful. It serves the story well and is delightfully inventive. The music attends to both the conflicts and the passions. There are several beautiful arias for both Thaïs and Athanael. There is a famous violin solo in Act II called Méditation that is spell binding in its beauty. Criticisms that I have read that the music is thin may be missing Massenet’s point; there is a difference between thin and sensitive. There is a male and female chorus. There are only a few ensemble numbers, though there are a couple of lovely duets between Thaïs and Athanael. It also included a short ballet sequence. A good deal of my enthusiasm for the opera is the music.
Okay, let’s get back to watching opera the old-fashioned way, sans supertitles. For Thaïs there are only three acts and seven scenes, so following most of the action from memory was doable, but honestly, there were still times I longed for the subtitles. I found the story to be engrossing; by the end of Act I, I was all in and loving the star soprano. As to the benefits of watching the old-fashioned way, I did find it easier to concentrate on the music and closely observe the nuances in singing and acting. The beauty of the music and the singing certainly stood out. In the end, I think it is just a different experience, a different way of enjoying opera.
The great composers Verdi and Wagner expected their operas to be translated and performed in the native languages of the audiences, evidence that, while the music is supreme, the words matter, matter quite a lot. There were some scenes in Thaïs where I felt I was missing out by not knowing exactly what the characters were saying. I appreciate benefits of opera the old-fashioned way, but in truth, part of me resisted the experience; perhaps it would grow on me with more exposure. For now, I’m sticking with the supertitles, and I’m not happy about it.
The Fan Experience: Maryland Lyric Opera performs Thaïs on January 30 and February 2 in the Kay Theater in the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center on the University of Maryland campus. The supertitles at the Smith are shown on screens on both sides of the stage. You can choose to read them or not; I will mostly be following them. I will also add that I really like the Clarice as a venue for opera – small enough to feel intimate, with excellent acoustics for both singers and orchestra. There is also plenty of free parking close to the center in the evenings and on weekends.