A clash of cultures, a misunderstanding or callow indifference, Puccini’s 1904 opera (revised several times) was based on an 1887 French novel and an 1898 short story, subsequently adapted into a one-act play called Madame Butterfly: A Tragedy of Japan—seeing this in London in 1900 was Puccini’s trigger. I might add that the first production was not particularly well received. Now it’s probably one of the most popular operas in the world, with the central role a vehicle for stardom—possibly.
Set in the period it was composed, Madama Butterfly, here sung in Italian with surtitles—tonight they are misbehaving—not unlike the American naval officer Pinkerton, who marries the Butterfly of the title, fifteen-year-old Cio-Cio-San, in a ceremony which suggests that in Japanese culture, marriages seem to be easily and readily dissolved. How convenient for the young officer. She is a geisha after all. From a fallen impoverished noble family.
And what is more, her father was ordered by the Mikado (yes Puccini did have Arthur Sullivan’s score in his library) to commit ritual suicide, and she has his sword centre-stage on a chest. There’s that Chekhovian adage—if you put a gun on the stage you must use it. The sword of Damocles, in other words. We can see where this is heading.
She is trusting, naïve, and when he is called back home, she waits patiently for his return, for he promised he’d come back. She has converted to his religion, so she expects the marriage to be valid, whereas in Japan, if the husband does not return, it is invalid. Back comes the callous callow man with wife in tow. Too embarrassed to tell her himself, the pathetic man sends the local US Consul, Sharpless (Ross Ramgobin excellent), who can’t bring himself to tell her out of pity.
But she has her own surprise—a little boy she calls Sorrow (in this translation). More heartbreak follows. The wife says they’ll adopt him. Another insensitive Western person—do they see the Japanese as a different species? Butterfly has sat up all night with her sleeping child waiting for Pinkerton to arrive after seeing his ship dock. The music is lovely—gives the audience time to think and maybe empathise. What choice does she have? She has no money, no prospects, her family have rejected her long ago. She takes the tragic option.
One’s heart should break, the music with its subtle oriental nuances should stab the heart, but tonight’s first night at Grange Park seems a bit under the weather—the heavy rain outside in accord. Slow, lethargic to start, the first act feels barely out of dress rehearsal, blocking still unsure.
Luis Gomes’s unprepossessing Pinkerton and Hye-Youn Lee’s shy Butterfly seem to have little chemistry. His acting skills are minimal. Director / designer John Doyle could be exposing awkward cultural differences, of course. The Gascoigne Orchestra under Stephen Barlow also takes a while to warm up.
After the long dinner interval—maybe they had low blood sugar—things improve, and finally it takes off. Famous arias are given full value at last. And the musical interludes are lovely, as is the lulling humming chorus—the calm before the storm.
Hye-Youn Lee has maybe paced herself for un bel di… in which she finally reaches poignancy. Slowly, slowly, we have been woken up to the tragedy. She gets a standing ovation, and the baddie Pinkerton is booed like a panto villain.
She chooses to die with honour, not live in shame—oh, these operatic divas... Pinkerton and his American wife Kate (Rosa Sparks with little to do but look stylishly rich) win. The coward says he is full of remorse, but we know it will soon be forgotten.
Japanese mores and ‘exotic’ culture seen through Western eyes (and vice-versa—there is some comedy in that) could be treading a fine line in patronising appropriation, but for Doyle’s simple staging—a Japanese painting of a tree, framed four times in gold, and three multipurpose table chests placed precisely. Bamboo blinds rise and fall, awkwardly defining space. Tim Mitchell’s lighting provides the lengthening shadows in Cio-Cio-San’s life.
Mezzo Kitty Whately as her maid Suzuki (in drab costume) contributes to the anxiety in the air. Matchmaker Goro (Adrian Thompson), her uncle the Bonze (Jihoon Kim) and the wealthy Japanese Prince Yamadori (Tim Bagley) Butterfly rejects are supporting roles that leave little mark. It is Butterfly and Pinkerton’s story, a story that was repeated many times after America’s Vietnam War adventure… and elsewhere.
Not a long opera, first half one hour, second an hour and a half—it is the second that delivers, the first a slow burn. A chamber version, I think, with the Anthony Minghella Barbican version invading my mind. The second offering after Simon Boccanegra opened the season. Tchaikovsky’s Mazeppa will follow, and Nishat Khan’s Taj Mahal, a world première. The final night in GPO’s imaginative season promises a ballet gala.