mary queen of scots by heartcaves/ Flickr.com/ Creative Commons
Over winter break, I watched the HD broadcast of the Met Opera’s production of Gaetano Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda (Mary Stuart), based on the story of the feud between Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. Joyce diDonato played Mary Stuart and Elza van den Heever played Elizabeth. For those three hours, it was hard to believe that there could be women more amazing in the world. At first, I thought diDonato was singing with her face while den Heever sang with her body. But then I saw madness and age in den Heever’s eyes, and I realized that diDonato’s faith and voice could only have come from her stomach, especially during the austere confession scene in prison.
Elizabeth’s raging red dress and heavy lipstick during her confrontation with her rival arrested me, but the scenes in Mary Stuart’s prison affected me the most. Even on screen, it was apparent how for Mary, her prison had become her convent. The cell was somber, barely furnished, and Mary’s attendants moved around in robes of black. We benefitted from the extra perspective of the camera lens, which provided us close-ups of the cross around Mary’s neck, and the change in her eyes when she prayed. This was something we wouldn’t have seen sitting behind rows of people at a live opera performance.
So did I miss anything by not seeing Maria Stuarda live? It seemed that everything I had taken note of— faces, sound, movement, settings and colors— were all elements that a screen could “give” me. But I thought again. The cameraman had showed me a detail he had noticed. I had received documentation of an opera. I am a novice to live opera, but I knew there was something different about actually being at the scene myself while (hypothetically speaking) Mary Stuart confessed her sins. There was something about hearing that voice coming from the stomach and filling the auditorium. It was about not trying to pay attention to detail for the moment but instead submitting to the spells of a grand production of music, bodies and outrageous emotions. The details would then appear on their own.
The screen can never “supplement” the stage. They’re both so powerful that if they weren’t given their own space they would destroy each other.