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Opera review: The Coronation of Poppea
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Last night I saw “The Coronation of Poppea” at the LA Opera. The opera was composed by Monteverdi, something like 350 years ago; it’s one of the earliest operas still performed.
The story covers how Poppea displaced Octavia as the wife of Nero, prior to the fall of Rome. It’s four hours long, counting the two intermissions. Four. Hours. Long.
I’m not sure why LA Opera is doing what it is currently doing in the way of staging and costumes. In my previous review of Parsifal, it was Robert Wilson’s extremely sparse staging which dominated one’s impression (such as the Neon Donut of Wisdom, the really REALLY slow movements—when there was any movement at all—and so on). This one had slightly more elaborate set design; in Act 1, there was a 8-foot-diameter sphere on stage right, and a large upright cylinder on stage left. That’s about it.
Costuming was even weirder in this one than in Parsifal, though. Whereas in Parsifal the costumes were generally minimalist (except for the guy who was dressed as a letter y), this one had:
1. A man dressed (as a woman) in what appeared to be two rolls of paper towels draped over the front and back, connected by sides of grocery bag. Really, it looks kind of like an Erlenmeyer flask—the ones that are kind of triangular.
2. The same man appearing later in a large amount of black and white crepe fans, stapled to him and to each other.
3. Seneca the poet, in what appeared to be a mu-mu made of shreds of plastic bags
4. Nero in royal purple gowns which had a large number of triangular flaps cut out; imagine the royal Whiffle Emperor of Rome and you’ve about got it.
Below is my plot synopsis:
ACT I
The goddesses Fortune and Virtue are insulting each other, while Love watches.
Fortune: Nobody listens to you anymore, Virtue. Go away.
Virtue: Alas, too true. Especially in this opera. (leaves)
Love: Awesome. Let’s mess stuff up.
Ottone (Poppea’s former lover): Hmm. There seem to be two guards here outside Nero’s bedroom. It’s as if he wanted not to be disturbed. On the other hand, they’ve fallen asleep.
Guards (waking up) Man, Rome sucks. And Nero’s too busy messing around with Poppea to do anything about it. And you there; if you say anything about this, we’ll kill you.
Ottone: Got it.
(at this point, Nero and Poppea emerge, cuddly, and say farewell to each other)
Nero: Goodbye.
Poppea: Goodbye.
Nero: Goodbye!
Poppea: Goodbye!
Nero: Goodbye, my love.
Poppea: Goodbye, dearest.
(this goes on for about ten minutes)
ARIA: “Oh, how I hate long goodbyes”
(Arnalta, Poppea’s nurse and confidante, comes out at this point. She (played by a man) is dressed in the two-rolls-of-paper-towel-cum-grocery-bag outfit described earlier. She is also wearing a hat which consists of a central pyramid, about a foot high, which seems to be made of tuna fish can lids, flanked on either side by a pair of—I swear this is true—bat wings, about a foot and a half long each. She cautions Poppea to be careful of ambition, and that Nero may not be trustworthy)
Poppea: But I love him. Plus, he’s the emperor of Rome; I’m sure that Nero would never do anything to hurt anyone, or be irrational.
(Enter Octavia, Nero’s current wife)
Octavia: I think Nero’s messing around on me.
ARIA (“Alas, the psycho emperor doth suck”)
Nutrice (Octavia’s nurse): You know, if he’s being unfaithful, the best thing to do would be to sleep around on him in vengeance. That’s what the gods do, after all.
Octavia: No, that would be wrong. I mustn’t do such a thing.
(enter Seneca the poet)
Seneca: Attagirl, Octavia. Be steadfast and philosophical about all this.
Octavia: Yes, I must be ethical. I won’t be unfaithful. I will, however, force someone else to kill Poppea. That’ll do nicely.
Seneca: Err…
Nutrice: Shut up or I’ll burn all your books and that stupid costume.
(That is almost verbatim what he actually said)
(now Pallas Athena shows up)
Athena: Seneca, you’ll be dying soon. Mercury will warn you when it’s coming. Just thought you should know.
Seneca: Well, that’s just swell.
(enter Nero)
Nero: Seneca, I think life would be better if I divorced Octavia and married Poppea, What do you think?
Audience: DON’T ARGUE WITH NERO!
Seneca: I think that would be morally and politically wrong, Nero. You can’t just get rid of a woman when a new hot one comes along. Plus, the Romans won’t like it. Don’t be a child, for the gods’ sake! Be a man, Nero. Keep your wife. Otherwise, you’re just a big jerk.
Audience: (smacks collective self in forehead)
Nero: Wow, Seneca. I’ll keep that in mind, thanks.
(exit Seneca, enter Poppea)
Poppea: (rubbing up against Nero) Last night was awesome!
ARIA: “Didst thou enjoy my tits, O lord?”
(I’m not making that title up—that’s pretty much what the song is. Literally.)
Nero: (groping Poppea in a disturbingly explicit and graphic fashion): Hell yes.
Poppea: You know, Seneca thinks you’re a big jerk. I’m thinking we ought to kill him.
Nero: Way ahead of you on THAT one, beloved. Hey, page. Go tell Seneca to off himself as painfully as possible.
ACT II
The scenery in act II consists of about five strategically placed rocks, a large thing which might be a Horta or possibly a huge crumpled paper bag, about fifteen feet across, and (for some reason) a metal pipe angling up from the Horta and out over the audience. There’s also a wall.
(Seneca standing in his garden. Mercury descends from above. For some reason, he is dressed as the Tinman from the Wizard of Oz, except he has one (yes, one) wing.)
Mercury: You’re gonna die now, Seneca. But we gods like you, so you can come hang out in the divine hot tub.
Seneca: Groovy.
(enter page from Nero)
Page: Uh, Seneca, I hate to tell you this…
Seneca: (pulls out knife)
Page: Right, cool. Bye.
Bunch of people who are either Seneca’s students or possibly his thoughts incarnate, we’re not sure which: Seneca, don’t die.
Seneca: Hot tub’s a-waiting. (goes off to kill himself)
Seneca’s students or thoughts or something: Aw, fuck.
ARIA: “Aw, fuck.”
(they all leave. Enter Lucano, who is Nero’s “page boy”, apparently)
Lucano: Poppea is awesome!
Nero: Yes, she’s incredibly hot.
Lucano: Way, way hot. (walks toward Nero)
Nero: So unbelievably hot. (embraces Lucano)
(manly mutual rubbing and bouncing, while they talk about how sexy Poppea is. They get into quite the frenzy, then spring apart)
Lucano: My lord, you are awash in the ecstasy of love!
Audience: You mean spooge, don’t you? Eeeeeeeewwww.
(except one person somewhere in the audience, who was clapping loudly and cheering.)
(they kiss, then leave. Enter Octavia and Ottone)
Octavia: She’s way too hot. Ottone, I know you and Poppea used to be lovers, but I’d really like you to kill her for me.
Ottone: Errr….
Octavia: Or I’ll kill you.
Ottone: Aw, fuck.
ARIA: “Aw, fuck.” (reprise)
(enter Drusilla, Ottone’s young girlfriend, played by a rather cute singer)
Drusilla: I love you so much, especially now that you’re over Poppea.
Ottone: Well, you ought to love this. I have to kill her.
Drusilla: How can I help? Here, she trusts me. Take my clothes so you can sneak up on her.
Male audience: YES!
(disrobes, but only partway)
Male audience members: Aw, fuck!
(scene shifts to Poppea and her weirdly dressed nurse in the garden, accompanied by five or six weirdly dressed handmaidens, in the paper-towel-or-maybe-Erlenmeyer-flask outfits)
Arnalta: Take a nap.
Poppea: OK.
(goes to sleep)
Arnalta: I’ll keep watch.
(goes to sleep)
Ottone (in Drusilla’s clothes): tiptoe tiptoe tiptoe
(this part has been very soothing, and I will admit to being lulled into drowsiness. I woke up when the Horta exploded, and the cross-dresser was chased offstage by the Erlenmeyer flasks. Under most circumstances, being woken by an explosion and having the first thing you see be a man in woman’s clothes chased offstage by a bunch of Erlenmeyer flasks wearing bat wings and tuna cans on their heads would make one question one’s sanity. That’s only until you remember that you’re at the opera; then it all makes sense.
So there is a huge explosion at the Horta, which results in most of the audience wetting their seats, and the goddess Love appears above the wall)
Love: You bastard. Don’t kill Poppea. I’d kill you, but you’re not worth it.
Arnalta (waking up): It’s Drusilla! She’s trying to kill Poppea. Seize her! SEIZE HER!
(the handmaidens shuffle after Ottone dressed as Drusilla, moving somewhat like penguins due to their costumes. My wife is insistent that they move exactly like the droid nurse Dot in Spaceballs. In fact, she’s convinced that their costumes and staging were based on Dot.)
ACT III
The set for act III is a crumpled muslin backdrop (which looks either like a rock wall or flames, depending on the angle or the orange light, and is actually quite awesome), and two large black square columns, one of which is upright and the other of which is lying diagonally across the stage. And that’s it.
(Drusilla enters)
Drusilla: Life is good. You know your boyfriend is no longer in rebound when he agrees to wear your clothes to kill his old girlfriend. Yay me!
(enter Arnalta and some sort of police person, along with Nero)
Arnalta: Seize her! SEIZE HER!
Drusilla: What did I do?
Arnalta: You tried to kill Poppea! I saw you.
Drusilla: But I’m innocent!
Nero: Torture her. And I get to watch.
Drusilla: (to self) If they torture me, I’ll reveal that Ottone did it, and they’ll kill him.
Drusilla: (to Nero) Yep, I did it. Just me. Nobody else.
Arnalta: Kill her!
Nero: Yep.
(enter Ottone)
Ottone: No, it was me. Don’t kill her, kill me!
Drusilla: I did it. It was me.
Ottone: Me!
Drusilla: Me! Dammit, it was me!
Ottone: It was me! Look, I have the clothes.
Drusilla: Aw, fuck.
Nero: Fine. Kill him.
Ottone: Of course, it was Octavia who told me to do it.
Nero: AWESOME! All right, let’s see…you, Ottone, are banished. (tears off Ottone's clothes) Go away.
(Ottone starts trudging off)
Nero: And you, Drusilla, I admire your courage. I’m going to hold you up to the empire as a shining example of proper womanhood.
Drusilla: I want to go with Ottone.
Nero. Fine. Go. (unfortunately, leaves her clothes alone)
(Drusilla trudges off)
Nero: As for you, Octavia, you’re banished too.
Octavia: Aw, fuck. (leaves)
(Octavia sings something as she goes which is eerie and heartbreaking. Some of the best music in the whole thing; this and Seneca’s students pleading for him to not kill himself are definitely worth hearing.)
(Poppea enters) Well, I have to say that worked out well for me.
Nero: Me too.
(Enter Arnalta, in black and white crepe outfit, resembling 3-D paper doll of Cruella de Vil) I am so loving this.
(Some pomp and circumstance involving more really weird outfits as the empire pays tribute to Poppea, their new empress)
Empire: Yay!
(Exit everyone except Nero and Poppea, in their nightshirts, who sing a surprisingly (and stunningly) tender duet)
DUET: “After a hard day of treachery, it’s so nice to put my bloodstained feet up with my beloved”
(lights out)
Audience: What? A happy ending? For NERO AND POPPEA? WHAT THE FUCK? They get a beautiful and tender love duet? Aw, fuck. (applauds anyway)
It was pretty good. I liked Parsifal better, although there's nothing like exploding Hortas and flasks chasing men dressed as women to keep an opera interesting. Also, as my wife points out, it was significantly smuttier than Parsifal, which counts for something. But I liked Parsifal's music better.
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