Opera - Madam Butterfly

We were not especially looking forward to this Opera. It was not one of our favorites based on two previous performances we had attended.  It may have been the futuristic costumes and stark stage setting, I’m not sure.  Both times, I closed my eyes and almost dozed off.

This time, it was as if I saw the Opera for the first time.  Madam Butterfly is one of Puccini’s most famous operas and was the inspiration for Miss Saigon.  In the movie, My Geisha, Shirley Maclaine disguises herself as a Japanese woman to play the role of Madam Butterfly as she tries to prove she can do more than “common musicals”. 

Before the performance, I read the program and I was surprised to read that the audience booed and heckled Puccini during the premier performance.  Undeterred, he believed in the Opera, made some adjustments until he was satisfied and presented it again to be proclaimed a triumph. 

I also read that the Opera was inspired by a short story based on true characters.  There was actually a geisha named Cho-San, Miss Butterfly and her lover is Ensign William B. Franklin.  Records show that there was an Ensign Franklin in Nagasaki from 1892 – 1893.

Before, I always thought that the Ensign and Madam Butterfly were deeply in love, married and had a child.  But based on the culture of the time, the Ensign regretfully had to marry an American woman and forced to leave Cho-San. 

But in this performance, I understood more fully that he just “married” her for companionship during his tour of duty and that the marriage caused Cho-San’s family to disown her.  Soprano Oksana Dyka was brilliant in her portrayal of Cho-San who had unwavering faith that her Ensign would return to her and their son. 

There was one scene when she kneels in front of her son, crying for the time they would see her husband again.  At the end of the aria she breaks down and her son reaches up to comfort her.  The whole audience breathed a sigh of “awww”. 

As the Opera progressed and Cho-San realizes that her “husband” wants their child and will leave her, I got teary eyed and cursed his cruelty of leaving her penniless and alone.  I could hear others around me sniffling. 

This was a wow performance and I hope I get to see another one as compelling as this one.