Bachtrack: Casting Trump as a 21st-century Brechtian villain
Publikováno: 3.9.2023
One cannot reasonably hope that Julius Ceasar or Henry VIII or even Richard Nixon for that matter might be making headlines as a new production of an opera about them is being staged, but a one-off mounting of Bernhard Lang's Playing Trump at Ostrava Days (Staatsoper Hamburg gave the world premiere in 2021) was opportune to the point of spectacle, made all the more surreal, personally, by being one of only a handful of Americans – most if not all besides myself performing in the festival – to bear witness to this tragicomic farce based on the 45th American president's tragicomic term in the White House.
Michel-Dansac was great in a role that could easily have been played as pantomime clown or Disney villain. Her swagger was on point and her leering at walk-on fashion models was convincing without the discomfiture that may have come with a male actor. Indeed, the satiric edge to having a woman portray the infamous misogynist was suggested without being forced. Like much that could have turned to tiny ham-fistedness, the sardonic edge was done by implication.
Kurt Gottschalk, Bachtrack | read the full review here >>>
