The Magic Flute: Exotically Familiar

Setting Mozart’s classical opera The Magic Flute in the mythic world of the Northwest Coast First Nations might seem a radical departure. But let’s face it, the opera was cultural appropriation and revision from its inception— an 18th-century, Viennese high-society take on an exotic world. The story was torn from a book of “Oriental” tales and plunked down in Egypt during the reign of Ramses I (12th century B.C.).

A re-vision of The Magic Flute, then, seems a natural progression. Vancouver Costume co-designer John Powell (Kwakwaka’wakw)
wearing his design for Papageno (Tim Matheson)Opera offers up a double vision—one for the mainstage, running January 27, 30 and February 1, 3, 6 and 8 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and another, titled The Magic Flute: Quest for the Box of Shadows, currently touring to over 100 schools around the province.

On the mainstage, the story adheres firmly to Mozart’s original but is set in a timeless Northwest Coast landscape—one more familiar to local audiences from our exposure to Haida or Salish art than the look of ancient Egypt.

The Magic Flute: Quest for the Box of Shadows takes the experiment a step further, fusing characters from indigenous myth into the storyline. For example, the Queen of the Night from Mozart’s original is taken up by T’sonokwa, a woman of the forest who steals the shadows of children and hides them in a box. The story was adapted by actor/director David Adams, native storyteller Richard Van Camp and Cree designer Lance Cardinal.

Calvin Powell as
Papageno, touring
show (Tim Matheson)“The process of developing and designing our new production has been an exciting journey of collaboration with a talented team of theatre artists, from both First Nations and non-First Nations cultures,” says James W. Wright, Vancouver Opera’s general director. “This crosscultural approach to creation has not, to my knowledge, been employed by any other opera company in North America.”

In Where Cultures Meet, a series of exhibitions and talks surrounding the productions, Wright says the company has “not shied away from the challenging issues that have arisen, Melody Mercredi as
T’sonokwa, touring
show (Tim Matheson)such as questions of the proper use of traditional First Nations language, story and dance, and the best means of collaborating while honouring the artistic and cultural integrity of all involved.” Look for events from the series on January 11 and 16 at Vancouver Public Library and February 4 at the Buschlen Mowatt Gallery.

All in all, the VO production is a colourful and ambitious way of finding the mythic, the exotic and the classic in the familiar—whether European or First Nations culture.

For more information tap into www.vancouveropera.ca