Thursday 1st August & Friday 2nd August, 2013
Paper Tiger
Genesis
In 2009, when Jade Goody was dying of cancer, Afsaneh became fascinated by an image in a magazine: Jade getting married, jaundiced yellow, bald, hiking up her wedding dress to show her stockings. There was something gothic about it, somehow operatic. So she found Erick and asked him if he wanted to collaborate with her and produce an opera. Yes, he said, as long as it’s not about Jade Goody.
Synopsis
When Jade Goody died in 2009, her death was consumed like one more episode of the reality television that had created her. She was the symbol of the Big Brother generation, the first reality TV star to get widespread recognition, with crews from the United States, Germany, and elsewhere standing outside her house, reporting on her final hours. Articles were written with titles such as “How Death Will Come”, wherein a doctor predicted in what order Jade’s organs would pack up and how she would feel as they did; the quote “KILL ME NOW” was emblazoned on the front cover of The Sun. Apparently, we couldn’t get enough of this grim ending for the girl who’d “made it”. Part account of the way her life and death were reported, part modern-‐day fairy tale, AND THE CROWD (WEPT) explores the emptiness at the heart of the celebrity dream. The story is told by a narrator and three women who attempt to piece together, and inhabit, the tale of this woman – a woman not once referred to by name.
This is not the story of Jade Goody. Of the woman she was, or even of the life she led. It is the story of celebrity.
(Please note that this is a first-‐stage production of an opera that is still in development.)
Music: Erick Flores
Words: Afsaneh Gray
Director: Pia Furtado
Designer: Georgia Lowe
Costume Designer: Rudabeh Gray
Music Director: Adam Gatehouse
One: Sarah Minns
Two: Norah King
Three: Cathy Bell
Narrator: David Hansford
Electronics: Camilo Mendez San Juan
Piano/Celesta: Charis Hanning (ne Cheung)
Flute/Piccolo: Ilze Ikse
Oboe: Rebecca Cass
Clarinet: Chris Goodman
Percussion: Felicity Hindle
Piano/Celesta: Charis Hanning (ne Cheung)
Violin I: Guillermina Chivite
Violin II: Pere Sarrio
Cello: Frederique Le Grand
Double Bass: Jess Ryan
Percussion: Felicity Hindle
Rehearsal Pianist: Leo Nicholson
Music: Erick Flores
Words: Afsaneh Gray
Director: Pia Furtado
Designer: Georgia Lowe
Costume Designer: Rudabeh Gray
Music Director: Adam Gatehouse
One: Sarah Minns
Two: Norah King
Three: Cathy Bell
Narrator: David Hansford
Electronics: Camilo Mendez San Juan
Piano/Celesta: Charis Hanning (ne Cheung)
Flute/Piccolo: Ilze Ikse
Oboe: Rebecca Cass
Clarinet: Chris Goodman
Percussion: Felicity Hindle
Piano/Celesta: Charis Hanning (ne Cheung)
Violin I: Guillermina Chivite
Violin II: Pere Sarrio
Cello: Frederique Le Grand
Double Bass: Jess Ryan
Percussion: Felicity Hindle
Rehearsal Pianist: Leo Nicholson
Erick Flores is a postgraduate student at the Royal College Music, under composer Kenneth Hesketh. His works have been performed by, amongst others: the London Philharmonic Orchestra, L’Orchestre Philarmonique de Radio France, The New Perspectives Ensemble and The Mercury Quartet. They have also been aired on BBC Radio 3.
Afsaneh Gray is currently part of the Royal Court Studio Group and, with Paper Tiger, Associate Artist at Ovalhouse Theatre. Recent work includes: Portrait of a Young Man (Probably an Arab) (V&A Late), The Fairground (Bush Bazaar, Bush Theatre), The Martian Cabaret (Blast Off! Soho Theatre), Old Bag (Rapid Write Rewind, Theatre503).
Adam Gatehouse is Editor Live Music at BBC Radio 3, and founder of their New Generation Artists scheme. He was Music Director of the Dutch National Ballet and Dutch National Youth Orchestra. He has worked internationally with orchestras, as well as at the Royal Opera House, and with soloists including Felicity Lott and Nicola Benedetti.
Pia Furtado’s opera credits include: L’elisir d’amore (Opera Holland Park), Werther (Scottish Opera), Susanna (Iford Arts), Cautionary Tales (Opera North), Werther, L’Histoire de Babar and Le Chouette Enhrumée (Les Azuriales), Coffee Cantata (Wellcome Trust/Early Opera) and Venus and Adonis (Blow/La Nuova Musica/Spitalfields Festival).
Georgia Lowe was a Linbury Prize for Stage Design Finalist (2011) and was shortlisted for The Jocelyn Herbert Award (2011). She was Trainee Designer for the Royal Shakespeare Company (2011–2012). Recent designs include: Say It With Flowers (Sherman Cymru), Facts (Finborough Theatre), Lift (Soho Theatre), Ignorance (Hampstead), and Pericles (RSC).
Rudabeh Gray is a student at Latymer School, where she has stage-‐managed productions including: Lysistrata, Oh What A Lovely War! and Murder In The Cathedral. She is applying for a technical scholarship next year.
Sarah Minns trained at the Royal Academy of Music and the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. Previous contemporary work includes: Title Role Eleanor Vale, a World Premiere by John Barber (Wedmore Opera), Verity Jago by Mike Westbrook (broadcast on BBC Radio 3), and Sprite Fantastic Mr Fox by Tobias Picker (Opera Holland Park).
Irish soprano Norah King holds a DipRAM and is a Britten-‐Pears Young Artist, Concordia Foundation Artist, Samling Scholar and recipient of an MBF Award. Opera includes: Susanna The Marriage of Figaro (ETO, OALC), Pamina The Magic Flute (Regents Opera), and Miss Jessell The Turn Of The Screw (Aldeburgh Music).
Cathy Bell studied English at Cambridge and singing at the Birmingham Conservatoire. Recent highlights: Wagner Der fliegende Holländer (Scottish Opera), Malcolm Martineau’s song master-‐course at Crear, and a summer on tour with Diva Opera as Third Boy Die Zauberflöte. Engagements in 2013: Poulenc Dialogues des Carmélites (Grange Park), several song recitals, Handel Messiah and Bach Christmas Oratorio.
David Hansford studied at the Royal College of Music’s International Opera School. Recent and future engagements include: Seneca L’incoronazione di Poppea, Daland Der fliegende Holländer, Sarastro The Magic Flute, and Urbain La Vie Parisienne. Other notable roles include: Colline La bohème, Don Alfonso Così fan tutte, Bartolo, Le nozze di Figaro, and Collatinus The Rape of Lucretia.