RICARDO FRAYHA
producer

Fascinated by the films of the French director Jean Cocteau, which he saw in his adolescence in Paris during the 1950s, the American Philip Glass was already one of the most important composers of his generation when he decided to make a trilogy of adaptations based on Cocteau’s work. The first of these was the opera Orphée (1993), based on the 1949 film about the myth of Orpheus — the poet and musician who moves heaven and earth to bring his beloved Eurydice back from the underworld. The director chosen to stage Orphée in Rio de Janeiro, the Brazilian stage director and filmmaker Felipe Hirsch, reveals that he was greatly moved by the fact that, during the composition of this work, Glass was engaged in an intense personal struggle to help his wife, the designer Candy Jernigan, in her fight against cancer. According to the director — «Philip Glass transformed Jean Cocteau’s masterpiece into another masterpiece. It is somewhat unusual but being unusual is one of Glass’s most distinctive characteristics.» Daniela Thomas, a frequent collaborator of Felipe Hirsch, met and worked with Philip Glass in the 1990s and they both considered the possibility of eventually working together. Felipe Hirsch says that, in the staging of the opera Orphée, he made a work that was «highly centred on Jean Cocteau», a multiple artist — a poet, novelist, playwright, filmmaker, actor, stage director and designer. In his adaptation, he was influenced by the work with mirrors of the Czech set designer Josef Svoboda, besides the mirrors of Cocteau’s own version of Orphée. The mirror is another character from Orphée, symbolising the relationship with death and old age. According to the stage director, it is a profound reflection on the place in life that is currently occupied by each of us in this situation, in this context. It is the reflection of all artists who reach a certain age, a certain level of recognition, and who reinvent themselves through their love of art.

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FELIPE HIRSCH

 

Cinema and theater director, is one of the founders of Sutil Companhia (1993-2012). Worked with important actors such as Fernanda Montenegro, Paulo Autran, Paulo José, Renato Borghi, between others. His first feature film, Insolação, premiered at the Venice Film Festival. Since 2013 directs the collective Ultralíricos, created at the Frankfurt Book Fair with the tetrology Puzzle, which was followed by the projects A Tragédia e Comédia Latino-Americana, Selvageria and FIM, performing in Brazil, Germany, Portugal and Chile. In 2017, Severina, his second feature film, premiered at the Locarno International Film Festival.

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ORPHÉE

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By Philip Glass | Based on the film by Jean Cocteau | Adaption by Philip Glass | Edited by Robert Brustein © Dunvagen MusicPublishers Inc. |  Used by Permission.

 

Direction: Felipe Hirsch | Conductor: Pedro Neves with the Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa | Art direction: Daniela Thomas and Felipe Tassara | Lights: Beto Bruel | Princess: Carla Caramujo | Eurídice: Susana Gaspar | Heurtebize: Luís Gomes | Cégeste: Marco Alves dos Santos | Orphée: André Baleiro | Judge / Comissaire: Nuno Dias | Poet: Luís Rodrigues | Aglaonice: Cátia Moreso | Reporter / Glazier: João Pedro Cabral | Costumes and make-up: Nuno Esteves | Movement direction: Sofia Dias e Vitor Roriz | Video design: Henrique Martins | Director's assistance: Crista Alfaiate | Production: Ricardo Frayha

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A coproduction Theatro Municipal do Rio de Janeiro, Centro Cultural de Belém

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CCB Centro Cultural de Belém
Lisbon, Portugal
27 and 29.01.2022

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