Opera Krakowska contemporary take on Madama Butterfly

It was a packed Friday evening (11 Oct) at the Krakow Opera House where Puccini's Madama Butterfly would be performed.  This contemporary looking building was opened in December 2008 and has since played an important role in the arts and culture calendar of Krakow.

The Krakow Opera was established in 1958 and did not have a permanent home till recently. This Opera House enables the company to plan and stage more performances.  In fact, the online Operabase website ranked Krakow Opera as the top 47 opera houses in the world, up from 98th position from the previous year.

Intermission time..

 I last caught Krakow Opera in 2008 where they staged La Boheme at the Julius Slowack Theatre, and I was eager to see this company again in its new (well, not so new now) home.

The 760-seat theatre was an intimate size and the audience was seated close to the stage.

On the night of performance, Marta Abako played the role of Cio-Cio-San and Tamasz Kuk took on the role of Pinkerton.  Both sang the role competently and I specially liked the dramatic acting of Marta Abako.  They were supported well by Agnieszka Czastka's Suzuki, Stanislaw Kufluk's Sharpless and Pawel Wunder's Goro.

It was a contemporary staging and the director Tomasz Tokarczyk made full use of the elevation stage and sliding sets to good effects.  The placement of singers and the chorus were also done smoothly.  The production team did take liberty with infusing various Asian elements into this production, and being an Asian, it looked awkward at times.  But this is just a minor comment.







This was the second Madama Butterfly production that I had seen this year, the other being Singapore Lyric Opera's production.  In terms of staging, Krakow Opera has an edge over SLO.

With appreciation to Opera Krakowska.  Website: http://www.opera.krakow.pl/english.php

Please also see my write-up on Wieliczkav Salt Mine