From the Dramaturg’s Desk: A Deep Dive into TOSCA
Director’s Note by Louisa Proske
Tosca is a perfectly constructed political thriller, full of hair-raising suspense, with complex and dazzlingly extreme characters who are involved in betrayals, double crossings, and as twisted a cat-and-mouse game as any John le Carré novel could imagine. The opera has its own rich political consciousness, and, what is more, self-consciousness. Being a work of art, written and performed by artists about artists, it asks: What is the role of an artist in an authoritarian regime? Can you make art during times of political repression? Should you leave or should you stay? And when does staying and working inside a political reality, the implicit acceptance of the terms, turn into collusion?
These questions, unfortunately, became existential for artists all over the world in murderous dictatorships and fascist regimes of the century following Puccini’s own. Dictators who sought to establish their propaganda as the supreme truth, the only solution, understood that the artist’s ability to imagine an “elsewhere,” a utopia, and to fill their work with coded criticism of power, was a threat to their survival. Maybe they also instinctively knew that while artists’ bodies can be incarcerated, beaten, maimed, and killed, their work tends to far outlive the fame of shabby tyrants dressed in a little brief authority. In the confines of a torture prison, the dictator may crush the artist, but once you think in centuries, artists survive dictators.
But artists can also suffer from myopia and miss the signs that society has slipped deeper into repression. Tosca, a woman of amazing imagination, spends a whole act believing she is in an entirely different plot — one about jealousy and romantic betrayal, not about a psychopath in power who extorts sexual favors and tortures and kills at will. Indeed, this is also the noose Puccini lays around the audience’s neck in the first act. Charmed by the love story and the sublime music it inspires, we want to forget that we’ve just seen a political prisoner so emaciated and abused that Cavaradossi doesn’t even recognize him as his comrade. It seems that Puccini was supremely aware of his music’s power to transport people, for better or worse.
Tosca’s awakening to her political reality, to the obscene horrors that happen “in the other room,” makes for the searing intensity of the second act. (The etymology of “obscene”: that which happens just out of view, off stage; that which cannot be shown directly on a stage.) Her long scene with Scarpia is propelled by Tosca’s extraordinary double nature: she is a creature of the theater, a passionate and exquisite prima donna — and also a deeply devout Christian woman whose religious anchorage is, like Job’s in the Bible, terrifyingly unmoored when she is placed in an impossible moral predicament. Being raped by Scarpia: the steep price for her lover’s life. Why, God, why do you repay me like this?
Is there an escape from Scarpia’s basement? It is at the crossroads of this question that our production opens up a new poetic space for the final act of the opera: one that deals in Tosca’s memories and visions and, in her moment of greatest despair, allows us to journey deeper into her theatrical and her religious imagination. Puccini’s coup — that Tosca believes the execution of her lover is just a piece of theater with fake ammunition and pretend death — creates an extraordinary self-awareness of the opera as an opera, and at the same time enacts the consequences of Tosca’s fundamental myopia, her inability to see the worthlessness of a deal with Scarpia whose word means nothing.
Cavaradossi and Tosca never make it out of Rome alive, but just before the end, they imagine their escape with the luminous intensity of two young artists in love: they see themselves free, sailing across the sea, spreading their art, their colors, their music, throughout the world. The irony is: they never will — but the deeper irony is that in this moment, in performing Tosca in the future year of 2025 in present day America, and in every live performance since 1900, they are doing just that — setting against the murderous cynicism of the world’s Scarpias the Utopian belief that art can transform reality. Can it? Certainly we live in a world where, according to this year’s headlines, one can be jailed for reciting a poem, flogged for singing a song, or disappeared for wearing the wrong tattoo. Enjoy the music, Puccini seems to say — but don’t lose the plot, and ignore the signs at your own peril.
A Conversation with Joseph Colaneri: “The thumbprint of the genius”
When Tosca premiered, critics were shocked by its grisly plot; one London newspaper said its juxtaposition of art and brutality “creates a feeling of nausea.” Others complained about the unorthodox harmonic progressions and supposed lack of tunes. Reviewing the Metropolitan Opera premiere in 1901, Henry Krehbiel wrote in the New York Tribune: “Phrases of real pith and moment are mixed with phrases of indescribable balderdash, yet these phrases recur with painful reiteration and with all the color tints which Puccini is able to scrape from a marvelously varied and garish orchestral palette. The most remarkable feature of it all, the one which shows the composer’s constructive talent in its highest aspect, is the fluency of it all.” The remarkably fluent musical dramatist had the last laugh. From the beginning, Puccini knew the melodramatic tale of the fearless diva was perfect for his talents: “In this Tosca I see the opera that I need: one without excessive proportions or a decorative spectacle, nor is it the kind that calls for a superabundance of music,” he wrote in a letter to Ricordi, his publisher. Dramaturg Kelley Rourke and Music Director Joseph Colaneri discuss the score’s enduring power.
Fifty years ago, Glimmerglass opened with La bohème (1896), an opera about a collection of artists living and working in the Latin Quarter of Paris. Puccini’s next opera, Tosca (1900), also centered artists — in this case, a painter and an opera diva who are living and working during a period of intense political strife. What does Puccini’s music tell us about these two characters? How does his musical characterization of these artists differ from those of the earlier opera?
Both Rodolfo and Cavaradossi are wonderful examples of the so-called Puccini tenor; ardent characters who are cast in the Italian lyric vocal style. Being a poet, Rodolfo has gentler, more mellifluous vocal lines, making him a true lyric tenor; Cavaradossi, on the other hand, is a more heroic type — his emotions and moral character run deeply; he is courageous and unafraid even in the face of death. Puccini’s musical characterization of him tends towards the vocally heroic — a more “spinto” (meaning “pushed”) tenor who has elegant, arching vocal lines contrasted with moments of exciting, stentorian delivery. The comparison is similar with Mimì and Floria Tosca; the former being a shy but emotionally deep character with warm, lyric vocal lines, and the latter a tempestuous opera diva (in every sense of that word!) who is guided by a strong sense of justice and a deep-seated love for Mario. Puccini’s music for Tosca is extroverted and hyper-emotional, painting her with an enormous palette of vocal colors, dynamics, and range, with special emphasis on the highest parts of the soprano tessitura.
The diva may be the title character, but the opera opens with chords that we will come to associate with Scarpia, the corrupt Chief of Police. Even before we know to associate the chords with Scarpia, there is a sense of menace, of danger that comes with them. How did Puccini achieve this effect?
Ah — the three famous Scarpia chords! The sense of menace at the start of Act One is created by Puccini orchestrating these chords with an emphasis on the low ranges of the strings, woodwinds, and especially the brass with a striking snarling quality. The third chord is even punctuated with a bass-drum stroke for added effect. There is a musical intervallic space between the second and third chords that really wrenches the listener away from any sense of settled harmony, creating a sense of musical disorientation. The Scarpia chords are actually a part of a longer series of chords that descend by the bass line in whole steps (creating what is called the whole-tone scale). Puccini was always interested in musical innovations and was well aware of what Impressionistic composers like Claude Debussy were up to — and that includes experimentation with the whole-tone scale. Puccini reached the apex of his employment of whole-tone harmony ten years later with La fanciulla del West (1910). But back to Scarpia — Puccini doesn’t let us hear the full series of these whole-tone chords until Act Two, when Scarpia proposes his offer of exchanging Mario’s life for a night with her. The entirety of Scarpia’s evil is thus exposed for the listener to hear. Notably, the final Scarpia chord is always a major chord — but Puccini brilliantly changes this chord at the end of Act Two when Scarpia is lying dead at Tosca’s feet; the chord is now a minor chord, draining it of its menace and threat. That musical stroke is what I like to call the thumbprint of the genius.
So many of the important arias in the opera, rather than speak to the tension of the moment at hand, project us OUT of the moment — I think of Tosca’s Act One anticipation of an upcoming night of love, or of Cavaradossi’s memory of such a night in Act Three, or of their fantasy of a triumphant new life together across the sea. These moments offer some relief in a plot dominated by Scarpia’s machinations. How does Puccini set these moments off for us? Could he be subtly telling us that this dream of love is just that — a dream, one that is not meant to be?
Much of the drama and its music do indeed, as you say, take us out of the moment, and this is due to the characters responding to the reality of a situation with extremely heightened emotions, often leading to flights of fancy or desirous thinking. In Act Two, Puccini first employs a two-note musical motive (often called the motive of deception) at the moment when Scarpia tells Tosca that Mario will be released after a mock execution if she cooperates; this motive is played several times throughout the act and is heard again in Act Three as Tosca explains to Mario what he must do to act out his simulated execution in the most realistic manner; this motive is thundered out for the last time by the orchestra in the moments preceding the firing of the volley of bullets that do indeed kill Mario. This begs the question: does Cavaradossi actually know that he is about to be subjected to a real execution and is somehow aware of Scarpia’s deception of Tosca? I think that Puccini leaves us little doubt with his use of the deception motive.
We know Puccini was interested in creating an authentic atmosphere for each of his operas, going to great pains to research the sounds associated with a specific place and time. Can you highlight a few of his findings for the Tosca score?
Of course, the greatest example is Puccini’s meticulous research into recreating the sounds of the bells in the churches of Rome tolling Matins in the pre-dawn hours; he actually stood atop Castel Sant’Angelo where Mario’s execution takes place and notated those bells in real time. He even included the great low-E bell of St. Peter’s Basilica, incorporating its pitch into the introduction to Cavaradossi’s aria, “E lucevan le stelle.” These bells make an absolutely stunning theatrical effect in the prelude music for Act Three. But Puccini was also interested in the smaller details as well, including the Te Deum that ends Act One. The very first time I studied Tosca, I realized that the initial notes of Puccini’s Te Deum are identical to those of the “Missa Te Deum Laudamus” by Lorenzo Perosi, director of the Sistine Chapel Choir from 1898. Perosi based his mass on a Te Deum melody used in Rome at that time, and I’m sure that Puccini learned of this tune from his priest friend and Roman resource, Don Pietro Panichelli.
As you approach this score again, what are you most looking forward to?
This will be my seventh production — hard to believe! Our new production at GGF is deeply meaningful to me as music director of the Festival — having the opportunity to lead this great opera with the orchestra that I’ve also collaborated with on two other Puccini works, La bohème and Madame Butterfly, and looking forward to carrying our Puccini exploration even further!
MORE TO EXPLORE
“History does not repeat, but it does instruct.” So begins Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny: Lessons from the Twentieth Century. Snyder’s concise manual, available as a slim paperback or a beautiful graphic edition, is neatly summarized by its chapter headings, read by John Lithgow and reprinted on the author’s substack. Lesson nine, “Be kind to our language,” includes suggestions for further reading, including “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell (1946); The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt (1951); The Rebel by Albert Camus (1951); The Captive Mind by Czeslaw Milosz (1953); “The Power of the Powerless” by Václav Havel (1978); “How to be a Conservative-Liberal-Socialist” by Leszek Kolakowski (1978); The Uses of Adversity: Essays on the Fate of Central Europe by Timothy Garton Ash (1989); The Burden of Responsibility by Tony Judt (1998); Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning (1992); and Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible by Peter Pomerantsev (2014).
The Characters of (La) Tosca by Olivia Gacka
These character descriptions will primarily be referencing an edition of Sardou’s play La Tosca translated by W. Laird Kleine-Ahlbrandt. In addition to the translated text, Kleine-Ahlbrandt’s footnotes provide invaluable context and insight to better understand both Sardou’s play and how it transitioned to Puccini’s opera.
Floria Tosca: The titular tragic heroine of Tosca, famous for her passionate characteristics in the best and worst of circumstances. Described as “heroic in love and savage in hate. She is superstitious, romantic, haughty, refined, jealous, coquettish, tender, defiant, loyal.” An opera singer in Rome favored both by the public and by the upper echelons of society at the time, whose devotion to her faith is rivaled only by her devotion to her lover, Mario Cavaradossi. Over the course of the opera the audience watches her lose the sense of order and certainty in which she had no doubt the world operated, punctuated by the performance of “Vissi d’arte,” wherein she begs her god for understanding as to why the events of the opera had come to pass. In Puccini’s interpretation of the story, Floria is much more apolitical, or rather comparatively quiet about her political opinions, than in Sardou’s original text, wherein she is much more engaged and opinionated a royalist. Sarah Bernhardt famously originated the role of Floria Tosca in Sardou’s play (photo above), and is partially credited for the impact that her performance had on the longstanding popularity of the piece. While Puccini’s opera does not offer much in the way of a backstory for Floria Tosca, Sardou’s play explains her rise to fame from humble beginnings. Sardou frames her as having been raised by Benedictine nuns in Verona, where she had duties tending to goats before her gift for music was discovered.
Mario Cavaradossi: Of Roman and French descent from his father and mother, respectively, Mario Cavaradossi is a painter, republican revolutionary, and lover of Floria Tosca. Sardou’s play describes him as a Jacobin and “visibly Voltarian.” Voltairism (followers/enthusiasts of French writer and thinker Voltaire) is categorized by its connection to the French Revolution and is associated with ideas of justice, equality, and questioning the divine authority of church and monarchy. Thus, Cavaradossi’s ideals present a philosophical conflict between himself and the powers that be of the time (represented by Scarpia). In terms of how it links to his described physical appearance, much is made over the physical markers of revolutionary thought that make Mario a walking target in Rome for someone like Scarpia at the time. In the beginning of Cavaradossi and Tosca’s first scene together, they discuss that she promised her confessor that she would get Mario to shave his mustache, a “revolutionary insignia.” Cavaradossi himself remarks in Sardou’s play that
“My clothes and my general appearance attract the attention of the police…anyone who doesn’t wear a powdered wig, knee breeches, or buckled shoes, anyone who dresses and has his hair cut short in the French style, is looked at with a jaundiced eye. Hair worn in the manner of Titus makes me out as an extreme liberal, having a beard shows I’m a free thinker, and wearing these top boots brands me as a revolutionist (La Tosca).
This contextual space given in the play for Cavaradossi’s visibility as a sympathizer of the revolutionary cause helps to answer another question audiences of the opera may have had over time: What is someone with the views and sympathies of Mario Cavaradossi doing painting a mural in a church? In a discussion between himself and Angelotti in Act 1 of the play, Cavaradossi explains that he petitioned to paint a mural in the church for free specifically to throw authorities such as Scarpia off his scent.
Baron Vitellio Scarpia: The Chief of Police, described famously in Puccini’s opera as “A bigoted satyr who uses devoutness to hide his libertine lust and, to implement his lascivious talent, acts as both confessor and hangman.” According to Sardou’s original text, Scarpia is a somewhat recent Sicilian transplant to Rome (by order of the Court of Naples) at the time of the events of La Tosca. Though technically a fictional character, there is considerable evidence to suggest that Scarpia is based on two different men that Sardou would have had reasonable knowledge of: Baron Scarpia and Vincenzo Speciale. Baron Scarpia (also known as Gherardo Curci) had been made a baron less than a month before the Battle of Marengo, and was known for being vengeful and merciless under the guise of falsified religious faith. Vincenzo Speciale, on the other hand, was a Sicilian judge who happens to be the subject of a satirical poem that draws on the Te Deum, written around the time of the events of Tosca. The details don’t end there, as it is even possible that there is significance found in Scarpia’s first name, Vitellio, which is theorized to link to the Roman Emperor Vitellio (15-69 AD), known for his cruelty and oppressive tactics. This amalgamation theory further serves to cement Scarpia as both a very real and specific character, as well as one symbolic of the capacity for cruelty and corruption in positions such as his.
Cesare Angelotti: Thought to be inspired by the real-life political pamphleteer Luigi Angeloni (1759-1842), who was one of the leaders of the doomed Roman Republic in 1798. In Puccini’s version of events, the only reason given for Angelotti’s imprisonment is his involvement with the Roman Republic. In Sardou’s play, an entire backstory is given by Angelotti where he divulges his previous romantic involvement with Lady Emma Hamilton and attributes his imprisonment to her vengefulness against him. Angelotti’s story in both interpretations ends with him committing suicide in the crawlspace in the well in Cavaradossi’s garden, so as to prevent Scarpia’s men from taking him alive.
A Sacristan: A staunch Royalist who detests Mario Cavaradossi’s heretical artistic interpretations and delights in the (eventually corrected) news that Napoleon was defeated at Marengo. Begrudgingly assists and cleans up after the painter, but happily consumes the food and wine he leaves behind. In Sardou’s play, the character is not Cavaradossi’s assistant, the role being fulfilled by the character Gennarino (see below).
Sciarrone and Spoletta: Probably the most intact minor characters in the transition from play to opera. Spoletta and Sciarrone are attendants of Scarpia, with Spoletta acting as an assistant in his police ranks and Sciarrone occupying a position resembling a butler or personal attendant.
Offstage/Absent Characters
Characters who are either offstage contributors to the story, or were cut and/or amalgamated for Puccini’s opera.
Queen Caroline of Naples: Maria Carolina of Austria, the wife of King Ferdinand IV of Naples. The sister of Marie Antoinette, which, among other things, informs how she, and therefore her court, felt about the French and Republican sympathizers. While only an offstage contributor to the action in Puccini’s opera by summoning Floria Tosca to sing in honor of the presupposed victory at the Battle of Marengo, the queen is a fully realized character onstage in Sardou’s play. She features in Act 2, wherein she speaks with Scarpia, who would have been installed as Chief of Police by the crown, about the search for and capture of Angelotti. This interaction further emphasizes for audiences of the play how closely Tosca dances with the forces that eventually kill her lover, and herself. Most dramatically, right as Floria is to begin singing, the Queen is the one to receive and subsequently read aloud the news of Napoleon’s victory, whereupon she immediately faints onstage. Historically, while play & opera place her in Rome at the time of the Battle of Marengo, she was actually on a multi-leg sailing journey to Vienna, and learned of the defeat when she came ashore at Leghorn approximately three weeks later.
Marchioness Attavanti: Not presented in the flesh in either Puccini or Sardou’s interpretation, but arguably one of the most consequential characters of the story, with her efforts to save her brother setting into motion the main conflict and events of May 24th. Additionally, while not in the form of a person onstage, the Marchioness Attavanti dominates Act 1 of both play and opera, via Mario Cavaradossi’s imposing painting depicting her as Mary Magdalene.
Marquess Attavanti: The husband of Marchioness Attavanti is absent in the opera both by presence and name, but a featured onstage character in the play. Noted as wanting to distance himself from his wife’s familial shame in the play, but who happily accompanies Scarpia to Cavaradossi’s villa to supposedly catch her with the painter.
Viscount Trivulce: Marchioness Attavanti’s cicisbeo. An altogether unimportant character except that he helps to identify the Marchioness’ fan in Act 2.
Gennarino: A young assistant to Mario Cavaradossi. While in Puccini’s opera, the Sacristan absorbs Gennarino’s assistive duties, in Sardou’s play Act 1 is partially characterized by the interactions between Gennarino and Father Eusebius. Depicted as young and eager, loyal to Cavaradossi but clearly a follower to the church and prey to Father Eusebius’ criticisms.
Trevilhac: An exiled nomadic Frenchman and viscount who works in Sardou’s play to personalize the sociopolitical tensions with the French at the time. A declared hater of Napoleon and a royalist but still met with suspicion in Rome, Trevilac also serves as a conduit for overt explanations of different customs and terms the audience may not have been familiar with, such as “minchiate” and “cicisbeo.”