On opera and mentorship
Celebrating its 26th year, the Philippine Opera Company continues its vision to bring opera to the larger theater community by staging Terrence McNally’s “Master Class,” a play about renowned opera diva Maria Callas. Callas is a famous opera star who—according to Menchu Lauchangco-Yulo (who is playing her)—“brought drama to opera.”
During the press launch of the upcoming play, Lauchengco-Yulo, along with director Jaime Del Mundo, and her co-stars Louie Angelo Oca, Arman Ferrer, and Alexandra Bernas, talk about the play, opera, art, and the modern world in relation to craft.
Bridging musical theater with opera
In the discussion, the cast and director talk about the different styles of opera—jokingly known as BC and AC or “before Callas” and “after Callas”—where traditional opera was just sung, and the emotions are found in the song itself, whereas Callas sang with emotion, acted out the pieces, often straining her voice until the point when she lost it.
This led her to do masterclasses in the US, which became the inspiration for McNally’s play—a fictional retelling of one of said masterclasses. Lauchengco-Yulo talks to the audience, who become the surrogate of her students. During the short excerpt that was performed, Lauchengco-Yulo’s performance then becomes two-fold: Callas performing on stage and the actress performing as Callas.
She’s sharp, spritely, forceful, frank, and also quite self-assured, leaning towards the arrogant. But why not? She is a diva of the opera world who, according to Lauchengco-Yulo, was once quoted as saying: “How can I have a rival when no one can do what I do?”
Even though the play is not a musical—no character spontaneously bursts into song—the play has a few arias, which will be sung by Bernas and Ferrer with Oca accompanying on the piano. Callas, whose voice is already ruined by this time, is said to sing only one line. This is why the Philippine Opera House founder Karla Patricia Gutierrez, an award-winning soprano herself, wants to restage this production again, as part of the company’s mission to “break the perception of opera as elitist.”
This play would serve as a bridge to bring musical theater aficionados to catch the performance and hopefully become curious about opera. It is a grounded piece that reflects on Callas’ own vast musical history and serves as an eye-opener about the art form’s rich history.
Art in a dark, crazy world
During her opening remarks, Gutierrez said she had to reflect on the world today and that “history reminds us that even in the darkest of hours, art has endured.” For her, the play “Master Class” is about truth, discipline, and vulnerability. These qualities must persevere and, in a way, are our way through these dark times.
“Art is not a privilege,” she says, “but a necessity.”
Del Mundo echoes this in his own answers to the questions from the press. “Art is important in life,” he says, “and art is an image of what man can be.” At first, he didn’t know if it would work since he felt that not many Filipinos know who Callas is, though he has friends who disagree with him.
But if there’s one thing he learned from his beginnings in Repertory Philippines, it was that he had to find the universality of the piece to have his entry point as a director to any piece of work. “I had to personally dig deeper,” he shares. “And what was it about? It was about mentors. I’m a mentor. And Menchu is a mentor. For us, it’s not going to be so much about Callas, but about mentors and how mentors pass things on. It just happens to be about Callas.”
Working out the material during rehearsals, Del Mundo said that the way that Callas teaches in the play is exactly what he does when he is directing or coaching. He even relates it to when Lauchengco-Yulo did her own masterclass, which was also very similar. “This is what we do,” he says, “what Callas does in the play is nothing extraordinary. It is how I teach. It is literally how Menchu teaches.” In that way, Del Mundo sees the universality of the play, how it can relate to Filipinos and the Filipino audience, and is further expanded by Callas’ own recollection of her fame.
“The lessons are colored by who she is, and who she was, and that might have some appeal,” Del Mundo says.
Bringing Callas to life
When asked about Lauchengco-Yulo’s approach to portraying the opera diva, both she and Del Mundo feel strongly about not trying to portray her exactly as she was. Del Mundo is quick to point out that “this is not a documentary” and that what we will be seeing is “Terrence McNally’s idea of Maria Callas.”
Lauchengco-Yulo points out that there are actual tapes, records of these master classes and McNally does lift from them—takes a line from one session and takes another thought from another session—and puts them in this play but, she says, “he has added some things like, she may not have behaved that way, she has real tantrums in this play and I don’t think she had those tantrums in the actual.”
But Lauchengco-Yulo reveals a bit more of the play as she says that at “the end of act one and the end of act two, we go into her head and she hears herself. There’s a recording of Callas, [where we go] into her head and she talks about her past—she talks about how Ari (her ex-husband) treated her, and about her difficulties in life, which technically the audience should not be able to see or hear because it’s in her head.” It’s this theatricality in McNally’s writing that allows them to take liberties in the portrayal of the character.
She even told her director early on that she “would not try to be Callas.” “I watched her videos. I know how she acts. I know how she talks. There’s an elegance about her,” she says. “She does have a special way of talking which I try to put in, but what I’m trying to do is get the essence of her. I don’t want to copy her because I can’t, and it would not be me. It would play very false.”
And Del Mundo adds that every performer who has done this role before—from Baby Barredo to Cherie Gil, from Patti Lupone to Faye Dunaway—has also approached it from their own experiences and individuality.
“What you’ll see is a lot of what Menchu brings to it,” he adds. “It would be useless to try and emulate everyone trying to emulate Callas because what you are looking for is individuality of performance.”
