If you have attended any of Marble City Opera’s previous productions, you undoubtedly know that the company lives for performances in unusual and intriguing spaces that immerse the audience in an alternative music-theatre experience. Along the lines of MCO’s production of La Traviata in the historic Westwood two years ago, their latest finds them in the Candoro Marble building in South Knoxville, a gorgeous structure constructed in 1923 as the former showroom and office of the historic Candoro Marble Works.
This week’s production is Nero Monologues, an immersive music and theatre experience created and performed by soprano Sarah Toth, that takes the audience on a journey through the mind and history of the Roman emperor Nero during his final hour. The work contains poetry by Geoffrey Lehmann that has been set to music with a score by Peter James Learn. Learn’s material is also contrasted with Monteverdi and Handel arias—a interplay of styles that in itself creates new music textural effects.
Is it possible to find humanity in a figure like Nero? Can such a man ever be any different? The opera explores the motivations and influences that sow the seeds of tyranny in an individual. The opera also lays bare some familiar themes— abandonment, abuse, passion, sexual identity, love, political ideals, and power struggles.
“Due to the improvisational aspect of the opera,” explains Marble City Opera Artistic Director Kathryn Frady, “Each performance will be slightly different creating a unique experience of the opera for each audience. We are placing the opera in the front room of Candoro Marble where the audience will be seated in the round. The audience will play different roles throughout the evening. Nero will enter from outside, so the audience will be on stage before Nero inhabits his home. The venue provides it’s own challenges. Besides limited seating, the ensemble [Knoxville’s Inner Voices String Quartet and pianist Danny Brian] will have to be in a separate room, much like our production of La Traviata.”
In a departure from Toth’s London premiere in 2017, director Marya Barry will be using three movement actors to help interpret some of the dramatic material as well as converting the movement to the site specifics of the front room of Candoro Marble with the audience in the round.
There are three performances of Nero Monologues: Thursday, November 1; Friday, November 2; and Sunday, November 4. All performances are at 7:30pm. Tickets
Candoro Marble is located at 4450 Candora Ave, Knoxville, 37920
