Orfeo ed Euridice is an opera composed by Christoph Gluck. The original text was written by Ranieri De’ Calzabigi. This film, done during the 1982 Glyndebourne Opera Festival, stars Janet Baker as Orpheus, Elisabeth Speiser as Euridice, and Elizabeth Gale as Amore (Love). Because it tells the story of Orpheus, it provides an interesting case study for the portrayal and landscape of the underworld. Truthfully, I found its portrayal of the Gods and some of the characters … interesting … and I have made several screen caps because pictures are worth a thousand words.
The Setting: Portrayal of Orfeo and Euridice
Traditionally, a woman has played the role of Orfeo since the music industry stopped castrating young boys to keep their voices high, and the same is likely true for the role of Love. I took most issue with the portrayal of Euridice, who spends the entire return from Elysium harping at her husband about why he won’t look at her — she thinks it means that he has been unfaithful. Gluck has also added a moral: “Jealousy torments and destroys, but all is renewed by faithfulness.” The faithfulness of Orfeo is the only defense against women’s unfounded jealousies. Personally, as Euridice has a singing role, I wondered why Orfeo couldn’t just tell her about the arrangement.
I did enjoy some elements of the opera. At the beginning, it shows a montage of scenes from the wedding, but they are shown in a series of happy stills from a dance. The real section doesn’t begin until Euridice dies, and Orfeo is left alone on stage with a broken lyre. (Don’t worry, Love shows up and gives him another one, which turns out to be Apollon’s.) It was a very powerful image, and I greatly enjoyed most of his journey down to the Underworld.
The opera did not end well. The truly moving part of the real story — that Orpheus (Orfeo) loses Eurydice (Euridice) and founds the Orphic Mysteries as a result of his understanding of the way the Underworld works — cannot happen with the way this ends. In order to provide salvation through the initatiory experience, Orpheus must return alone, and he must be killed by the mainades. In Orfeo ed Euridice, Orfeo turns to look at Euridice and she dies a second time. He tries to kill himself, but Love comes to tell him that Orfeo’s faithfulness must be admired. Euridice is automatically restored, and they spend the last half hour of the opera singing and dancing for joy before walking into the sunset (and I will never get those thirty minutes back). The removal of the mystery religions from the opera makes its polytheism shallow, almost like an unworthy contestant to the dominant religious thinking of Gluck’s time.
What Orfeo ed Euridice Says About the Underworld: Thank Gods Gluck Didn’t Control the Stage Designers!
The depiction of the Underworld in Orfeo ed Euridice seems very standard. To travel there, Orfeo must go underground through many winding caverns. All of the action in the opera takes place along that road he travels, laid with bricks, and the various dangers Orfeo faces along the way must be quelled with his lyre.
At the opening of each act, we see Euridice’s soul passing through fog deeper into the Underworld. She arrives there only minutes before Orfeo comes to rescue her (just after an on-stage costume change into the clothes of the dead, an untied Ionic chiton).
During these short scenes, Euridice walks almost mechanically along the path, facing no opposition from the Furies at the gate; the way to Hades is easy for the dead. She has no psychopomp leading the way to the Underworld. Regardless, she makes her way to Elysium — a place with trees and ambient light where people sit calmly and peacefully. Even Orfeo admits Elysium is beautiful.
To Orfeo, Hades looks like Hell. At the double gate of the Underworld, a large number of Furies wait to oppose his ingress. I did not see Cerberus, but the Furies had bestial aspects portrayed through the spontaneous growth of hair in strange places on their bodysuits.
Orfeo’s gate is bleak and red-lit. His single voice must compete against many voices in the opera. Only through relying on the power of the lyre to quell opposition can he finally persuade them to let him through. They demand that he be terrified “if he be not a God.” The turning point in their encounter comes when Orfeo internalizes the Underworld. The words “I bear my own hell within me” are relatable to the Furies and represent the first piece of contact that quells their anger. Hades grows calmer the deeper he goes, and when he finally joins Euridice at Elysium, all of the frightening portions have fallen away.
Absence of Chthonic Gods
No Chthonic Gods figure into this opera at all. The Underworld seems unstaffed, as it were, although one of the women in the Elysium scene wears a crown that reminds me of Persephone. Zeus (or “Jove,” according to the opera) — not Hades — decides that Orfeo will have a chance to retrieve his wife. Love interferes on his behalf everywhere. He even shows up on the road out of Hades to stop Orfeo from killing himself.
During the long and tedious dance number at the end, the Olympioi actually show up. Apollon is — I kid you not — covered in gold dust.
Only Love has a speaking role. Zeus communicates primarily through gesture. All deities hang above the action.
Conclusion
I really disliked this opera. The act with the Furies came closest to a watchable moment, but the rhetoric about female jealousy at the end — and the lack of Orpheus mourning for the rest of his life — really spoiled it for me. The absence of Chthonioi was NOT accurate, especially considering that persuading Hades and Persephone through music is integral to the original story. All of these things rely on Gluck’s original telling of the tale. The portrayal of the Underworld, on the other hand, actually gets the setting right — probably because the ideas and concepts came from late 20th century stage designers. It provides the dead with someplace peaceful and good to go, and it has enough obstacles to keep the living out.
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