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“LOOKS, SOUL AND A GOOD STAGE PRESENCE”
Verdi’s requirements for a good Violetta were deceptively simple: “looks, soul and a good stage presence.” What attracted Verdi to Violetta? According to music historian Nicholas John, “it was the character of the fallen woman which attracted Verdi in the first place. In her, vice and virtue are combined. Violetta is a courtesan who is called upon to be an example of noble self-sacrifice in a venal, materialistic society.” Truly, she is an unconventional heroine: although gracious, erudite, and eloquent, she also drinks like a fish, parties like a rock star and swears like a sailor—not to mention the fact that her occupation as a courtesan places her securely among the demimonde. The challenge for the actress singing Violetta is to carry a strong sense of this reckless indulgence in “vice” to the stage. For it is this insistence on fun with which Violetta struggles to drown out feelings of emptiness and dissatisfaction with a life that is one frivolous party or meaningless sexual act after another.
Hedonism aside, Violetta is a model of selfsacrifice, one of a long line of 19th century operatic and literary heroines that display a blatant disregard for their own happiness or self worth. She agrees to put the needs of Alfredo’s family, as articulated by Germont, before her own, dashing her own hopes for happiness in the process. She knows she is dying, and she also knows that agreeing to never see Alfredo again will only hasten her demise. Contemporary audiences may argue that her definition of virtue sound more like delusion and stupidity—many ask, “why wouldn’t she just say NO to Germont?”—but for the time, her example of “noble self-sacrifice” was virtuous and, more importantly, was expected of her. In the moral universe of the 19th century, this was the only way to expiate her sins.
This precarious balance between vice and virtue is the essence of the character and, when the audience is let in on this secret, can grow to feel very close to her. She becomes pitiable when one realizes she had very little choice. For a woman of her social background, who probably grew up penniless and uneducated, the career of a courtesan must have been appealing as it could be lucrative financially and allow a woman a degree of independence unavailable in marriage or working in a shop or factory. The price she paid, however, was to be paraded around Paris as a status symbol by wealthy men who could offer everything but genuine affection. Violetta exercises great power in her indulgence in vice, that is, in her determination to enjoy the pleasures that her money can buy. Yet at the end of each encounter she knows she’s nothing more than a discarded plaything and does not believe she could ever truly love—until Alfredo explodes into her world.
The singer who plays her will indeed require “looks, soul and a good presence” to present a woman whose beauty allows her to rule at the top of Parisian society; who lives only for pleasure and, after she finds it, for love; and who has the presence to dominate the stage for two-plus hours, often in scenes of gut-wrenching intensity. They did not make Violetta the title of the opera (La traviata, or the Fallen Woman) for nothing.
—Luke Dennis, Education andCommunity Programs Manager
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