AFP

A powerhouse trio of American song will interpret the voice of Virginia Woolf on New York’s prestigious Metropolitan Opera stage, as the highly anticipated run of “The Hours” makes its world premiere Tuesday.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and Oscar-nominated film explores how threads of English writer Woolf’s “Mrs. Dalloway” tie three women of different generations together, and its darkly moving operatic adaption offers a new vision of the drama that probes themes including mental illness and the alienation from tradition that haunts its protagonists.

The production began with a pitch from Renee Fleming, widely considered the leading American soprano of her generation, whose role as the show’s Clarissa Vaughan marks her return to the Met after bidding adieu to her trademark role in Strauss’ “Der Rosenkavalier” in 2017.

“It was perfect for opera because of the complexity of the dealing with three periods,” Fleming said of “The Hours,” whose music was written by the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Kevin Puts.

“Music gives a kind of a river, on which we can all sort of float — together or separately,” Fleming said of the three-pronged production.

Fleming’s Vaughan — a 1990s-era New Yorker who mirrors the character Clarissa Dalloway, and whose plotline centers on her party-planning for a friend, a renowned poet dying of AIDs — is joined onstage by the Broadway and opera star Kelli O’Hara, who performs as the depressed 1950s housewife Laura Brown.

Grammy-winning mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato plays the struggling Woolf herself.

“The possibilities were so exciting,” composer Puts told AFP, saying that “what you can do in music that you can’t really accomplish in a film or a book is that you can begin to present the three stories… simultaneously.”

“The idea of introducing those stories musically and then gradually bringing them together, until maybe all three of the leading ladies would sing trios together, was a really exciting idea,” Puts continued. 

“I loved the book so much, and I felt like I had the musical vocabulary for it.”

– Extraordinary women –

For Fleming — who prior to collaborating with Puts on “The Hours” was putting on a song cycle by the composer, which drew from the writings of the artist Georgia O’Keefe — part of the appeal of both that project and her latest venture was to tell stories of powerful women.

“Too many times in opera, historically, women have been sort of pawns,” she told AFP. “They’ve been victims, they’ve been really at the center of power struggles when they have no power or no agency.”

“I want to tell stories now about women who are extraordinary.”

Along with the force of the show’s vocals, “The Hours” integrates modern dance in a way not often seen in traditional opera houses, with dozens of performers physically manifesting the characters’ emotions.

Choreographer Annie-B Parson — who’s worked with the likes of Mikhail Baryshnikov, David Byrne and David Bowie — told AFP her process is generally “less about narrative, more about the worlds that I’m trying to create.”

“We spent a lot of choreographic currency on how to animate and inhabit the actual physical set and the moving parts,” she said; the Met’s stage is one of the most technologically advanced in the world, allowing for complex sets including at different levels.

“I liked the idea that these dancer beings would be the sinew — the interstitial, physical animation of the set,” Parson said.

Fleming said productions like “The Hours” can play a vital role in freshening the opera experience and drawing in new audiences, a major goal the Met has been working towards including by staging Terence Blanchard’s “Fire Shut Up In My Bones” last year.

The soprano emphasized the need to continue bringing in composers of diverse backgrounds and giving women more and larger creative roles.

The Grammy-winning performer herself was the first woman in the Met’s history to solo headline a season opening night gala, in 2008.

“All of our art forms really need to represent our population,” Fleming said.

“The Hours” runs at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Opera from November 22 through December 15.

Joe Biden on Monday used his powers as US president to pardon two turkeys, sparing them from winding up as the main course during an upcoming Thanksgiving dinner later this week.

“I hereby pardon Chocolate and Chip,” Biden said at the pardoning ceremony on the South Lawn, a lighthearted autumn event that has become something of a White House tradition.

The large white birds, which were raised on a farm in North Carolina, were named for the president’s favorite ice cream flavor, Biden told several schoolchildren who were present for the event.

“That’s a big bird,” Biden quipped as 46-pound (21-kilogram) Chocolate was placed on a table.

Biden used the backdrop of the recent US midterm elections — in which his Democrats fared better than many experts expected, retaining control of the Senate and only narrowly losing the House of Representatives to Republicans — to crack jokes about the time-honored turkey pardoning.

“The votes are in. They’ve been counted and verified. There’s no ballot stuffing. There’s no fowl play,” he said to laughter — and likely a few eyerolls.

“The only red wave this season (related to the traditional color of Republicans) is going to be a German Shepherd, Commander,” the president said, referring to his dog, who “knocks over the cranberry sauce on our table.” 

Turkey with stuffing is the traditional dish that Americans serve at a family feast on Thanksgiving, which is Thursday.

Biden mentioned how the Covid-19 pandemic had interrupted or curtailed such commemorations by Americans in recent years, and urged the invitees to feel gratitude for those who had protected US communities during the crisis, notably doctors, nurses and scientists.

“Two years ago, we couldn’t even safely have Thanksgiving with large family gatherings. Now we can,” he said. “That’s progress, and let’s keep it going.”

In a dramatic twist worthy of a “Star Wars” spin-off, Disney ditched CEO Bob Chapek and brought back Bob Iger, Hollywood’s most respected executive, who faces a huge challenge to revive the Magic Kingdom.

Iger’s return comes as Disney is trying to negotiate an uncertain era, where investors have lost faith in some of the most storied names in US media as companies bleed cash in the hunt for customers to streaming platforms.

Disney’s board of directors rehired Iger for a two-year contract that will add to the 15 years he ruled over the company until 2020, when he handed the reins to Chapek.

But Disney’s share price has slumped 40 percent this year and Chapek was unceremoniously fired after less than three years in the top job, much of it struggling to fill the big shoes left by Iger.

Iger’s leadership was extraordinary even by Hollywood’s standards.

The 71-year-old led Disney to new frontiers when he bought the Star Wars and Marvel franchises and launched the Disney+ streaming service to rival Netflix head-on.

He also bought 21 Century Fox from media baron Rupert Murdoch and held on to sports network ESPN despite calls to sell it, maintaining an empire that stretched from theme parks to local TV stations and cruise ships.

The return of Iger was cheered on by Wall Street, with Disney’s share price surging by six percent on Monday, and analysts recommending the stock for the first time since he exited the company.

– ‘Not guaranteed’ –

But some analysts were not so sure, warning that the world that Iger left in early 2020 — before Covid-19, before the streaming wars — had changed.

“The bold move might feel like the right one, however the business is at a different phase of growth,” said Paolo Pescatore, analyst at PP Foresight.

“It will take time and immediate success is not guaranteed.”

The core problem for Iger will be to turn a profit at Disney+ when, according to the latest figures in November, it burned through four billion dollars in just 12 months.

Launched in early 2020, Disney+ streams all that the Star Wars and Marvel franchises and Disney have to offer, releasing new content at a furious rate, but that weighs heavily on finances.

On the positive side, the Disney+ platform continues to gain subscribers and had 164 million customers at the end of September.

But the financial hole has put pressure on Disney’s other sectors: Theme parks and merchandising have succeeded for now to keep the Disney group in the green.

– ‘Expensive’ –

The pressure has grown worse as the economic outlook sours. 

Households are winnowing down entertainment subscriptions to just one or two, a cold reality that has seen the Netflix share price plummet by 50 percent in a year.

For Jonathan Kees of Daiwa Capital Markets America, Disney’s current troubles are also a result of choices made by Iger. 

“Iger pushed for the creation of Disney+, which has become an expensive business venture,” the analyst said. 

As for the 2019 purchase of 21st Century Fox, “that purchase alone loaded up the Disney balance sheet with an incredible amount of debt, which is not what investors are valuing in this current stock market.”

And even under the hugely respected Iger, Disney will face pressure from activist investors looking for quick results.

The Third Point fund, which increased its stake in Disney this summer, is among the most vocal on the matter. 

Dan Loeb, its founder and CEO, has previously demanded that Disney hive off the ESPN sports media business from the rest of the group before reversing his position.

And according to the Wall Street Journal, the return of Iger is decried by activist fund Trian, which acquired more than $800 million worth of Disney shares after the stock market tumbled after poor results.

“At the end of the day, it’s his legacy that’s at stake,” Pescatore said.