Pagliacci is an opera by Ruggero Leoncavallo, premiered in 1892. The production by the Minnesota Opera company that I saw has been inherited from Britain's Glimmerglass Festival. The show is an exploration of the blurring between reality and fiction that occurs on the stage of Comedia dell' Arte production performed by an itinerant troupe of traveling players. Although characterized as the type of a verismo opera, that is "slice of life" realism, the show is designed to also exploit archaic theatrical effects and stylized forms of acting -- the effect is a melange of realistic elements combined with overtly theatrical and broad effects within the play within a play. There are aspects of the work that bring to mind Luigi Pirandello's Six Actors in Search of an Author.
The first act is about fifty minutes and establishes the situation. There is a brief framing prologue. Tonio is recalling the tragedy that occurred on stage 40 years ago. He's exploring a sort of warehouse full of wagons and props once used by the troupe of traveling players of which he was a member. A lonesome train whistle hoots in the distance and the characters in the show appear as ghostly presences. Tonio, played in this production by a large, heavy set Black man, dons a resplendent red jacket with brass buttons and, then, reminds the audience that the actors that we see on stage are flesh and blood people, just like those watching the show from their seats in the theater. The opera's narrative commences with introducing the characters. Canio is the jealous and violent husband of Nedda. She is flirtatious and high-spirited, but also the mother of a strange, sad little boy whom we see near her. (The child introduces performances by blowing on a horn.) Tonio desires Nedda and, in fact, tries to rape her. The scene is graphic with the hulking Tonio pushing Nedda onto a barrel or sawhorse, pulling her legs apart and trying to press himself between her thighs. She pulls a small gun from Tonio's pocket, brandishes it, and forces his retreat. Tonio has been joking with Canio that he would like to spend time with his wife alone, taunting Canio into a frenzy of jealousy. After Tonio has been vanquished, Nedda's actual lover, Silvio, appears, a dapper young man in a vanilla-colored coat. The two pledge their love and Silvio plots with Nedda to extract her from her unhappy marriage to the cuckolded Canio.,
During the much shorter second act, the itinerant performers put on a comedia dell'arte skit casting Nedda as the coquettish and unfaithful Columbine, Canio as Columbine's husband, and Harlequin played by Beppe, another member of the company, as Columbine's lover. Canio becomes increasingly incensed when he observes Nedda (as Columbine) flirting with Beppe. He loses his grip on reality and takes the action in the skit for further evidence of Nedda's infidelity. In a fit of jealousy, he uses the gun Nedda took from Tonio to shoot her to death. Silvio, Nedda's actual lover, rushes on-stage to provide assistance to the wounded Nedda. This exposes him as Nedda's paramour and Canio guns him down also. Tonio, in his resplendent red and gold jacket, stares at the scene of carnage and utters the opera's last line: La commedia a finita! -- this famous line is usually spoken by Canio, but here is sung by Tonio, completing the loop with the opening scene set forty years later.
The scenario is simple with archetypal elements. We are presented with a frame story set in the warehouse full of abandoned properties, a sordid story of marital infidelity and a story within a story that presents a grotesque parody of the actual dilemma in the plot -- this is the comedia dell'arte show presented for the public by the traveling players. The music is only rarely memorable and mostly just sighs and thunder from the orchestra to underline the action. The set is very complex with the stage crowded with two circus-wagons (one of which serves as the stage), various props, bits of furniture and neon-lit letters each about three feet tall that spell, if properly assembled "comedia". There is a large chorus, too many people to fit on the congested stage, and so the chorus often ranges through the audience in the aisles of the theater. Ordinarily, the domestic violence in the show is accomplished with knives -- here, the show is staged as an example of gun-violence run amuck. The acting in the play within the play, the comedia skit, is very broad and relies on pratfalls and colorful clown costumes. The most notable feature of the opera is the tortured performance by the witness to the violence and the would be rapist, Tonio. This element of the show seems designed to make the audience cringe -- Tonio as played by the jolly and obese African American, Reginald Smith Jr. has a minstrel show aspect, he grins mindlessly, connives, and rolls his eyes. The rape scene caused people in the audience to gasp out loud -- this monstrous gorilla of a Black man menacing a petite White girl. As I left the theater, I saw Smith on the street corner outside, his white shirt untucked, leering at the passers-by, and was a little alarmed by the strange spectacle -- it was as if the actor had also lost his moorings in reality.
I think the show should end with someone in the confused audience clapping reluctantly at the carnage on stage and, then, the rest of the chorus joining in that acclamation. After all, how can we be sure what is real and what is merely staged?
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