Posted on Apr 8, 2023
'Champion' is not your grandmother's Metropolitan Opera
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https://www.npr.org/2023/04/08/ [login to see] /champion-terence-blanchard
In a hangar-like wood-paneled room at the Metropolitan Opera House, more than 60 artists-- actors, dancers, musicians, directors and stagehands —are arriving for a rehearsal for Terence Blanchard's Champion. Last season, Blanchard made history when his Fire Shut Up in My Bones was the first opera by a Black composer staged by the Metropolitan Opera.
"Walking around this building, it's still like a dream," says Blanchard. "And then, this time it seems like things have ratcheted up to another level. Because the singers are amazing, and the production, as you see, is just awesome. And that's just half of the people."
Along with its huge cast, the production includes a full-sized boxing ring on the Met stage. Champion tells the story of Emile Griffith, a closeted gay boxer --in an era when gay people were outcasts --who rises from obscurity to become world champion and, in one of the great tragedies in sports history, kills his homophobic archrival in the ring.
In a hangar-like wood-paneled room at the Metropolitan Opera House, more than 60 artists-- actors, dancers, musicians, directors and stagehands —are arriving for a rehearsal for Terence Blanchard's Champion. Last season, Blanchard made history when his Fire Shut Up in My Bones was the first opera by a Black composer staged by the Metropolitan Opera.
"Walking around this building, it's still like a dream," says Blanchard. "And then, this time it seems like things have ratcheted up to another level. Because the singers are amazing, and the production, as you see, is just awesome. And that's just half of the people."
Along with its huge cast, the production includes a full-sized boxing ring on the Met stage. Champion tells the story of Emile Griffith, a closeted gay boxer --in an era when gay people were outcasts --who rises from obscurity to become world champion and, in one of the great tragedies in sports history, kills his homophobic archrival in the ring.
'Champion' is not your grandmother's Metropolitan Opera
Posted from npr.org
Music
Theater
Boxing
LGBTQ+
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 2
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel good day Brother William, always informational and of the most interesting. Thanks for sharing, have a blessed day!
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Griffith was from St Thomas and was prominent when I was growing up there. There were rumors Griffith was bisexual, but that was kept pretty quite. I was 11 or 12 at the time and didn’t care. There was a large gay community on the Island so it seems odd but machismo was a dominant philosophy in the islands. The name for a gay person was “anti man”. Calling someone an “anti man” was fight words. Howard Cosell was a big fan of Griffith and announced most of Griffith’s fights. I don’t think Paret was anymore a homophobe than anyone else but wanted to rattle Griffith. If people on the Island thought Griffith was homosexual many people would have turned their backs on him. It was the way life was. Interesting they made a opera about Griffith. Griffith stated he was bisexual. Griffith says he loved both men and women the same.
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