'The Handmaid’s Tale' — And A Sea Of Blood-Red Dresses — Comes Home To Harvard In An Opera

“The Handmaid’s Tale” unfurls in a Boston where extreme fundamentalists overthrow the U.S. government after widespread environmental collapse causes mass infertility. The men in charge enforce a violently rigid theocracy in their newly created Republic of Gilead to ensure humanity’s survival. Women who can bear children are forced into reproductive slavery as Handmaids for barren Commanders and their Wives.

Trying on her blood-red cape and dress for the first time at a two-hour fitting was creepy for soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano. The fictional garments have become potent, political symbols of female oppression, particularly after #MeToo.