May 27 2008
Lisa the lezzie?
Many years ago, a former girlfriend was defending this theory of hers stating that, in tennis, if two women were playing doubles, that meant they were in some sort of a “more than friendly” relationship. She would ramble about Steffi and Gaby, Conchita and Patricia, and so on. I was thinking if, in the opera world, the story might not be similar. It appears that, at times, it has been. After all, a lesbian fantasy might as well be to sleep with a prima donna…at least for intello-lesbians.
A very famous opera critic in Buenos Aires once told me about the rumors involving a famous soprano of the 1960s, whose first name was Lisa, and one of her co-stars. It seems that there was quite a lot of thorough backstage rehearsing before and after the performances. Well, if we consider that this famous soprano was well-known for her portrayal of the Marshalin in Der Rosenkavalier, or her role as the Countess in Mozart’s Nozze di Figaro, the association with the world of tennis does not seem too capricious. After all, what else would roles en travesti be good for?
Years ago, mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne mentioned an anecdote about herself having a similar slant. She commented that, during an interview, a journalist asked her whether it was true that she and Joan Sutherland were in fact having an affair. At the time, the two women were singing the opera for which they were known best as a duet — Rossini’s Semiramide — with Horne in the starring role en travesti. Horne’s answer to the out-of-place question was blunt and funny, as she is in life, and throughout her delicious autobiography My Life. She nonchalantly explained that it was indeed the case, only that Sutherland played the man between them, because she was taller.
Had Horne said that today, she would have been greeted with approving grins on one side of the GLBT spectrum and, probably, might also have been accused of being politically incorrect by others, more sensitive to the existence of roles in same-sex relationships. Whatever the case, back in the 1970s, Horne’s answer was surely avant-garde and brilliantly funny.
I am thinking that funny might indeed be a key word in a world of difference. We are far from able to thrive on difference nowadays, the world at large is. If we could only be more relaxed about ourselves and laugh at our own incoherence, we might all be a little happier, and free.
