The Verona Arena, the third largest amphitheater in the world after the Roman Colosseum and the Capua Arena, has had various uses throughout its history. It began, in the 1st century AD, with bloody gladiator fights. During the Middle Ages it had defensive uses, later it housed brothels and later, during the Napoleonic conquest, it was even the scene of bull-hunting shows by dogs.
But for a century now, the Verona Arena has been home to the largest open-air lyric theater in the world. Specifically, since in 1913 –the two world wars paralyzed performances for ten years– Giuseppe Verdi’s Aida was played for the first time among the Roman ruins, a title chosen to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of the Italian maestro’s birth. It was the Veronese tenor Giovanni Zenatelli who, after singing a chest C on a visit to the Roman amphitheatre, thought it would be a great idea to organize a first festival. “Who knows why he chose Aída, perhaps because he linked the amphitheater with the old stage”, imagines the superintendent Cecilia Gasdia. “But Aida is our queen opera and this stage has brought great fortune.”
That is why, to celebrate a century of operatic seasons, the temple opened this Friday the summer of the centenary with a performance of Aida with the diva Sophia Loren as godmother and a luxury cast: the acclaimed Russian soprano Anna Netrebko and her husband , the tenor Yusif Eyvazov, as Radames.
After a brief delay due to a few drops of rain that threatened to ruin the show –although the local public, accustomed to this theater, opened their umbrellas without flinching– the centenary began with a new abstract adaptation by director Stefano Poda, which debuted at the Arena with a spectacular decoration made up of a gigantic mobile metal hand, ruins of Greek columns, brilliant costumes that reflected the lights from the transparent floor or the Ethiopian prisoners surprising with apparitions from inside the floor.
A very applauded idea, although the one who took home the biggest ovation was Anna Netrebko, who dared to play the Ethiopian slave princess again in the Verona Arena a year after receiving fierce criticism for dyeing her face black when represent the same role in an original production by Franco Zeffirelli. She was then accused of being racist, but she defended that she was only following the pattern that the famous Italian stage director premiered at La Scala.
“I am excited and right now I can’t say what I will remember about tonight, because everything has been impressive, from the planes – the night began with the passage of the Tricolor Arrows, the Italian military acrobatic patrol, which dyed the sky with the national colors – to the public. I am very happy for everyone who has worked very hard to create this spectacular performance”, the Russian soprano commented to the press at the end of the show. All of Verona was involved in this first night of opera, since they installed four giant screens in different neighborhoods to follow the bel canto from the street as well.
After the inaugural serata, which ended with the audience shouting “Long live Verdi”, the centenary will continue with seven other titles. One of the most anticipated will be a new production of Rigoletto, also from Verde, or the latest version of La Traviata by maestro Zeffirelli, whose centenary this year Italy is also celebrating his birth, with soprano Lisette Oropesa. “It is said that Verona is La Scala in the summer and it is going to prove it,” says the artistic deputy director of the lyrical festival, Stefano Trespidi. In fact, the Milanese opera, for many the best in the world, will offer a concert by its orchestra and choir.
Throughout its hundred years of opera, Verona has seen unforgettable nights. Like the debut in Europe of a very young Maria Callas in 1947, who married a Veronese and called the city of Romeo and Juliet home for years. “When she spoke Italian, she had a Veronese accent,” promises Superintendent Gasdia, who also remembers when another lover of this amphitheater, Montserrat Caballé, “twisted her ankle in a Don Carlo in 1969 that made her walk with a cane.”
