Ralph Fiennes will make his opera directing debut
The Paris Opera said Wednesday the production will run from Jan. 26 to Feb. 27 at the Palais Garnier and will star Boris Pinkhasovich in the title role, Ruzan Mantashyan as Tatiana, Bogdan Volkov as Lensky and Susan Graham as Madame Larina.
Fiennes, 62, has been nominated for three Academy Awards — most recently, this year, for 'Conclave' — and one Emmy Award. The British actor won a Tony Award in 1995 for Shakespeare's 'Hamlet.' Fiennes starred in the title role of the 1999 movie 'Onegin,' based on the same Alexander Pushkin novel as the opera. The film was directed by his sister Martha Fiennes.
Semyon Bychkov will conduct most of the performances. Michael Levine designs the sets and Annemarie Woods the costumes.
The Paris Opera 2025-26 season will have new productions of Verdi's 'Aida,' Wagner's 'Die Walküre and 'Siegfried" and Antonia Bembo's 'Ercole amante.'
Revivals include Claus Guth's staging of Puccini's 'La Bohème,' moved to a spaceship and planet surface and John Adams' 'Nixon in China' with Renée Fleming and Thomas Hampson.
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Boston Globe
2 hours ago
- Boston Globe
A Napoleon from Long Island meets his Waterloo
'For me, it's not a problem,' Springuel said. 'But the public doesn't expect that from Napoleon,' he said. For the 210th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo, the organizers held their biggest reenactment in a decade, with 2,200 actors restaging the battle last weekend before 17,000 spectators. Advertisement Mark Schneider, born on Long Island, New York, secured the job over other would-be Napoleons, including from Belgium and Italy, in part because of his unrivaled ability to command respect on the battlefield, several organizers said. 'Even though it's 200-plus years later, they look to me as their Napoleon, and I look to them as my Grande Armée,' said Schneider, 55. For anyone who had an issue with his American accent, well, 'haters gonna hate,' said Schneider, who lives in Williamsburg, Virginia, where he works as a historian and professional actor. He added that Napoleon himself, born in Corsica, spoke French with an Italian accent (especially when angry), so 'it's very Napoleon to speak French with an accent.' Many of the reenactors' assignments aligned with their nationalities: German and Polish reenactors formed the Prussian battalions, British fought with the British, and French with the French. But there were exceptions: Portuguese reenactors studied Dutch phrases so they could follow their Dutch-speaking unit, Czech people fought with the French (the stylish uniforms were a draw, one said), and some Spaniards and Italians fought in a kilt-wearing Scottish battalion. Advertisement And then, of course, there was the American leader of the French army. Schneider has in recent years become the most sought-after Napoleon globally. 'I get more street cred, if you will, because I rose up through the ranks,' he said, referring to his start as a rank-and-file reenactment soldier. 'I didn't immediately make myself the emperor.' In 2015, for the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo, organizers chose a French Napoleon, Frank Samson, a lawyer in Paris. But Samson's retirement just after the battle sparked a search for replacements. For bigger anniversaries, like the 210th, organizers stage a larger event, while holding smaller reenactments in other years. Franky Simon, a reenactment organizer who played Napoleon's right-hand man, Marshal Michel Ney, said that organizers had to search far and wide for an emperor up to par for this year's battle. 'For small events, we take a local Napoleon, and for big events, we take Mark,' said Simon, a Belgian librarian, praising Schneider's equestrian skills. Last year, Jean-Gérald Larcin of Belgium played Napoleon for the pared down 209th anniversary. On Sunday morning, on a wheat field rented from a farmer, war reenactors and 100 horses staged the battle -- which lasted around 10 hours in real life -- in 90 minutes. One reenactor had to be assisted off the field because of the heat, made more trying by the woolen uniforms as temperatures soared into the high 80s. Advertisement At the time of the 1815 battle, the real Napoleon Bonaparte, 45, had recently left exile on Elba and returned to power. At Waterloo, on June 18, he faced a coalition of European armies, led by Britain's Duke of Wellington and Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher of Prussia. More than 60,000 men were killed, wounded or captured in the battle, which ended Napoleon's reign and France's quest to dominate Europe. In a speech at the start to hundreds of reenactors, Michael Haynes, who played a British general, tied Waterloo to modern events. 'We are going to remind the world of how that tyrant was stopped and pulled down,' he said of Napoleon. 'We will encourage Europe and the world that there is hope when faced with oppression.' Haynes spent the nights leading up to the battle camping in one of the hundreds of tents erected a few miles from the French army's encampment. (He confessed that he slept on an air bed, not a wooden and canvas one, like some of the most dedicated reenactors). While the mood among the allied forces before the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 was reported to have been anxious, the encampment last week was lively. Alcohol flowed freely, and drinking songs lasted until the early hours. When, at 7 a.m. one day, someone started playing bagpipes, shouts of 'shut up,' with expletives, could be heard from the tent of an annoyed reenactor trying to sleep, according to Mair Mason, from Birmingham, England, who played a friend of the Duke of Wellington's wife. As for Schneider, after 20 years of leading the French army into mock battles across Europe, he plans to pass the baton following his career-crowning performance at Waterloo. Advertisement 'There are a bunch of Napoleons popping up left and right,' he said. 'I want to give them an opportunity. Whether they be the Polish Napoleon, the Dutch Napoleon, or the Belgian.' Or maybe, one day, Napoleon will be French again. This article originally appeared in
Boston Globe
11 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Actor Kurt Russell makes 4th of July visit to Arlington home of ancestor killed in Revolutionary War
The home, which was built by 'According to legend, the actor's forefather shot down and bayoneted on his own doorstep,' the statement said. Advertisement After the battle, British regulars went through every home, ransacking and plundering them before setting the homes on fire, the statement said. There are at least 13 surviving scars on the property from the battle. After visiting the home, Russell and his son took a tour guide to the Old Burying Ground, where they saw the gravesite of Jason Russell and his compatriots. Russell said in the statement that it was 'an incredibly eye-opening experience' after visiting both locations. 'It was haunting to see the bullet holes that remain in the wall from that fateful battle, but it was also inspiring,' Russell said. 'To see the grave of Jason Russell was something I won't ever forget. That's a humbling reminder of how grateful we should be for the freedom that our forefathers fought for and won for us.' Advertisement Adam Sennott can be reached at
Yahoo
12 hours ago
- Yahoo
‘Apollo 13' star Kathleen Quinlan relives the 1996 Oscars, from a Whoopi wink to a Sorvino hug
The winners of the Best Supporting Actress Oscar belong to an exclusive club. But Apollo 13 star Kathleen Quinlan can boast to membership in an equally select society — call it the Whoopi Goldberg Wink Squad. Quinlan was inaugurated into that group three decades ago at the 68th Academy Awards, held on March 25, 1996. The then-41-year-old actress walked the red carpet outside the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion as a Supporting Actress nominee for her role as Marilyn Lovett in Ron Howard's space acclaimed space drama. Inside, meanwhile, Goldberg was preparing for her second appearance Oscar host, replacing the previous year's controversial emcee, David Letterman. More from Gold Derby Could 'Sinners' campaign as a musical at the Golden Globes? The surprising answer 'Awards Magnet' mailbag: A 'Bear' Emmy nominations tank? A cap on acting nominees? And the comedian couldn't resist tweaking the late night host right out of the gate. 'So… didja miss me?' Goldberg asked the crowd with a smile. She then proceeded to launch into her stage patter, which riffed on the proliferation of colorful ribbons at that year's ceremony, the race between Bob Dole and Pat Buchanan to be President Bill Clinton's Republican opponent and the surprising number of big-name actresses that played hookers that year, from Elisabeth Shue to Sharon Stone. Oh yeah, and Goldberg poked fun at Apollo 13 — several times, in fact. Sitting towards the front of the room, Quinlan laughed at each joke that Goldberg made at her movie's expense. And that's when she was admitted to the Wink Squad. 'Whoopi gave me a little wink,' Quinlan, now 70, tells Gold Derby about the moment she made eye contact with the night's emcee. And the wink wasn't just out of appreciation for her good humor — she and Goldberg had some personal history, having acted alongside each other in the 1988 drama Clara's Heart, also starring a young Neil Patrick Harris. 'I really liked Whoopi a lot,' Quinlan says. 'She gave me that little wink and it felt very special.' While Quinlan took home a Whoopi Wink, she ultimately didn't take home an Oscar. That year's Supporting Actress statue instead went to Mira Sorvino for her breakout Mighty Aphrodite role as — wait for it — a hooker. But Quinlan had no hard feelings in the moment or now, nearly three decades later. 'I was so happy for her,' she says. 'It was a great performance.' As part of our celebration of Apollo 13's 30th anniversary, Quinlan provided Gold Derby with a personal walkthrough of her Oscar night experience. Two days before she turned up at the Oscars, Quinlan was swimming in the Bahamas — not for fun, but for work. The actress was in the midst of shooting the PG-rated family film Zeus and Roxanne opposite Steve Guttenberg, but was given the equivalent of a weekend pass to attend the ceremony. 'I got out of the water, peeled off my wetsuit, packed my bag and headed to L.A.,' she remembers. 'Then when I got to the hotel, I put on my dress, did my hair and makeup and headed out to the show. It was otherworldly!' Prior to jetting off to the Bahamas for Zeus and Roxanne, Quinlan had spent months making the rounds campaigning for a Best Supporting Actress nomination with the help of her publicist, Kelly Bush. 'She did an amazing job, but I was worn out by the end,' the actress says now. 'You have to go everywhere and talk, talk, talk, talk.' All that talking paid off, though. When nominations were announced on Feb. 13, 1996, Quinlan and Ed Harris were the only two members of Apollo 13's star-powered cast to score acting nominations. To this day, Quinlan is shocked and surprised that her onscreen husband, Tom Hanks, missed the cut for his performance as the doomed spacecraft's commander, Jim Lovell. (Howard also notably missed out on a Best Director nomination.) 'The problem is that kind of mastery is seamless,' she says of Hanks, who at that point in his career had just won back-to-back Best Actor statues for Philadelphia and Forrest Gump. 'Inside the Apollo 13, Tom was always calm and didn't touch one button where he didn't know what it did. That kind of masterful work is maybe not so showy, but good luck mimicking it.' After making the quick change from her travel clothes to her Oscar finery, Quinlan and her then-husband Bruce Abbott hopped into a limo bound for the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion. 'It was a long ride,' she recalls. But what waited on the other end of that ride made the trip worth it. 'Stepping out of the limousine and onto the red carpet was a moment,' Quinlan says happily. 'It felt like I had finally arrived in Hollywood.' That enthusiasm started to mingle with nervous energy as she took her seat inside the theater. The run of show had the Supporting Actress statue being handed out midway through the night, a wait that Quinlan calls 'nerve-wracking.' Asked whether she had a speech prepared should her name be called, the actress says that she came armed with a list of names and a general idea of what she intended to say. 'I made sure to have that list, because I could tell that everyone went blank as soon as they got up there,' she laughs. But that list ended up going unused. Presenter Martin Landau introduced the roll call of nominees — which included Nixon's Joan Allen, Georgia's Mare Winningham and Sense and Sensibility's Kate Winslet in addition to Quinlan and Sorvino — and then called the Mighty Aphrodite star's name. Sitting next to then-boyfriend Quentin Tarantino, Sorvino took a moment to compose herself and then headed to the stage. As the newly minted Oscar winner left her row, she passed her proud father, actor Paul Sorvino, and the two shared a big father-daughter hug. Moments later, she addressed him from the stage, saying: 'When you give me this award, you honor my father who has taught me everything I know about acting.' The cameras promptly cut back to her dad and caught him mid-cry — an only-at-the-Oscars moment that warmed the heart of everyone in the room. 'I saw her father well up and start crying when she looked at him and I thought, 'Oh, that's a great moment,'' Quinlan says with a warm smile. (Reflecting on that moment years later, Mira Sorvino called her tribute to her father 'a celebration of our love for each other.') Quinlan watched and enjoyed the rest of the show after Sorvino's win and hit the party afterwards. The next morning, she was once again Bahamas bound. 'I flew back to set, put my wetsuit back on and got back in the water,' she recalls. To date, Apollo 13 remains Quinlan's only brush with Oscar and the 68th Academy Awards remains the only ceremony she's attended — though not because she hasn't been invited back. 'I could go almost every year if I wanted to,' she says. 'But at that time, I most wanted to go to enjoy the moment and the people.' As an Academy member, Quinlan does still follow the Oscar race from afar and singles out this past year's ceremony as a particularly good show. 'Those movies were, for the most part, not big money makers,' she says of a Best Picture roster that included The Brutalist, Emilia Pérez, and the eventual winner Anora.'They put more money into the campaigns for the movie than they do into making the movie,' she marvels. 'I don't know how they make their money back, but they were all well-made films.' Asked about the impact of her Apollo 13 nomination on her career, Quinlan says that it 'helped somewhat' as she continued to navigate the industry. While she describes herself as 'not aggressively ambitious,' she has worked steadily in the thirty years since that Oscar night, with a diverse slate of roles across television and film. 'Winning an Oscar is definitely the Amex Gold card,' she jokes. Looking back on her Oscar experience, though, Quinlan feels like she won simply by showing up. 'It was fun just to be there and have my little wink with Whoopi,' she says. "I also got to be in a great film that's become a classic. That's a great thing to have in my kit." Best of Gold Derby Everything to know about 'The Batman 2': Returning cast, script finalized Tom Cruise movies: 17 greatest films ranked worst to best 'It was wonderful to be on that ride': Christian Slater talks his beloved roles, from cult classics ('Heathers,' 'True Romance') to TV hits ('Mr. Robot,' 'Dexter: Original Sin') Click here to read the full article.
