Rodula Gaitanou doesn’t believe in ghosts. The Greek opera director said she’s rational when it comes to the supernatural, not putting much stock in stories of haunted theaters.
“What is stronger than the actual idea of a ghost is a sense of atmosphere, and the atmosphere always kind of triggers your imagination,” Gaitanou said. “I can imagine the glory of past times, past performances — an audience 100 years ago that was going to watch an operatic performance. I think if you are in tune with ghost stories and you’re looking for it, then you might see it.”
This theory becomes more complicated, however, when directing an opera about ghosts.
“It’s really tricky to create a world where a ghost story becomes believable,” Gaitanou said. “But then we are working on a ghost story, so bring all the ghosts.”
Gaitanou is currently directing “The Turn of the Screw,” the 1954 operatic adaptation of the novella by Henry James, which will run at Spoleto Festival USA from May 30 through June 6. The piece follows an unnamed governess who accepts a position caring for two children at their country house, only to discover supernatural forces at play. Part of the story’s allure is the uncertainty over whether the ghosts the governess sees are real. In this production, Gaitanou leans into the ambiguity and her doubts about the supernatural.
Conductor François López-Ferrer said what makes the production special is that Gaitanou asks questions and poses them to the audience without offering an opinion on whether the story is real or unfolding in the governess’s head.
Design, direction heighten opera’s eerie power
Beyond the mystery of the plot, “The Turn of the Screw” tells a story of obsession, with composer Benjamin Britten’s “Screw Theme” digging a deeper hole with every repetition.
“The more we were working on it, the more the piece was becoming a little bit of an obsession,” Gaitanou said. “You enter this world, and it is overwhelmingly powerful. You kind of live with this piece as you work on it.”
Charleston’s Dock Street Theatre, where the opera will be performed, was the first venue in the United States built for theatrical performance. Given the space’s history, the ghosts of the theater bled into the set design, inspiring scenic and costume designer Yannis Thavoris to create a toned-down set that blends the atmosphere of Dock Street Theatre with elements from James’ own home.
Though Thavoris is also a skeptic when it comes to ghosts, he said he hopes any in the theater will be kind. “We don’t want to find ourselves in a ‘Phantom of the Opera’ situation,” he said.
More than anything, the creative team wants the audience to leave the theater unsettled by what they’ve seen. The score doesn’t linger in the mind, per se, but the atmosphere and emotion created inside Dock Street Theatre should haunt the audience beyond the two hours and 15 minutes they spend there. What’s more, they hope the childlike wonder of the governess’s two charges carries over to theatergoers.
“This is what I’ve always been seeking when I go to the theater — to recapture the feeling I had when I first went to a theater,” Thavoris said. “You know when your jaw drops and you follow a story and you want to know, ‘And then what happened?’ This sense of curiosity is what keeps us alive.”
IF YOU WANT TO GO: “The Turn of the Screw” will be performed at Dock Street Theatre at 7:30 p.m. May 30; 5 p.m. June 1; 7 p.m. June 3; and 8 p.m. June 6.
Ally Watkinson is an arts, style and culture journalism graduate student at Syracuse University.
Help keep the City Paper free.
No paywalls.
No subscription cost.
Free delivery at 800 locations.
Help support independent journalism by donating today.