What do Norfolk and Nagasaki have in common? Both are historic ports, of course, that likely have had their share of macho mariners loving and leaving hapless residents behind.
Let all self-styled rovers make their way to a performance of “Madama Butterfly,” Giacomo Puccini’s classic 1904 romantic/verismo opera originally set in post-Commodore-Perry-era Nagasaki, Japan. The Virginia Opera version has been updated to the 1946-52 postwar American occupation by stage director Mo Zhou and her Asian team of designers.
“Madama Butterfly” recounts the tragedy of 15-year-old Cio-Cio-San, aka Butterfly (excellent alternate soprano Sachie Ueshima at the March 6 performance), who is forced into geisha work but then supposedly liberated by her marriage to a young U.S. Navy lieutenant, B.F. Pinkerton (tenor Jonathan Burton, capable of the tenderness and fecklessness the role requires).
But wait. Wasn’t composer Puccini himself a hard-loving adulterer? And isn’t Puccini guilty of fetishizing women’s helplessness and suffering (as in poor coughing Mimi in “La Bohème,” 1896, and turret-jumping Tosca in her 1900 show)? Well, yes, the latter according to Guardian writer Oliver Mears. Puccini probably did make the rounds. But there must have been something about the fate of Cio-Cio-San that compelled him to condemn such behavior.
Originally a short story by American John Luther Long, “Madame Butterfly” was first published in an 1898 magazine, and then adapted into a stage play by David Belasco that Puccini saw in London. As Virginia Opera scholar Josua Borths points out in his always invaluable pre-show lecture, Puccini didn’t speak English but still fell hard for the material. He adapted his operatic version, which premiered at La Scala, immediately flopped, and closed. Puccini jumped into heavy revisions, reopened the show, and had a smash. The “Butterfly” material has continued to metamorphose into the Marlon Brando 1957 film “Sayonara”; David H. Hwang’s gay-themed 1988 play “M. Butterfly”; the 1989 musical “Miss Saigon,” etc. But the opera retains its popularity and soulfulness based on its distinctive characterizations, plot and music, the latter nicely rendered by the Richmond Symphony for this production.
The genius of Puccini’s version is, again according to Borths, his creation of Cio-Cio-San as “one of the most complete, complicated, grounded, strong, naïve, brash, funny women to ever be on the operatic stage.”
Though modern sensibilities rightly recoil at the thought of a 15-year-old forced into sex work — we can easily consider her suitor-then-husband Pinkerton as a pedophile — Butterfly has a determination that places her at least partly in charge of her own choices, for example, converting to her husband’s religion, which alienates her from her Japanese family. She is burdened by her obsession — her certainty that Pinkerton loves her and shall return to her and their young son, Sorrow (a wonderful Alana Kypros, the essence of innocence in a non-speaking role).
Unburdened by such delusions about Pinkerton, Cio-Cio-San’s servant Suzuki (Kristen Choi) sometimes serves as her surrogate sufferer in Acts 2 and 3. It takes both women to care for Sorrow and fend off the predations and calumnies of the procurer Goro (effectively evil tenor Zhengyi Bai). Goro’s immorality and greed are echoed by the flamboyant disavowal of Butterfly, after her conversion, by her Uncle Bonze (bass Taewon Sohn).
The two main Americans, Pinkerton and the United States consul, Sharpless (fine actor and baritone Grant Youngblood), are saddled with representing the worst and best men America has to offer. Sharpless warns Pinkerton that Butterfly is taking their wedding vows seriously. But Pinkerton’s morals are utterly “elastic,” as the Schirmer translation puts it. Baritone Prince Yamadori (Yinghui He) isn’t given much to do in the plot except offer Butterfly an attractive escape from Pinkerton’s perfidy, which she refuses to take.
When Pinkerton returns after six years, it is not, of course, to renew his commitment to Butterfly. Instead, he has his new “real” American wife, Kate, in hand, and they have come to collect his son Sorrow and abandon Butterfly definitively.
Kate Pinkerton (Katherine Sanford Schrock) wears a strikingly beautiful 1950s dress ensemble and shows appropriate embarrassment at her husband’s sexual shenanigans. Costuming by Ruoxuan Li is impressive throughout the opera, separating Western occupiers from local Japanese who flaunt or court American regard. Goro, for example, in Act 2 sports traditional Japanese raiment but wears a British/American straw hat, marking himself as eager to serve the sexual needs of the occupiers. Butterfly dons Japanese wedding and honeymoon wear for Act 1. In Acts 2 and 3, she smokes cigarettes and wears an American-cut shirtwaist dress and cardigan sweater. The dress, however, sports a Japanese-looking print.
Butterfly is hopelessly conflicted in her fashion and cultural loyalties. Her home on the hill overlooking Nagasaki’s harbor sports an American flag and photos of U.S. presidents. All are taken down when Butterfly finally realizes Pinkerton’s cowardice. The notes within the score that echo our national anthem should make Americans in the audience abashed instead of proud.
The point of updating the show from the early 1900s to the post-World War II period becomes clear only at a brief entr’acte of surtitles between Acts 2 and 3. Here stage director Zhou mentions the administration of Gen. Douglas MacArthur (and his successor), during which 45,000 Japanese women married American men; many of these women were, like Butterfly, abandoned in Japan when their husbands returned to the States.
To return to our initial question, “What do Norfolk and Nagasaki have in common?” one striking difference is that Nagasaki suffered an atomic bombing soon after the one in Hiroshima. The bombings killed well over 300,000 people, according to a Virginia Opera study guide. The only reminders director Zhou includes are two minor stage figures wearing leg and eye bandages, which perhaps allude to the destruction. It’s probably not enough of a reminder for an American audience.
Final praise must be made of the casting of Asians in Asian roles, directed by Asian artists. No more “yellow face” should appear on American stages. As Guardian critic Mears notes, some may consider this new ideal “cancel culture.” It is admittedly just another way of making what he calls the “nasty story” of “Madama Butterfly” more palatable.
I say let’s admire the efforts of director Zhou and Virginia Opera to at least grapple with American history, including our injustices abroad. Butterflies are and should remain free. They surely don’t belong pinned in some conqueror’s collection.
Page Laws is dean emerita of the Nusbaum Honors College at Norfolk State University. prlaws@aya.yale.edu
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If you go
When: 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2:30 p.m. Sunday in Fairfax; next Friday through Sunday, Richmond
Tickets and details: 866-673-7282, vaopera.org
