Gilliam on Benvenuto Cellini

Philip Stubbs

JUNE 2014 – Terry Gilliam has directed a new opera Benvenuto Cellini at ENO in London. Its opening night was given a very favourable response from its audience, and further acclaim from the London critics. Speaking to Dreams a few days after the opening night, Gilliam talks about the development of the opera and how certain decisions were made.

Visit The Grauniad for Gilliam’s diary of preparation for the opera.

The opera plays at The Coliseum in London throughout June. Buy tickets here.

Benvenuto Cellini will be beamed live to cinemas in UK & Ireland (and selected cinemas worldwide) on June 17. Click here for more detail.

Phil Stubbs: How did this opera – Benvenuto Cellini – come about?
Terry Gilliam: It was really the result of the success of Faust I suppose. John Berry from ENO kept pestering me to do another one. And I foolishly thought having done Faust I knew how to do operas. So I said OK I love Berlioz. In fact, Benvenuto Cellini was something I wanted to do as a film years ago when I read the autobiography. I was quite keen on it, and it’s been floating in my head so it seemed to be the perfect combination so I agreed foolishly.

The opera has little to do with the autobiography, I understand
Yes, but the opera does focus on the high point of the autobiography – the casting of the Perseus. That is the focus, yet Berlioz invents a lot of silly stories that lead up to that moment. And we’re working hard to keep the essence central even though there are many diversions along the way.

Cellini has a reputation for being difficult to stage. Why is that the case?
Berlioz had three goes at writing it. Structurally it’s a mess, but so many operas are. Also it’s incredibly hard to sing – particularly for the character of Cellini. The range is extraordinary and it’s unending. By the end of it there’s a huge chorus. It’s an expensive one to put on. And it just seems that nobody really found a way to make it work until we came along, I guess. I’m certainly as mad as Cellini and Berlioz, but I’m luckier in that I’ve got really great people to help make it happen – to the point where I sit back and direct from slightly further away than what I do on a film.

You are working with Leah Hausman again. Is it two heads dealing with the same problems or do you divide and delegate the tasks between the two of you?
It’s hard to say because we are both involved at an early stage throwing ideas around and arguing. She is much more experienced in opera than I am. She’s brilliant at dealing with the chorus and the cast. It’s hard to say who’s got the bigger picture, that’s what’s interesting about the collaboration. It’s hard to say who does what. She does more than I do dealing with the people on stage.

Sounds like a First AD…
People have said it’s like that, but in my case on film I’m in the thick of it much more. It is like that but First ADs normally just take orders, and it’s not the relationship Leah and I have. I’m learning from her and she’s learning from me all the time.

And how did you work out what to leave in and what to leave out?
In fact today we’ve talked, we’ve got to cut out a couple of recitatives at the end, because they slow the ending down. Leah and I argued, but let’s say “discussed” because everyone gets frightened by the word “argument”! You fight quite passionately for your ideas. We brought in Charles Hart who did the translation, and Charles is incredibly experienced: he did the libretto for Phantom of the Opera and he’s been translating Les Miserables, so he knows theatre, and structure. The three of us have been discussing what we should and shouldn’t leave in, and then Edward Gardner came into the picture as conductor, saying we can’t do that, we say yes we can. The battle went on, so we really reached the beginning of rehearsals with an agreement, OK this is it.

I had some brutal cuts which would have worked dramatically, but the thing in opera is the music seems to be much more sacrosanct, and it’s a matter of who wears whom down!

How did you land on the overall concept?
I don’t know if there is a concept. But Leah and I agreed the problem is the casting of the Perseus, we established that at the beginning: his problem. And then it was trying to limit the crude comic opera stuff that goes on, and concentrate on the character Cellini. And rather than just being the guy who’s in love with the girl blah blah blah, we turned Cellini into a serial seducer. At the beginning of the overture, he’s with a bunch of prostitutes; they seem to be his buddies. It was torment we were working on. He’s not just in the love with the girl; he’s got a big aria in the beginning where he is proclaiming his love for her. It’s more interesting if we established him as a seducer, and what he’s saying… the words are the same but the meaning is completely different – he’s lying. It’s worked on many girls, so it’ll work on her. And then surprise, surprise, he discovers he’s fallen in love with her. A more interesting way, and also we are dealing with the bombastic nature of some of the earlier arias – so he’s a liar now.

He’s got a problem with the statue, but Mardi Gras is there. Let’s see if I can distract myself, he says, with the work in hand. In the beginning, in the overture we put up headlines saying what the story is. He’s got this papal commission to do a statue, and he’s proclaiming it’ll be the biggest thing ever… Michelangelo is history. People are saying, the critics are saying: it’s too big it’s too expensive. Costs are spiralling, there are delays. Suddenly he’s being called a fraud and it will never get finished, and he’s begging for postponement. Now, we’ve done all of that in the overture, which has never been in there. We’ve established the problem early on.

Then we have the carnival, which is a 30-minute section with no breaks in it. It’s ridiculous, it just goes on and on. It’s got the entire cast on stage. So we tried to populate it with our stilt walkers, acrobats, tumblers, everything to make it interesting.

Also we establish the class warfare between the bourgeoisie and the workers whom Cellini employs in the foundry. We tried to keep that going, there’s an element of real class war, hopefully which will break free during the Mardi Gras, and things could get ugly.

Comparing with Faust, how has the experience been on this one?
I think more things have gone wrong. It’s been more exhausting, a slog. But on the other hand, we got through the perils of Faust – the horror of the opening night, not knowing whether it was going to work or not. By the time I got to opening night of Faust I was numb: it didn’t make any difference to me! That’s the difference… the panic I went through on Faust was not here in the same way. It was a panic all the time, and a kind of fatalism crept in.

What are the plot themes that resonate with you?
It’s basically the creative process: the artist, hubris is very much alive there, you think you can do these wonderful things, take on something that nobody’s pulled off before. That is hubris, and then as it marches on and everything starts going wrong, the panic starts coming in and then you are punished for your hubris.

It’s exactly his casting of Perseus is extraordinary, it’s the best part of the book as far as I was concerned. It’s exactly the process we have gone through. And like Cellini, we seem to have pulled it off with the critics and the audience. It is a happy ending, quite extraordinary. This always happens with the films I do, but this was even more intense, it was the nature of the story.

Your feature films have pretty mixed reviews, some terrible ones, some good ones. Yet Faust and Cellini have gathered consistently positive reviews. Why do you think that is?
Maybe opera audiences are easier to fool! I don’t know, on opening night we were 80-85% where we should be, and it was just rapturous, the reaction. There’s something about a live performance that you are given a little more slack. And the audience is probably a little more intelligent.

But I am surprised. I’m told a five star review in The Telegraph is such a rarity, and they gave it a five star review. It may be you are given more slack because it’s an opera that never seems to have worked. So to come off with something half way decent, would have given a lot of credit for that.

My own theory that in the film world, reviewers are probably less open
You’re probably right I think. If I could say it was the commercial reviewers don’t get the films, that would be one thing – but the art reviewers don’t get it either. I just read one on The Zero Theorem, a long piece from Fog. It was talking about the golden age of sci-fi of the fifties and sixties. It was positive, and then it went dystopian. He just loved The Zero Theorem, this guy. It was so intelligent. It was written from the angle of somebody who really enjoys and understands sci-fi. He really seemed to understand The Zero Theorem and what we were doing, even though we played with standard sci-fi tropes, we used them in a very different way.

In the end he found the ending not depressing; he found it intelligent and sensitive. Most reviews I have read haven’t. Harry Knowles was bowled over by it. It’s a very weird thing… I seem to be talking in films to a more specific audience than the standard cinemagoers, or cinema reviewers. I’m not sure I have a theory any more.

Could you tell me a bit about the cast?
Michael Spyres [as Cellini] played Faust in Antwerp and Ghent. We became good buddies. He’s a wonderful singer, and he’s a great guy. As always I want people who can act. We knew we were in good hands. I know Michael well now. He’s got a very dark, intelligent, brooding side, which we kept pushing him to use more and more. He can be charming and funny and sweet and cuddly. But there’s a darkness there that we need for Cellini, and he’s pulled it off brilliantly. He’s great fun to work with. And he has the voice to do this part. It is so, so demanding.

Corrine Winters [as Teresa] – I saw her in La Traviata at the ENO. I just liked her – she’s wonderful looking. She’s got a terrific voice. She can sing. This is good. She’s been great. The audience love the two of them.

The interesting one was Nicholas Pallesen [as Fieramosca], who was thrown at us at the last moment because the guy who was doing it fell out. We were very very concerned about him. We went on to youtube to see what he had done, and I thought this isn’t going to work. And he has proved to be just absolutely extraordinary because he’s got a great voice, he’s a wonderful singer, and he proved to be great on comic timing. He’s constantly surprising, what he’s doing. I just think he’s extraordinary.

And we have Willard White as the Pope, who has all the gravitas and the voice you could ever hope for a pope.

Was he really comfortable with all the things you were asking him to do?
No, it’s taken a while… There were a couple of moments he didn’t do on the opening night which he had done at the dress rehearsal which were so funny. It is great to encourage him to be the public face of the pope. In fact there are several faces of the pope. There’s the grand, majestic and powerful pope, and then there’s the art lover. He’s a real aesthete, a bit camp, and when he sees something so beautiful he goes all fluttery. That was the side he was very hesitant to do. But he’s got into it and when he pulls it off it’s wonderful. And then there’s a cold business side to the character. It’s great for him to play these different facets of the character.

So, the cast is great. I’m really terrified when we go to Amsterdam, that they’ll be as good, and how they’ll do it because there’ll be a different cast.

The other person who is wonderful is Paula Murrihy. She plays Ascanio. Now Ascanio is normally Cellini’s servant – a boy. And we turned the character into his business manager/agent – a hustler. Paula has just been brilliant in this character. Once she got dressed up in men’s clothing, she just became a real dapper character. I was beginning to wonder if I’m going gay here… A girl playing a guy and doing it brilliantly. She’s got a great voice, and she’s got a couple of the greatest arias in the piece as well. We’ve had a really good time with these people.

They’re willing to be actors, they’re willing to throw themselves into it, and not just “park and bark” as they say.

The pope’s costume, he wears this wonderful costume when he’s wheeled on that looks Japanese
Katrina Lindsay did the costumes. I kept pushing her to Japanese costumes. In fact Cellini in the beginning is wearing a short kimono. She found this wonderful headdress for the pope, I’m not sure whether it was Indian or Javanese, that she bought early on and then we extended it with rays and the sun going out, it looks like a big halo around him. It’s spectacular, it’s wonderful.

Would you do another?
I don’t know. Last week I was saying never again! And then you get the reaction we got on opening night, and you get the reviews and you say well, maybe I’m learning how to do this stuff. But at the moment I’ll need the same gang around me whatever we do on the next venture if we ever do one again.

Where else is it going?
Next February it will be at Amsterdam, because it is a co-production. And Rome is talking about doing it, we shall see…

You say the cast changes. Does Edward Gardner go round with it?
No, that’s what’s always odd. You get it right here, and then you go and stage it elsewhere. Sometimes it’s not as good because the cast isn’t as good, but we’ll see.

Is there any news you can share about a new feature film?
No – except that we pushed Quixote off till next Spring time because this is all proving to be a bit too much for me. I’ve got to go to France for the premiere of The Zero Theorem, then Moscow for the same thing. Then I’m back to start rehearsing the new Python show. I have no spare time really.

I think that The Zero Theorem will sell better in Paris than in London
I agree with you. Well, we can’t do worse than Sony, who just dumped it out there, it was ridiculous.

It was in the wrong cinemas
They don’t know how to deal with something like that. They know how to deal with Spiderman, and that’s it. In Paris I know the distributors, the company and I like them, they’re good. They’re very positive about it. We shall see.

The French are altogether a more reflective nation with respect to philosophical matters…
Yes. In fact it played somewhere in Poland at a festival, and the responses of people were great, people who actually think and who have experienced life, as opposed to whatever England has become, I’m not sure!

Gilliam on Benvenuto Cellini

Philip Stubbs

More to explore

Tideland: Ask Terry Gilliam Part 2

Sanjeev Bhaskar as Doctor One

Terry Gilliam Q&A on location in London

Films in depth