文：司馬勤（Ken Smith） 編譯：李正欣

幾周前在馬德里舉行的世界歌劇論壇上，短短的兩天時間內(nèi)，我被灌輸了諸多熱血沸騰的、關(guān)于“多樣化”的言論——說這些話的人大多來自美國。其實，在大環(huán)境下，這個議題的回響寥寥——我們的世界已經(jīng)夠多樣化了——可是，當(dāng)你把這個話題放到美洲，后果就會顯得十分嚴(yán)重。不信你去問問多倫多人。

? MONIQUE CARBONI / COURTESY OF THE SIGNATURE THEATRE

5月底，加拿大歌劇院與多倫多交響樂團失去了大約百分之十的資助，因為它們“沒有達到市政府多樣化的目標(biāo)”。這個結(jié)論是否合理，很難界定。我可以肯定，政府會找出各種借口來減少藝術(shù)資助以節(jié)省預(yù)算。盡管如此，為了歌劇藝術(shù)的未來，每一家機構(gòu)都必須認(rèn)真地正視“多樣化”這個議題。

要吸引“多樣化”的觀眾來看歌劇的話，最合乎邏輯的方法就是找來不同種類的人在舞臺上亮相。以我膚淺的推算，可以歸類為三個大方向：1．創(chuàng)作一些新作品，題材環(huán)繞少數(shù)族裔的生活經(jīng)驗；2．搬演傳統(tǒng)劇目的時候，選角“不分膚色”（英語俚語colorblind，直譯是“色盲”）；3．在傳統(tǒng)劇目選角的時候，刻意挑選某些族群的演員，目的是凸顯“種族”的差異。無巧不成書，上一次回到紐約時，我竟然真的在一周之內(nèi)，碰上了這三種方向的不同個案。

屬于第一類的案例，是署名劇院（Signature Theatre）重演的《121街的修女》（

Our Lady of 121 Street

）。編劇史蒂芬·阿德利·桂吉斯（Stephen Adly Guigis）不是黑人，但他熟知哈林（Harlem）區(qū)，這個著名的黑人區(qū)正是故事發(fā)生的背景地。這部首演于2002年的話劇里有黑人，也有同性戀者——包括一位黑人同性戀者——還有傳統(tǒng)信奉基督教的白種歐洲族裔（White Anglo-Saxon Protestants，簡稱WASP）與來自愛爾蘭的天主教徒。這些人物走在一起勢必會燃起戰(zhàn)火，而他們針鋒相對的言論更帶來一觸即發(fā)的危機。桂吉斯筆下的臺詞比另一位著名編劇更加尖銳——相較而言，大衛(wèi)·馬麥特（David Mamet）所用的粗言穢語聽起來就像蘇斯博士（Dr.Seuss，20世紀(jì)最卓越的兒童文學(xué)家、教育學(xué)家）筆下的兒童故事那樣天真無邪。但最起碼，這次的公眾媒體還能夠刊登出話劇的劇名（桂吉斯于2011年創(chuàng)作的另一部作品劇名包含極下流的詞匯，杜絕了任何媒體刊載的可能性）。

我們先撇開那些粗鄙的詞匯不談，桂吉斯的確是一位極有才華的編劇。當(dāng)年《121街的修女》的首演贏得了多項外百老匯獎項，也被各大劇評人選入“2003年十大最佳劇目”之列。到了2015年，桂吉斯的《河畔大街與癲狂之間》（

Between Riverside and Crazy

）更贏得了當(dāng)年的普利策戲劇大獎。因此，請不要小覷這位編劇。

可是，我們需要慎重地處理他的作品：如果導(dǎo)演的力度過于柔軟，劇中的幽默不復(fù)存在；如果過于強硬，角色人性的一面就很難引起共鳴。當(dāng)年該劇首演時我失之交臂［導(dǎo)演是已故演藝巨子菲利普·塞默·霍夫曼（Philip Seymour Hoffman）］，幸好這回署名劇院的制作由菲利西亞·拉沙德（Phylicia Rashad，美國著名黑人女演員、歌手、舞臺導(dǎo)演）執(zhí)導(dǎo)，效果恰到好處。

上、左頁：《121街的修女》劇照

看起來有點反諷，因為公眾對拉沙德女士的印象，無法跳脫出她在歷時八年的長壽電視劇《考斯比一家》（

The Cosby Show

， 1984～1992）中扮演的考斯比太太的模樣。電視里那個十全十美的美國非洲裔家庭與121街中那些極不靠譜的人物，距離十萬八千里。

要復(fù)述桂吉斯的故事大綱太艱難了，因為這部話劇并沒有什么主軸情節(jié)?！靶夼睕]有亮相，因為在大幕拉開前她已去世，本來放在殯儀館的遺體也被偷走了。前來參加喪禮的人們——她從前教導(dǎo)過的學(xué)生——也沒有機會為她送別。這看起來，是展示不良行為的最佳借口。

盡管人物設(shè)定十分夸張卻百分百擁有人性，這歸功于演員的功力。演員之間合作無間，每一位角色進退得宜，舞臺焦點突出，這得歸功于導(dǎo)演拉沙德。除此之外，大家對劇本的了如指掌、處理適中，可見一斑，讓字里行間透出嚴(yán)肅性，而不會淪為僅僅只具侮辱性的喜劇。

拉沙德出生于休斯敦，雙親都是專業(yè)人士，年幼的她的生活環(huán)境可能更接近《考斯比一家》而不像是“121街”。盡管如此，拉沙德熟知桂吉斯筆下的各類人物。即便他們外表粗糙，那群狂人也可以歸為三大類：有些從來都沒有機會、有些是失去機會的、更有些把握住了機會卻又最終失敗的。撇開每個角色的不同背景，他們來到殯儀館——以及隔壁的酒吧——面對的是生命中重要的議題，當(dāng)然也包括死亡這個關(guān)口。最令我感到驚嘆的是，盡管舞臺充滿張力，卻沒有一個矛盾與種族話題相關(guān)。

《圣女貞德》劇照

＊＊＊

其實，在觀看署名劇院演出的前一個晚上，我徘徊于附近的百老匯，欣賞了拉沙德的女兒康多拉·拉沙德（Condola Rashad）參與的曼哈頓戲劇俱樂部（Manhattan Theatre Club）搬演的《圣女貞德》（

Saint Joan

），康多拉擔(dān)綱這位出自大文豪蕭伯納（George Bernard Shaw）筆下的經(jīng)典女主角。除了無所不在的天主教以及舞臺上出現(xiàn)的族裔多樣化，這兩部作品就像南北兩極。畢竟，這部話劇是蕭伯納創(chuàng)作于1923年。

上一次我在百老匯舞臺上目睹年輕的康多拉，是她首次亮相《蒼蠅拍》（

Stick Fly

）。雖然那是一部“群戲”（ensemble cast），康多拉的演出也令人眼前一亮。我在銀幕上也看到過她，是莎士比亞名著《羅密歐與朱麗葉》電影版本，男主角是奧蘭多·布魯姆（Orlando Bloom）。這樣說吧，康多拉締造出兩個截然不同的形象：參演描述美國非洲裔生活的現(xiàn)代寫實話劇，以及一個與她身為非洲裔沒有任何關(guān)聯(lián)的傳統(tǒng)古典戲劇中的角色。

幸好，劇院沒有刻意解釋選角的意圖。導(dǎo)演丹尼爾·沙利文（Daniel Sullivan）把焦點放在如何讓當(dāng)代觀眾產(chǎn)生共鳴上——總的說來，是把劇本中原有的大歌劇般的宏偉場面縮小，換來更貼心的、細(xì)膩的演繹。他沒有向觀眾交代女主角（以及其他個別演員）為何不是白種人。沙利文更要突顯的，是宗教與政權(quán)的角力。作品中民族主義的線索，讓整個制作增添了詭秘的現(xiàn)代感。我認(rèn)為，還有另一元素把《圣女貞德》與《121街的修女》兩劇連接起來，那就是：舞臺上沒有壞蛋，只有犯錯的人。

關(guān)于康多拉·拉沙德這次演出的報道，媒體只關(guān)注于對她演技的不同評價，而沒有人刻意提出她膚色深淺的問題，這間接來說，是對演員的一種極大敬重?！都~約時報》的杰西·格林（Jesse Greene）描述舞臺上有著“明智、熱情的處理”，可是我從頭至尾沒瞧出這一端倪。他更稱贊康多拉的演繹“有著令人敬佩的女權(quán)效應(yīng)，強調(diào)理智而非歇斯底里”。

這么說吧，我看到的“貞德”的確沒有歇斯底里，但也算不上理智。康多拉的貞德之所以征服了早期的那批粉絲，主要是因為她那狂熱的精力。到了第二晚——我在署名劇院中場休息的時段，跟一位演員兼音樂家朋友（明知他已看過那場演出）談起前晚的《貞德》。朋友十分謹(jǐn)慎地說：“知道嗎，真的要把貞德這個角色演得好，你要讓觀眾明白，周邊指控你的人都大錯特錯，因為你才是真正理智的。而康多拉的貞德給我的印象，是個瞪大眼的瘋子（bug-eyed crazy）?！?/p>

同理，這一意見也只限于對康多拉藝術(shù)演繹的評價，而未質(zhì)疑她為何被選中演出貞德這個角色。《圣女貞德》毫無疑問落實了“不分膚色”選角的效應(yīng)。問題是，沒人能夠預(yù)料哪幾句臺詞或某幾個形象會產(chǎn)生觀眾的共鳴。貞德大判的一幕當(dāng)時困擾著我，直到演出結(jié)束我才茅塞頓開。離開劇場的時候，身邊的朋友說：“即使在今天，在舞臺上看到給一個黑人女子戴上鐐銬，還是會傳遞給觀眾很不一樣的信息。”

＊＊＊

沒有人可以指控心跳歌劇團（Heartbeat Opera）的《菲岱里奧》（

Fidelio

）傳遞錯誤的信息。導(dǎo)演伊?！ず盏拢‥than Heard）仔細(xì)地鉆研了貝多芬那部疑難重重的經(jīng)典歌劇后，一“使勁”把作品又哭又笑地搬到了21世紀(jì)。赫德很清楚他想要如何表述導(dǎo)演意圖。

倘若今天的觀眾對于法國大革命這個政治題材已經(jīng)提不起興趣，何不重新整理故事，把大家的關(guān)注點聚焦在當(dāng)代議題上？倘若演出版本的囚犯都是黑人，正如美國監(jiān)獄人口比例失調(diào)的現(xiàn)狀，效果會怎樣？或是劇中角色包括因為戰(zhàn)亂而逃來美國的非洲難民，又會如何？后者正是特朗普領(lǐng)導(dǎo)美國政府后所引發(fā)的熱門話題。你可能會說——有人的確這樣說過——把經(jīng)典歌劇套上熱點時事未免太俗套了。但最起碼，在觀眾席中沒有一個人打呵欠。

要簡單地解釋導(dǎo)演怎樣解剖原作，實在很難。讓我先舉一些表面上的潤色改動吧。被囚禁的弗洛雷斯坦（Florestan）的名字被縮短，變成斯坦（Stan）。他的夫人萊奧諾拉（Leonore）的名字變?yōu)槔麃啠↙eah）——在原著里，她女扮男裝混進監(jiān)獄工作，這一回她卻假裝是女同志，與瑪西（Marcy，原名瑪澤麗娜，Marzelline）調(diào)情?，斘鞯母赣H洛克（Roc）——這名獄卒的名字在貝多芬的筆下更加“德國”（Rocco，羅科）。壞蛋唐皮扎羅（Don Pizarro）在舞臺上只取了“唐尼”（Donnie）這樣一個昵稱名。

心跳歌劇團的《菲岱里奧》劇照，投影在屏幕上真正的“囚犯大合唱”

在貝多芬原著中邂逅瑪澤麗娜的小獄卒雅基諾（Jaquino）被刪掉了，這是導(dǎo)演大刀闊斧改編劇本的第一個標(biāo)志。序曲也消失了，還有貝多芬絕大部分的配樂。為了這次演出，丹尼爾·施洛斯貝格（Daniel Schlosberg）所編排的濃縮版本只配有兩臺鋼琴、兩把大提琴、兩支圓號與打擊樂。本來的對白也統(tǒng)統(tǒng)被刪掉，換上了赫德與馬庫斯·斯科特（Marcus Scott）一起創(chuàng)作的新劇本。幸好，英語臺詞與德語唱段的交接都十分順暢。

刪掉的很多段落都是源于資金預(yù)算以及演出場地的限制，然而最明顯的可“截肢”的段落——合唱，不僅沒有移除，地位甚至被提升。貝多芬那著名的歌頌（犯人暫時性的）自由的“囚犯大合唱”，在這場演出中變成錄像投影。在屏幕上亮相的是美國中西部多所監(jiān)獄的合唱團，參與演出的成員都是正在服刑或曾經(jīng)服刑的囚犯們。

心跳歌劇團歷年來那些激進的新演繹方式包含多種方向。今年春季，歌劇團呈獻了《菲岱里奧》與《唐喬瓦尼》，后者用莫扎特筆下那個玩弄女人的騙子來故意影射現(xiàn)今西方社會性騷擾問題的大環(huán)境，可惜效果不如前幾年克里斯托夫·奧爾登（Christopher Alden）為紐約市立歌劇院炮制的版本（奧爾登套用類似的手法演繹現(xiàn)代新編版的《托斯卡》，卻一敗涂地）。很明顯，某些歌劇是無法“更新升級”的。最終，我認(rèn)為心跳歌劇團的《菲岱里奧》的成功還是得歸功于貝多芬。沒有一部歌劇像《菲岱里奧》這般經(jīng)歷過重重的修改，至今都沒有一個權(quán)威的、不可撼動的版本。

這當(dāng)然也引出了一個很大的疑問：如果歌劇《菲岱里奧》的新制作缺乏原作故事、原本音樂與配器，那么歌劇團真的可以宣稱他們演的是貝多芬的歌劇作品嗎？我提議他們可以效法倫敦的寂靜歌劇團（Silent Opera）。這個倫敦的團隊同樣用嶄新的角度演繹莫扎特與雅納切克（Janá?ek）的作品，但他們把劇名更改為《喬瓦尼》（

Giovanni

）與《小狐貍》（

Vixen

），以防誤導(dǎo)觀眾，以為他們觀賞的是原作。

還好，即便在刪除了很多《菲岱里奧》傳統(tǒng)元素的情況下，最終的效果卻還是切入了故事的核心。歌劇團聘請了幾位出色的黑人歌唱家——例如飾演斯坦的尼爾森·埃博（Nelson Ebo）曾是一位難民，來自非洲安哥拉——無論在戲劇性及音樂性上都十分合理。當(dāng)晚，連熟知貝多芬原版作品的樂迷都緊張得坐立不安，因為他們被新的故事情節(jié)所吸引，渴望知道下一步劇情如何展開——這種情況，自從貝多芬放棄修改《菲岱里奧》之后，應(yīng)該從未發(fā)生過。

A few weeks ago, I was subjected to two days of emotionally inflamed nonsense about “diversity”—mostly coming from the American contingent—at the World Opera Forum in Madrid. The topic doesn’t mean much in the big picture—the world is a pretty diverse place, after all—but close to home the topic has proved to be rather important. Just ask the people in Toronto.

In late May, the Canadian Opera Company, along with the Toronto Symphony, lost about 10 percent of their funding “for not meeting the city’s diversity goals.” How much of this reason is legitimate is rather unclear. I’m sure the government would’ve found any excuse to cut arts funding. Still, for the very future of the art form, it's a question that communities still need to address on their own terms.

Getting different types of people to the opera logically starts by getting different types of people on stage, which by my own calculation can happen in one of three ways: (1) creating new works representing minority life and experience, (2) casting traditional works “colorblind” with no regard to race, or (3)casting minorities in traditional works and make race entirely the point. Funnily enough, on my last trip to New York—by complete coincidence—I saw an example of each in less than a week.

First was a revival of

Our Lady of 121 Street

at the Signature Theatre. The playwright Stephen Adly Guigis isn’t black, but he certainly knows Harlem,where the story is set. Black and gay characters—including one gay black character—mix with WASPs and Irish Catholics in his 2002 play, and if that mixture of personalities wasn’t combustible enough, their language certainly was. Guigis’s dialogue makes the vulgarities of David Mamet sound like Dr. Seuss,but at least you can print the play’s title in a family newspaper (which is more than you can say for his 2011 work

The Motherfucker with a Hat

).

Foul language aside, Guigis is the real deal. In its original run,

Our Lady

racked up several Off-Broadway awards and got mentioned in nearly everyone’s list of “10 Best Plays of 2003.” His

Between Riverside and Crazy

later won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. So this is not a playwright to take lightly.

He does, though, need careful handling: too soft, and the humor evaporates; too hard, and the characters aren't sympathetic. I never saw the original version (directed by the late Philip Seymour Hoffman),but the Signature’s production under director Phylicia Rashad has just the right balance.

There’s a certain irony here, because Ms. Rashad is best known as the television wife of Bill Cosby during his eight-year television series

The Cosby Show

(1984-92). The portrait of an all-too-perfect African-American family is, to put it mildly, a millennium away from the supremely fallible denizens of 121Street.

It’s hard to recount Guigis’s plot, since there isn’t much of one. There isn't even an “our lady,” since the nun in question has died and her body stolen from the funeral home before her former students have a chance to mourn. A perfect excuse for bad behavior, it would seem.

That each of the characters was larger than life yet fully human was a credit to the cast. That the ensemble was so well-managed, each actor getting a moment to shine before retreating to the background,was a credit to Rashad. So too was a pitch-perfect grasp of the script that kept its harshness from resorting to mere insult comedy.

Rashad, a Houston native of professional parents whose early life was probably closer to

Cosby

than

121 Street

, nonetheless knows Guigis’s characters well. With rough edges left unpolished, the chorus of crazies breaks down into three distinct categories:those who never got a chance, those who missed their chance, and those who took their chance and blew it. Individual back stories aside, each comes to the funeral home—and the bar next door—confronting the same major issues of life, not least being death. But quite tellingly, of all the tensions on stage, none was related to race.

《121街的修女》劇照

＊＊＊

The night before my Signature Theatre outing, I had actually been a few blocks away watching the director’s daughter Condola Rashad appearing as Joan of Arc in the Manhattan Theatre Club’s revival of George Bernard Shaw’s

Saint Joan

on Broadway. Apart from the omnipresence of the Catholic Church and a wide array of ethnicities on stage, the two plays were poles apart. Shaw wrote the play in 1923, after all.

The last time I saw the younger Rashad on stage was in her Broadway debut in

Stick Fly

, where she shined brilliantly in what was ostensibly an ensemble show.The last time I saw her on screen was a film of another Broadway appearance in Shakespeare’s

Romeo and Juliet

opposite Orlando Bloom. So she’s handled two extremes: contemporary works singularly informed by the African-American experience, and classical dramas with characters not traditionally associated with her own ethnicity.

《圣女貞德》劇照，康多拉·拉沙德與丹尼爾·蘇賈塔

Thankfully, in

Saint Joan

no casting explanation was given. Director Daniel Sullivan was more focused on bringing the story to contemporary audiences—essentially replacing quasi-operatic grandeur with a more intimate reading—than explaining why the title character (and indeed several others on stage) were not white. Much more crucial in Sullivan’s approach was identifying the core competition between the Church and the State, with threads of nationalism that again make the play again seem eerily modern.Perhaps the only thing that linked the

Saint Joan

with

Our Lady

was the sense that there were no villains on stage, only fallible people.

The biggest compliment regarding Rashad’s performance was that the only reactions I heard simply concerned the quality of her acting. Not that there was any uniformity there, however. I looked far and wide on stage for the “sensible and enthusiastic manager” that

New York Times

critic Jesse Greene had described. Rashad’s performance, he said, has “the salutary feminist effect of highlighting competence instead of hysteria.”

Well, the Joan I saw wasn’t hysterical, but she wasn’t entirely sensible either. Rashad’s Joan converts her early doubters into supporters mainly by overpowering them with manic energy. This came up in conversation the next night—during intermission at the Signature Theatre, in fact—when I saw an actor-musician friend I was sure had seen her performance. “You know,” he said carefully, “to really pull off this role, the only way to show that the people accusing you are wrong is to be the sane one. She came out bug-eyed crazy.”

Again, it was simply questioning artistic choices,not the casting itself, so on the colorblind front

Saint

Joan

fulfilled its key purpose. Still, no one can predict how certain lines and images will resonate. Something about Joan’s trial scene bothered me, and I couldn't quite put my finger on until after the show. As we leftthe theatre, my companion pointed out, “Even today,putting a black woman in chains simply sends an entirely different signal.”

＊＊＊

No one could accuse the Heartbeat Opera’s production of

Fidelio

of sending the wrong signals.Director Ethan Heard, who pored over every element of Beethoven’s problematic masterpiece and hauled it kicking and screaming into the 21century, was supremely conscious of his message at all times.

If audiences today yawn at the political intrigues of the French Revolution, why not refocus the story on matters they do care about? What if the prisoners in this version were black, noting the disproportion in America’s prison population? What if you have a refugee from a war-torn African nation, reflecting another hot topic in the United States under the Trump administration? You might say—and several people have—that this is way too tinkering for repertory opera, but here’s the thing: nobody yawned.

? ETHAN HEARD / COURTESY OF HEARTBEAT OPERA

It’s hard to relate in so few words the level of surgery employed on the original work, but let’s start with the cosmetics. Florestan, the prisoner in question, became simply “Stan.” His wife Leonore(now “Leah”) is no longer dressed as a man but pretending to be a lesbian to flirt with Marzelline(“Marcy”), the daughter of the prison guard Rocco(“Roc”). Don Pizarro, the warden and main villain of the piece, is just “Donnie” to his friends.

The character of Jaquino, Rocco’s assistant with a crush on Marzelline, is gone entirely, marking only the first of deeper surgical procedures. Gone too is the overture and, for that matter, most of Beethoven’s orchestration. (Daniel Schlosberg’s reductiondistillation consists of two pianos, two cellos, two horns and percussion.) Spoken dialogue from the original was scrapped and replaced with a new script by Heard and Marcus Scott, which somehow smoothly transitioned into the musical portions sung in German.

While most of these cuts directly reflected the production’s limited budget and physical scale,the most obvious amputation—the chorus—was not only not removed but actually enhanced.Beethoven’s famous Prisoners’ Chorus, with its joyful ode to (albeit temporary) freedom, was sung in a projected video featuring a chorus of hundreds of current and former inmates from correctional facilities in the American Midwest.

上：心跳歌劇團的《菲岱里奧》劇照，洛克（左）與斯坦左頁：心跳歌劇團的《菲岱里奧》劇照，瑪西（左）與利亞

Heartbeat Opera’s success in reinterpretation varies immensely. Their

Don Giovanni

, which ran alongside

Fidelio

this season, viewed Mozart’s seducer through today’s climate of sexual harassment cases but was nowhere near as successful as Christopher Alden’s reinvention several years ago for New York City Opera.(Alden himself failed drastically in employing the same formula with

Tosca

.) Clearly, not all operas are open to such treatment, but the strength of Heartbeat Opera’s

Fidelio

ultimately belongs to Beethoven. No opera that had so many revisions under its own composer can justly claim to be engraved in stone.

It does beg the question: If a production of

Fidelio

doesn't have the original story, or the original music,or the composer’s distinctive orchestration, can the company still rightfully claim to be presenting Beethoven’s opera? Better, I think, to be like Silent Opera, the London-based company whose radical takes on Mozart and Janacek are simply called

Giovanni

and

Vixen

, lest people expect the original.

In this case, though, by amputating much of Fidelio’s tradition, Heartbeat Opera actually cut to the story’s core. It employed several fine black singers—Nelson Ebo, the tenor playing “Stan,” was actually a refugee from Angola—for theatrical as much as musical reasons. Even devotees of the original were on the edge of their seats wondering what could possibly come next, which probably hasn’t happened this much since Beethoven himself stopped tinkering with the show.