This was my swansong, my finale, a farewell from thirteen wonderful years with the Ukrainian National Opera. Rehearsals had been perfunctory; necessarily short with Kyiv’s ongoing power disruptions, security alerts and the overarching tensions across the country as the Russian invasion ground on.
But theatre-goers are resilient, balancing inconveniences and uncertainties, sometimes, particularly in the Kyiv of 2024, even life and limb, against entertainment. But like moths to the flame, they come, never shrinking from the operatic excitement, drawn inexorably through this wretchedness to take their seats for three hours of magical, masterful escape.
Tonight is to be no exception. The crowds know of my departure, but also, they’ll thrill to the opportunity to be part of this audience, with Iryna Petrova, Pyotr Oleksander and me in the three key roles: Pyotr playing that dastardly, morally bankrupt Duke of Mantua, Iryna, Gilda, my unfortunate, love-struck daughter and me, the cursed, luckless hunchback, Rigoletto.
The third act is reaching a climax. The Duke, Gilda, the Duke’s mate Borsa, and I come together in that wonderful quartet. The Duke continues to loudly declare his love from the castle battlements. Gilda’s takes the melody, rising above the rest of us and the audience are on the edge of their seats. The house holds its collective breath as she delivers her cadenza, from top C, trilling between D and E flat.
The orchestra is restless, another crescendo building, and the conductor, with practiced mastery, holds back the energy, massaging and directing, skilfully allowing the groundswell to build. And then, the orchestra stills.
The massive chandelier, above the orchestra pit, falls. I see the movement from the stage, a dreamy catastrophe unfolding, ever so slowly. First dust, plaster flakes, then tiny individual glass filaments following. Maybe another five seconds and the superstructure groans massively, lights flicker, sparks and then it descends onto the musicians.
A moment’s stunned silence. Loose plaster continues to float down from the ceiling as the collective mayhem erupts. Screams, the crowd unsure but they struggle: along, over, even under the seating, desperation and panic as they surge towards the exits. I watch, still rooted to the stage.
A moment’s reflection – flashes from a hundred cameras underscore the uncomfortable reality of a 21st-century crowd: record the moment first, help later! The venality of the crowd!
People are now in the pit, citizenry, helpers assisting the injured and removing the debris. I presume the white coats are medicos, others carry stretchers. I remain fixed above, witness but divorced from the carnage. It takes me a few minutes to get down into the pit. I am instructed to hold two separate intravenous saline bottles, one going into the arm of a violinist and the other, into the bass player.
I will never forget that Kyiv farewell. Investigators were unable to determine whether terrorism, the vibrations from repeated, nearby bombardments or a failure of a maintenance schedule were responsible for the tragedy. Remarkably, there were only two deaths.
Tragedy on and off the stage!