A still from a new high-tech production of Berlioz’s “Damnation de Faust,” premiering this weekend at the Met. An “interactive opera,” the production synthesizes performers and sets through technology: flocks of digital birds fly in sync with an aria, video grass parts its blades for oncoming soldiers, high-def water reflects a passing boat, a JumboTron mirrors a singer’s love song in flames.
To bolster his argument that the technology is appropriate, [director Robert] Lepage cites Berlioz’s epoch, a time of technological innovations like photography and electricity. “All these ideas were around,” he said. “They believed these things were modern alchemy.”
“Techno-Alchemy at the Opera,” audio slideshow. (Photo credit: Sara Krulwich.)