Frano Parać - Judith
Croatian National Theatre, Zagreb, 2024
Ivan Josip Skender, Snježana Banović, Sofija Petrović, Matija Meić, Stjepan Franetović, Mate Akrap, Ivo Gamulin, Emilia Rukavina, Petra Cik, Marin Čargo, Siniša Galović, Mario Bokun
OperaVision - 5th October 2024
Despite being the only female character to have a book dedicated to her in the Old Testament, Judith has not made a great impression on the opera world. There have been several notable but rarely heard works, including Vivaldi's oratorio Juditha Triumphans in 1717, an 1863 Russian opera Judith by Aleksandr Serov and a 1922 opera Judith und Holofernes by the Austria composer Emil Nikolaus von Reznicek, but Judith is perhaps better known to most people through some of the great classical painters, Caravaggio's probably being the most famous. The single powerful and extremely violent image of Judith's beheading of Holofernes in some of those paintings may explain why it hasn't been adapted more often to the theatrical or lyric stage, but it's more likely that the impact of the story centres on this key scene and it's difficult to establish a sense of drama and context around it.
To outward appearances, it's not a complex or even a subtle plot by any means. To save the people of Bethulia from the Assyrian forces Judith seduces Holofernes with her charms and cuts off his head while she sleeps. Essentially, that is it in terms of dramatic action, but there is a need to establish historical context, and there are evidently considerable depths of human feelings, resistance and consequences of enacting such a violent act to be taken into account. From a contemporary viewpoint, the subject raises questions of female empowerment and achieving justice, even if there are questionable behaviours in a woman using her beauty and female wiles to achieve those aims. The greatest paintings of the subject - and perhaps the most graphic - Caravaggio's and Artemisia Gentileschi's Judith, manage to address all these questions in all the gruesome horror of the act, while an opera must seek to address those issues in the composition and music.
For Frano Parać, I get the impression that rather than push a particular reading or direction on the action of Judith, he is content to rely on the source material for the libretto and by giving it the most appropriate dramatic treatment that it will be left to the individual to interpret and indeed feel the moral dilemma and the necessity of Judith's action. That would seem to be a reasonable way to address the subject if the music is up to the challenge of expressing or invoking those deeper issues. Parać doesn't rely on avant-garde musical techniques or instrumentation, but on a more traditional musical treatment, which under conductor Ivan Josip Skender is clearly effective if somewhat limiting.
I wouldn't say that the composer was restricted as such, but the original source material for Parać's opera, composed in the year 2000, undoubtedly plays a part in his approach to the subject. Parać's own libretto is based on the epic work Judita by Marko Marulić, the father of Croatian literature, written in 1521. His intent was to take a biblical story that was written in Latin and make it accessible to the common people, making it the first literary work in the Croatian language. It's a work unadorned by psychological motivation or wider context, relating the story of Judith and Holofernes in a direct fashion and Parać adheres to that principle. The direction of this new production of Judith for the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the death of Marulić, similarly relies on the most direct and effective way of putting this story across on the stage.
The subject itself suggests a certain approach and delivery and those are evident in this 2024 Zagreb production. Musically, Parać keeps that classical form and structure in the opera, and there are certainly a number of effective models for this subject. It's hard not to think of Verdi's Nabucco at the opening of the work, as the people in chorus lament and pray for delivery from their fate under an oppressive regime, the Israeli people of the city of Bethulia under siege by the Assyrian forces of Holofernes. Verdi is evident there, but there is also more than a little of the undercurrent of menace running through Turandot in there, particularly in those opening scenes, but the playing out of one person's determination to see through her duty despite the considerable dangers is evident throughout in the darker but still melodic character of the music in Judith.
It might not employ any of the techniques or instrumentation of new music, but what this Croatian National Theatre production of Parać's Judith makes apparent is the strength of the work as one of pure opera. In its directness and simplicity, it comes across as a powerful plot of high emotion and drama, strong dramatic musical writing, exceptionally good singing and an unfussy but impressive direction by Snježana Banović that supports the drama and provides spectacle. You can't argue with that. You could expect that it might make some contemporary commentary on the conflicts against oppressive forces in the world today - and god knows there are plenty to choose from - although perhaps we don't need reminded of it on the opera stage as well. Like Turandot however there is little historical context emphasised in this production of Judith, so it almost operates in abstraction of the necessity of goodness and purity to fight against evil. And there we are very much aligned with Gentileschi and Caravaggio as much as Marko Marulić.
Adhering to the directness of the drama, the structure and arrangement of scenes keeps to a classical form across seven scenes divided into two acts. In Act I, the first scene sets up the climate of fear in a choral arrangement with the people of Bethulia praying, awaiting attack from the army of Holofernes just outside the city. The danger is heightened by the arrival of Achior who testifies to the horrors about to be enacted. Unwilling to surrender while there is a chance God will save them, they choose to wait for five more days. Judith, unwilling to believe you can impose a deadline on God, chooses to go into the enemy camp herself, and prepares herself with the help of her maid.
Once past the enemy guards, introducing another fearful choral episode with the assembled male chorus using handheld wooden claps, Judith has no difficulty in seducing Holofernes with her great beauty, but also using the five-day challenge to God as a reason for her rejecting the Bethulians. After a celebratory banquet and much drinking, Judith takes Holofernes' sword and summons up the strength to kill the sleeping drunk General and remove his head. Bringing it back to Bethulia, the people rejoice and prise Judith while the Assyrians flee in fear and confusion.
Evidently, a production of this opera relies on having a powerful central performance, Judith is indeed written as such with all other roles secondary, and it requires a commanding but lyrical voice to carry it. We certainly have that here in the rich, deep full voice of mezzo-soprano Sofija Petrović, who gives a compelling performance. A mark of the nature of the work is that she doesn't even have a tenor to compete with. The only tenor role is a relatively minor one, Achior, but he plays a key role in the plot nonetheless and is sung well by Ivo Gamulin. Holofernes, sung by Matija Meić, is obviously is a baritone baddie, but the part is surprisingly underwritten as far as the characterisation and limited singing role he has. Everything however is built around the role of Judith, the choral arrangements impressive, the well-designed sets and lighting serving to enhance her presence and the mood of the opera, and it comes across wonderfully effectively in this production.
External links: OperaVision, Croatian National Theatre
