Years In-the-Making, Lyric Opera Forced to Cancel RING Cycle
WDCB’s Gary Zidek talks with Lyric Opera of Chicago President & CEO Anthony Freud about pivoting in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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“The Ring represents one of the greatest achievements in western art. In terms of scale, it’s the largest undertaking that any opera company can produce. And there are not so many opera companies around the world that have the capacity, either artistically, technically or financially, to actually produce Wagner’s Ring.” - Lyric Opera President & CEO Anthony Freud talking about what makes Wagner’s RING cycle so special.
Anthony Freud, President & CEO of Lyric Opera of Chicago
April was set to be an especially exciting month for Lyric Opera of Chicago. The company was set to present three full cycles of Richard Wagner’s The Ring. Made up of four individual operas, presenting a full RING cycle requires a great deal of resources. The last time Lyric presented a full cycle was 2005, and the company has been working on a new production for the past several years. There was a tremendous amount of anticipation as April 2020 got closer, rehearsals were already underway in March, when everything changed as the COVID-19 pandemic took shape.
Christine Goerke and Brandon Jovanovich in Wagner’s Die Walküre. Photo credit: Cory Weaver
“I gathered together the Ring company, we’re talking about many people, and I said to them there’s no easy way to say this, ‘in the context of everything going on we have no option but to cancel the Ring and cancel rehearsals with immediate effect’. And it was a very emotional moment, there were a lot of tears.” - Lyric’s Anthony Freud talking about Friday, March 13, when he had to break the news to the cast and crew working on the Ring.
Image from Götterdämmerung tech stage set-up. Photo credit: Andrew Cioffi
As far as mounting a full RING cycle in the future … Freud believes it’s absolutely possible. But right now his focus is on the short-term and navigating Lyric through the current storm of uncertainty. He says operatic planning cycles take place years in advance, so any type of RING productions are unlikely in the next 3 or 4 years.
Photo credit: Andrew Cioffi
