Rehearsing a scene from Jules Massenet’s opera Manon.
At Boulder Opera, we are excited to announce that Gene Roberts will be joining our team once again to direct our production of Verdi’s Il Trovatore. To celebrate this, we want to share more information about Roberts with you!
Gene Roberts, stage director, returns to Boulder Opera for Il Trovatore, after directing Cavalleria Rusticana, Signor Deluso and Little Red Riding Hood in the 2018-19 season. In recent seasons Roberts directed Le Nozze di Figaro and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat for the Bay View Music Festival in Michigan, was a guest director of Webster University’s opera theater in St. Louis, MO and has served as the scenes’ director for the Naked Voice Institute at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. In the fall of 2019 Roberts produced and directed Luisa Fernanda at MSU Denver, where he serves as Director of Opera Theatre. This was the first bilingual production of the beloved Zarzuela in the state of Colorado.
Roberts began his professional career in Europe, where he joined the Swiss premier cast of Lloyd Webber’s das Phantom der Oper in Basel, Switzerland. Phantom led to many other opportunities throughout Europe in stage and television, including starring as Beast in the German production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (die Schöne und das Biest), a role Roberts performed over 500 times. Altogether, throughout the US and Europe, Roberts sang over 30 roles in musical theater including Tony in West Side Story and Snoopy in You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown, and 20 roles in opera including Basilio in Le Nozze di Figaro, Normano in Lucia di Lammermoor and Bardolfo in Falstaff.
Roberts holds a BM in vocal performance from the St. Louis Conservatory of Music, where he also studied opera stage direction, and a MM in vocal performance from the University of Houston.
A shot from Boulder Opera’s production of Little Red Riding Hood, directed by Gene Roberts.
Boulder Opera: What are you looking forward to most in directing Il Trovatore?
Gene Roberts: Verdi loved good stories, and I love Verdi. Directors are story tellers. Our work is to help the singers, costumes, lighting and set designers tell a powerful story. And you have to start with a powerful story. Characters in this tumultuous tale are making earth shattering discoveries literally until the last 60 seconds of this opera. I've loved this piece since I was 18 and first heard it on the Live from the Met, Saturday afternoon broadcast, and couldn't feel more privileged to share it with Boulder Opera audiences.
BOC: What do you hope people will think or feel when they go home after seeing this opera?
GR: I hope they are discussing the plot, the characters and how things might have gone differently, just like you do when you leave a great, highly anticipated movie. For me, that should be the experience of every great Verdi opera.
BOC: What are the challenges of this opera?
GR: The characters - the humans, in the story are larger than life. Very easily archetypes of who they are and what they represent. It is always a challenge to play these types of characters and show the depth of their humanity. These are challenges an actor faces in any work, whether on stage or screen. The opera singer (a singing actor) has to keep all of these expressive issues always in mind, and use music and vocalism to paint the emotional landscape of the story. When they find success in this, a great power is unleashed to transport the audience.
A still from Boulder Opera’s double-feature: Cavalleria Rusticana and Signor Deluso which Gene Roberts directed.
BOC: What lead you to a career in the performing arts?
GR: There is no more powerful medium for story telling than music. When I was in high school I saw my first opera. I'd been in choir and musicals in school for what seemed like forever. Opera was a revelation for me. It was La Bohème, and those singers and the orchestra were engaged in something magical. When (spoiler alert) Mimi died, I snuck a peek down my row to see if I was the only one crying and I didn't see a dry eye anywhere around me. I knew I had to be a part of that.
BOC: Why should people come to see Il Trovatore?
GR: I haven't spoken specifically about our gifted cast of singers. Each of these singing actors assembled in this production will transport you though this thrilling music and their brilliant singing. Come hear this beautiful work - not just to escape, but to enrich your life!
Grab your tickets for Il Trovatore, directed by Gene Roberts!
You do not want to miss this passionate and dramatic Opera!