Actress Sandra Oh trades the small screen for the grand stage of the Met Opera
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Sandra Oh (middle) will make her operatic debut as the Duchess of Krakenthorp in Gaetano Donizetti's comic opera La Fille Du Regiment on Oct 17.
PHOTO: AFP
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NEW YORK – Best known for her acclaimed TV roles in Grey’s Anatomy (2005 to present) and Killing Eve (2018 to 2022), Sandra Oh finds herself “amazed” by the magic of the stage as she readies for her operatic debut in New York on Oct 17.
In La Fille Du Regiment, Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti’s comic opera, the Canadian-American actress plays the Duchess of Krakenthorp, who reluctantly marries off her son. The role is spoken rather than sung – and in French.
“She’s very stern and she’s very angry, and I find it very, very difficult to keep that face when the most beautiful music is happening right in front of me,” Oh says with a laugh during an interview with AFP after the dress rehearsal on Oct 14.
The 54-year-old’s first foray on the Metropolitan Opera stage was the result of a happy accident: the storied institution’s general manager offered her the role after seeing her perform William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night in the open-air theatre in Central Park, which ran from Aug 7 to Sept 14.
“To move into a stage this grand, and to move into the heights of what opera is, and really it’s to be in rehearsal with some of the greatest artistes... is something that’s very, very rare,” she says.
“I wanted to try that experience. And I do try and do that in my life and in my career, to just try things that are new, things that mostly scare me.”
What surprised Oh most was the “crazy” pace of the production, at odds with the “slow or gentle” way audiences experience opera.
“You have sets that are moving all the time, people who are just coming, and you have people who are telling you exactly where to be all the time. And while it is divine, it’s bananas,” she said.
‘I’m in my comedy phase’
There is little doubt that the presence of a bona fide small screen star at the Met will attract a larger audience than usual – a boon for an institution struggling financially since the Covid-19 pandemic and eager to modernise its programming.
Sandra Oh is interviewed after a dress rehearsal for Gaetano Donizetti's comic opera La Fille Du Regiment at the Metropolitan Opera on Oct 14.
PHOTO: AFP
Oh’s entrance on stage – in a purple gown, her hair adorned with feathers, and waving a fan – drew cheers and excited shouts from New York schoolchildren invited to the dress rehearsal.
The winner of two Golden Globes, among other awards, for her roles as a talented surgeon in Grey’s Anatomy and an intelligence agent obsessed with an assassin in Killing Eve is delighted by the prospect of these youngsters and her fans to “see the opera and to experience what storytelling is in a grand scale, what music is, and to see the top artistes in the world”.
On the wide stage, the actress herself more than holds her own. Far from the subtlety required before a camera, her powerful voice and exaggerated gestures fill the space – and draw peals of laughter.
“In a special stage this big, you do have to be very conscious of all your gestures,” she sums up, noting that on screen, it is the quality of an actor’s expressions that the lens captures. “As an actor, you should be able to do all of it.”
As it happens, Oh is also set to appear in American cinemas starting on Oct 17, alongside actors Keanu Reeves, Seth Rogen and Keke Palmer in the comedy Good Fortune. The movie is showing in Singapore cinemas.
“I’m in my comedy phase, and everything is like, feel good, it’s a comedy. And, you know, bring a bit of joy,” she concludes. AFP
