Russell Wustenberg, a bridge between director and performer
Blog post by Chris Maskell
As Opera McGill’s landmark 60th season continues into the New Year, the momentum of its programming isn’t letting up. With major events on the horizon such as next weekend’s production of Die Fledermaus at the Monument-National and the subsequent Opera B!nge festival, both Schulich students and faculty alike have busy schedules.
Stage manager Russell Wustenberg is no stranger to this hectic preparation process, having been a performer in Opera McGill productions as a graduate student before working in his current position. In a recent interview, Wustenberg offered insight into the nature of his job, some outstanding moments of the year so far and his history with Fledermaus.
How did you get to work as the stage manager for Opera McGill, and what does your role entail?
I first met Patrick Hansen in 2012, and he promptly shot me. He was directing Fargo-Moorhead Opera’s production of Beethoven’s Fidelio and picked me from the lineup to play a character that’s blindfolded, beaten, and executed as the curtain came down on the first act. The whole show, I kept thinking, “Now, this is opera!” It was through him that I was introduced to Ď㽶ĘÓƵ and he’s ultimately the reason I came to study here.
After I graduated from my master’s degree in 2015, Patrick hired me to be his full-time production stage manager. Truly, I am in his debt – if had he not hired me for this position, I most likely would have left the opera industry altogether. Instead of being a barista somewhere, I’m having the time of my life working with wonderful artists on pieces of human history. Who could ask for more than that?
I really do think that “stage management” is a misnomer. We control space and time, and hardly ever actually touch the stage! The stage manager is the link between the artistic team in the rehearsal hall and the production staff who work on the visual aspects of the show. We distribute schedules, coordinate costume fittings, and make our way through sometimes hundreds of emails a day to keep the heart of the show pumping. Months before the opening night, we’re compressing the show down to a spreadsheet and predicting how every second of the evening is going to flow. It’s a thrilling job that has sent me on international adventures across both Canada and the United States ever since I donned the headset seven years ago!
As a former graduate vocal student at Schulich, what does it mean to you to be involved in Opera McGill’s 60th year? What have been some of the highlights of the year so far for you?
Patrick and I had an amazingly surreal experience while we were scouting for locations for the upcoming Opera B!nge Festival. We had just been in a meeting with a technical director for a theatre that was definitely not going to work for our festival. As we were walking to the metro, we passed by L’Arsenal, a contemporary art museum in Griffintown, which had been suggested to us as a performance space by a number of our colleagues. We decided to poke our heads inside with just 10 minutes to close. The receptionist called down their space rental manager, who gave us a tour of their amazing space that screamed “opera should be performed here!”Â
Halfway through the tour, we started hearing snippets of something orchestral, modern, and with vague hints of the avant-garde. We finally asked our guide about it, who said, “Oh, it’s some opera company that’s performing here next week. We can take a look, if you want.” As we rounded the corner into a massive warehouse, we locked eyes with an Opera McGill alumnus who was surrounded by thirty white-clad ninjas pretending to be trees. Just as Patrick started pantomiming “why are you here,” a voice rang out from up in the lighting board and a former Opera McGill sound engineer waved us over to take a better look at their setup. Here, seemingly randomly, were two Opera McGill alumni working with Ballet, Opera, Pantomime (a local company in Montreal) and we just happened to stumble into their final rehearsal.
That’s Opera McGill: great artists in surprising new places, all bound by this common, 60 year-old thread. It’s a huge network of students, teachers and alumni who are making their own way in the opera industry, and this year’s festivities have shed some light on just how diverse that network is. Some of us are running plucky opera companies, others are hanging out among the dazzling lights of North American opera productions, and at least two are standing in a warehouse surrounded by an army of operatic ninjas.
On the opening day of our season this year, we had an alumni reunion open to anyone who had ever taken part in Opera McGill in any capacity. The participants took masterclasses, talked about our successes in making our own businesses in performance and bridged some of the generational gaps that exist between student alumni. It’s easy to forget that your university experience goes beyond just the students in your classes – Opera McGill exists in every person who has come before you, and will come after.
How does having recently sung in a Toronto-based production of Die Fledermaus affect your approach to managing Opera McGill’s production?
Assisting co-directors Aria Umezawa and Jessica Derventzis on Opera 5’s zany production of Die Fledermaus was the best introduction to a work I’ve ever had. In so many ways, the production turned the operatic paradigm on its head. Both the audience and performers were packed to the rafters in a wild raver party, swilling free beer and Snapchatting our way through the opera.
While Opera McGill’s production of Die Fledermaus is more-or-less traditional, it still evokes the unmistakable party spirit that’s made the piece a staple in the repertoire. There’s no other show that I have worked on that conjures such a vibrant thrill from the first note to the last, no matter the setting. Even though my job as manager has me focusing slightly more on chronology than choreography, I still carry the same frenetic excitement with me whenever I work on the show.
What elements of Die Fledermaus do you find particularly striking?
This past New Year’s Eve, I was with the Eugene Opera opening a production in celebration of their 40th Âseason, and it ended with the second act of Fledermaus! So, this is actually my third production of the opera this year! A particularly memorable moment happened in the middle of the Watch Duet while I was standing next to the principal ballerina of the Eugene Ballet, who was waiting to dance. Suddenly, she started to rock out to Rosalinda’s melisma, and said to me, “I just could not get this out of my head last night!” Here was a principal ballerina with the Eugene Ballet jumping and jiving to a 147-year-old opera duet! That’s the beauty of what Johann Strauss II crafted – something joyously infectious whether it’s your first listen or your one-hundredth.
What advantages do you think the Monument-National has as a venue for opera over Pollack Hall?
A curtain, mostly! I’ve only been in the Monument-National once and I’m very excited to get to know it better once we load in. That said, this is my 13th production with Opera McGill, and I’ve come to learn that it’s the people who really make the company, not the performance space. Every meeting, every rehearsal and every performance is infused with this drive to make each show a unique experience. Everyone involved carries that spark and it’s contagious! My hope is that the audience at the Monument-National will catch a taste of what’s been going on at Opera McGill for the past sixty years and will come join us, no matter where we are.
What are you most looking forward to in the remainder of the season, once Die Fledermaus is done?
Next up is the B!nge Festival: a collection of seven one-act operas in six different venues, featuring 47 students and all in 24 hours. It’s a massive undertaking for all of us, and definitely worth the price of admission. The repertoire ranges from a Baroque classic to the North American premiere of James Garner’s East o’ the Sun, West o’ the Moon. Overall, it’s a sampler of every kind of opera we have to offer. Feeling like some laughs? Come to Mozart’s The Impressario! Have kids? Fox’s Sid the Serpent Who Wanted to Sing! Looking for a dose of the obscure? Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle!
I come from a rural background (literally a town called “Farmington”) and I’m always telling my family and friends that opera is amazingly diverse. There’s an opera out there for everyone, and the B!nge Festival will be a great event to taste a little bit of everything we have to offer while looking ahead to the next 60 years of Opera McGill!
Opera McGill will present the following at the Monument-National:Â
- Thursday, January 26, 2017 at 7:30 p.m.
- Friday, January 27, 2017 at 7:30 p.m.
- Saturday, January 28, 2017 at 7:30 p.m.
