Giacomo Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly,” one of the most popular and frequently performed operas in the world, is a searing story of the exploitation of a teenage geisha set against a backdrop of imperialist ignorance and hubris.
But sometimes forgotten or overlooked is that the 1904 opera itself is a kind of exploitation as well — white, European creators and interpreters offering their perhaps well-meaning yet frequently ill-informed re-creation of Japanese culture both in the music and story.
“Just as Butterfly is trapped with little agency in this opera, we as Asian Americans have been trapped by many of the traditional depictions of Butterfly’s story,” writes stage director Matthew Ozawa in his program note.
When: 2 p.m. March 22 with six additional performances through April 12
Where: Lyric Opera House, 20 N. Wacker Drive
Tickets: $55-$434
Info: 312-827-5600; lyricopera.org/butterfly
He and an entirely Japanese and Japanese American artistic team have conceived a bold, new take on “Madama Butterfly” that was first seen at the Cincinnati Opera in 2023 and is being presented for the first time at Lyric Opera of Chicago in a nine-performance run ending April 12.
But as commendable as the intent and imagination behind this version are, the intrinsic emotional power of this beloved opera is significantly lost amid the production’s complex, conceptual structure and invented narrative overlay.
In this version, the opera opens in a present-day apartment where B.F. Pinkerton dons a virtual reality headset and enters a game that sets the whole story in motion with him in the role of his avatar — a Navy lieut
