# Singers who act so well...



## russetvelvet (Oct 14, 2016)

I was watching the documentary series 'My Favourite Opera' earlier today and this episode in particular: 



, which features Katia Ricciarelli talking about Bellini's 'I Capuleti e i Montecchi'; liked it immediately, did some googling around and incidentally found out that she actually has won a rather prestigious award in Italy as a movie actress in 2006! (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nastro_d'Argento_for_Best_Actress) Quite a crossover feat, isn't it?

Are there any other singers who are having or have had similar careers? Mario Lanza comes to mind; Natalie Dessay seems to consider acting her main passion but to be honest her acting isn't on a par with her voice. I can't think of another.


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

Loa Falkman is a well known opera singer and actor in Sweden probably more recognised as an actor. There is a video on youtube of Un ballo in maschera with him as Holberg and Nicolai Gedda as Gustav III that have been linked here previously.

Afro Poli appeared in several opera films while being dubbed by other singers.


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Yo! Does the name Maria Callas come to mind?

Let us not forget some truly creative acting in some other fine singers:
Magda Olivero/Neil Shicoff/Rene Pape/Sondra Radvanovsky/Franco Corelli/Jon Vickers/Teresa Stratas/Joyce di Donato/Patricia Racette/Patricia Neway/Jonas Kaufmann/Boris Christoff/Dmitri Hvorostovsky/Eva Podles/Christine Goerke/Felicity Palmer/Diana Soviero/Anna Netrebko/Rolando Villazon/ and on and on and on......


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Tito Gobbi:


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## nina foresti (Mar 11, 2014)

Woodduck said:


> Tito Gobbi:


Of course Tito -- and so many others I have missed.


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## davidglasgow (Aug 19, 2017)

Grace Moore was nominated for the Best Actress Oscar and was a very accomplished singer
Depuis le jour from Louise





I remember reading that Inge Borkh was an actress before she was a singer
O Namenlose Freude with Jess Thomas





Ljuba Welitsch was later an actress as well
Menotti's The Consul


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## davidglasgow (Aug 19, 2017)

When I was thinking of examples it occurred to me how many female operatic artists have euphemistically - and it might be argued pejoratively - been called "singing-actresses". This tends to mean the critic likes their acting but not their singing  Some names which come up when searching the web include (in no particular order):

Mary Garden
Martha Modl
Leonie Rysanek
Anja Silja
Astrid Varnay
Maria Callas
Lorraine Hunt Lieberson 
Karita Mattila
Waltraud Meier
Renata Scotto
Teresa Stratas

I think this sort of characterization may reflect a double standard...

A lot of these artists have performed challenging roles such as Elektra, Salome, Venus, Medea, Lady Macbeth, Abigaile which have big requirements: drama and even melodrama, histrionics, malice, revenge, sometimes ugliness and cowardice. In facing these challenges, we can probably all remember reviews saying these artists were at times vulgar, risking vocal-suicide, making ugly sounds, privileging drama over vocal beauty. Often this is represented as less to do with artistic imagination and more to do with vocal frailty or vocal necessity.

However, I am hard-pressed to think of a corresponding list of male artists. Can you think of an Otello who was considered to have truly gone overboard? Maybe only James McCracken (which John Steane nonetheless rated highly) or Giuseppe di Stefano's ill-rehearsed live recording... Or a Pagliacci which was considered too melodramatic? What would you need to do as Peter Grimes to be considered vulgar or risking vocal suicide? With Wagner, a badly sung and acted Tristan or Siegfried is not _really_ because of the idiosyncrasies of that particular artist but explained away as being because of a 'dearth of genuine Heldentenors nowadays'...


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Raina Kabaivanska/ Catherine Malfitano / Teresa Stratas/ Renée Fleming will do well on the list.


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Sutherland actually played an Australian country woman on an Australian TV show. I doubt it was on the level of Callas' Medea, though;-)
Marilyn Horne played an opera singer, stretch, on the Odd Couple and it is on Youtube.


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## Macbeth (Sep 6, 2017)

You actually have to consider in this group any opera singer who has participated in one of those filmed versions of operas, and do it succesfully. I don't mean filmed theatre performances, but those movie-made ones, you know, as the final product is some kind of crossover between a theatrical performance and a feature film.

I particularly enjoy the 1986 Macbeth, with Nucci and Verrett, so dark and gloomy, despite the fact that the face for Samuel Ramey's voice is a non-singing actor. No idea what was the reason for this, Ramey could perfectly have impersonated the character in film.






Sorry for the very poor quality. LOVE Verrett's Lady Macbeth.

And to pick a not so good effort in this matter of translating operas into movies, the *super kitsch* and very abridged movie version of Roméo et Juliette with Alagna and Gheorghiu at their most cloying. NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH THE FILMED VERSION OF THE STAGED OPERA.

I mean this _thing_:

https://www.amazon.com/Gounod-Julie...=8-1&keywords=romeo+juliette+alagna+gheorghiu



Seattleoperafan said:


> Marilyn Horne played an opera singer, stretch, on the Odd Couple and it is on Youtube.


Fun fact: young Horne was the voice for Carmen Jones (1954) in a rather indistinct and weak soprano.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

> You actually have to consider in this group any opera singer who has participated in one of those filmed versions of operas, and do it succesfully. I don't mean filmed theatre performances, but those movie-made ones, you know, as the final product is some kind of crossover between a theatrical performance and a feature film.


Teresa Stratas is heartbreaking in Zeffereli's La Travita though.


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## BalalaikaBoy (Sep 25, 2014)

I'd consider Jennifer Larmore and Joyce Didonato to be decent actresses.


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## SenaJurinac (Nov 29, 2017)

Anna Moffo. She did several operettas too (actually, quite a few opera singers tried themselves in the operettas too, especially back in the 1940s, 50s and 60s in Germany and Italy)


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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

Dame Gwyneth Jones, Astrid Varnay and Eva Marton were all very powerful actresses onstage with incredibly powerful voices. Varnay studied with Dame Judith Anderson. All we have of Varnay on video is when she was a senior and singing Klytemnestra. Oh, to have had her Elektra!!!! Both Marton and Jones had incredible video records of their Elektras, perhaps the most taxing opera dramatically for a soprano to sing.


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## SenaJurinac (Nov 29, 2017)

I loved Dame Kiri te Kanawa in 1979 Don Giovanni filmed opera: http://klassikundopern.web.tv/video/don-giovanni-opernverfilmung-losey-1979-mozart-raimondi-te-kanawa-berganza-maazel__mjwjvtnfwz6

also in Le Nozze di Figaro from 1976: http://klassikundopern.web.tv/video/le-nozze-di-figaro-opernverfilmung-ponnelle-1976-mozart-te-kanawa-fischerdieskau-freni-bohm__wbujzdjvsry

Raina Kabaivanska was also very good in famous 1976 live Tosca from Rome: http://klassikundopern.web.tv/video/tosca-opernverfilmung-de-bosio-1976-puccini-kabaivanska-domingo-milnes-bartoletti__notlrnpwuya


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

> Raina Kabaivanska was also very good in famous 1976 live Tosca from Rome: http://klassikundopern.web.tv/video/...i__notlrnpwuya


Outstanding, both vocally and acting. 
Milestone in DVD history.


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## SenaJurinac (Nov 29, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> Tito Gobbi:


Gobbi also borrowed his voice several times, like in 1953 to Anthony Quinn in Gallone's Cavalleria Rusticana.

There were more such operatic movies, like Fracassi's Aida from 1953 where Renata Tebaldi borrowed her voise to Sophia Loren


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

I love Diana Damrau as Gilda in Rigoletto


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