The Amazon Theatre () is an opera house located in Manaus, Brazil, in the heart of the Amazon rainforest. It is the location of the annual Festival Amazonas de Ópera (Amazonas Opera Festival) and the home of the Amazonas Philharmonic Orchestra which regularly rehearses and performs at the Amazon Theatre along with choirs, musical and other performances.
More than 126 years old, it represents the city's heyday during the rubber boom.
History
The Amazonas Theatre was built during the Belle Époque at a time when fortunes were made in the
rubber boom. Construction of the Amazon Theatre was first proposed in 1881 by a member of the local House of Representatives, Antonio Jose Fernandes Júnior, who envisioned a "jewel" in the heart of the Amazon rainforest.
[ The Guardian UK, Tuesday 14 April 2015 11.29 BST]
In 1882, the State legislature approved some limited financing, but this was considered insufficient. Later that year, the president of the Province, José Lustosa Paranaguá, approved a larger budget and initiated a competition for the presentation of plans. The chosen project was made by the Gabinete Português de Engenharia e Arquitectura, an engineering and architecture office from Lisbon. By 1884, construction was ready to begin under the Italian architect Celestial Sacardim. Work proceeded slowly over the following fifteen years with some stops and restarts from 1885 to 1892.
By 1895, when the masonry work and exterior were completed, the decoration of the interior and the installation of electric lighting could begin more rapidly. The theatre was inaugurated on December 31, 1896, with the first performance occurring on January 7, 1897, with the Italian opera, La Gioconda, by Amilcare Ponchielli.
Architecture and style
The theatre's architectural style is considered typically Renaissance Revival. The roofing tiles were imported from
Alsace, the steel walls from
Glasgow, Scotland and the
Carrara marble for the stairs, statues and columns, from Italy. The
dome is covered with 36,000 decorated
painted in the colors of the national flag of Brazil. The interior furnishing came from France in the
Louis Quinze. Italian artist Domenico de Angelis the Younger painted the panels that decorate the ceilings of the auditorium and of the audience chamber. The curtain, with its painting "Meeting of the Waters", was originally created in Paris by Crispim do Amaral. The theatre's 198
were imported from Italy, including 32 of
Murano glass.
Internal structure
The Auditorium seats 701 persons. The ground floor (stalls, in British usage) seats 266; the stall boxes, 100; the first-tier boxes seat 110; the 25 second-tier boxes seat 125; and the 20 third-tier boxes seat 100.
The Main Stage is wide, high and deep and the principal stage is high for a total area of .
The orchestra pit has a height of ; width: 6 ft 11 ins; and a length of .
In popular culture
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The theatre is featured in the film Fitzcarraldo
[Herzog, Werner (2001). Herzog on Herzog. Faber and Faber. .] directed by the German director Werner Herzog in 1982. At the beginning of the film, the opera-obsessed character Brian Sweeney "Fitzcarraldo" Fitzgerald makes his way by paddling his own boat to the opera house to hear Enrico Caruso sing in Giuseppe Verdi's Ernani,[ Art of Darkness, The Progressive, August 1982] which also features aging Sarah Bernhardt whose role is sung by an off-stage soprano.
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It is featured twice in novels by Eva Ibbotson: Journey to the River Sea
[ "And the winner is ... : ... a book that lasts. Kevin Crossley-Holland's The Seeing Stone creates a real world whose people you will remember a lifetime, says Anne Fine, introducing our recommendations for young readers". Anne. The Guardian 9 October 2001. Retrieved 2012-06-19.]
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The theatre was featured in Ann Patchett's 2011 novel, State of Wonder.
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The film Pavarotti opens with Luciano Pavarotti traveling to the theatre in 1995 to replicate Caruso's performance there.
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The theatre is mentioned in Daniel Catán's 1996 opera "Florencia en el Amazonas" as the location where the titular opera singer Florencia Grimaldi is traveling to give a concert.
Further reading
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Author and naturalist Sy Montgomery gives a historical account of the building of the theatre in her 2001 book, "Journey of the Pink Dolphins".
External links
