Prologue
Allegorical figures “Earth” and “Sky” sing of how humankind is constantly tugged by two conflicting forces: pursuit of the ideal and acceptance of what is realistically achievable.
Scene 1 [1’47”]
Meanwhile, in the Australian city of Sydney in 1955, the State Premier stares down the vociferous opposition of his Cabinet ministers to commission an opera house.
Scene 2
In Mexico in 1956, a Danish architect tours the ruins of the ancient city of Teotihuacan while echoes from a centuries old ritual of human sacrifice seem to ring in his ears. He ponders his modest achievements and wonders if he will ever make his mark as an international artist.
[4’54”] As he climbs a great pyramid, an image sharpens in his mind while the ghostly ceremony reaches its grisly climax. At the summit a moment of vertigo triggers a vision of an architectural wonder-at once firmly grounded and seemingly weightless-and he resolves to get it built.
Scene 3
It’s 1957, and in a room at the Sydney Conservatorium, a nineteen-year-old student soprano (Alexandra Mason) is practising an arpeggio. Her teacher, Magda, is a formidable, sophisticated Hungarian who has been living in Australia since the end of the war. Alex seems troubled about something and the situation is not helped by the unexpected appearance of her boyfriend, Stephen, at the door with a message that the two students are required in the director’s office.
[2’51”] Alex confides to Magda her worries that marriage and family may smother her potential and she, recognising a major talent, urges her to accept an offered scholarship to study in Europe.
[7’00”] In the corridor outside Stephen expresses xenophobic suspicions about the “battle-axe” who wants to split them up. He’s about to get a permanent job with the orchestra and envisages for them a rosy safe future in Australia.
[9’28”] The head of the Conservatorium (Maestro) enters and invites his two brightest students to join him at the official unveiling of the winning plan for the city’s new opera house.
Scene 4 [10’32”]
The scene shifts and a gathering of art lovers, socialites, and hangers-on give voice to their gilt-and-red-velvet tinged dreams while the Premier fields off embarrassing questions about the instigator of the idea, distinguished conductor (no longer) Sir Eugene. Fumbling with the envelope, he flippantly but ominously describes the Danish architect as “the chosen one”. The breathtakingly futuristic design floors and eventually horrifies the crowd.
[16’04”] As the outraged mob disperses, Alex expresses an opposite response. The Architect’s daring concept sketch strikes a chord with her: spiritually, it seems to embody all her own artistic aspirations while practically, it gives her the means by which her career can blossom in her own country.
Scene 5
Light snow is falling. The architect is walking in a forest near his Denmark home when his 11-year-old daughter catches up to him on her bike to tell him the news: he won the competition. At first dumbstruck at the thought of the task ahead, he embraces the idea of relocating to a strange and exciting “new world”.
[3’47”] Suddenly we are bathed in dazzling sunlight and Alex enters in a swimsuit seeking “the view from the other side”. She is pursued by Stephen, who tenderly sings of her as an embodiment of summer, and begs her never to leave him. She responds as he hopes. Meanwhile, Magda and the Maestro are picnicking and discussing the young couple; she berates the complacency and inertia of her adopted country and predicts Alex’s talent will not survive it. The Maestro sings of his pride for this “down to earth” land. All the characters reprise their feelings-be they of longing, regret or comfort-in a final sextet.
Scene 6
In 1958 the Premier and the British chief engineer are inspecting the opera house site as the old buildings are being demolished. They discuss how the adventurous project belongs in the “new” rather than the “old”, tradition-bound world, before the Premier drops the bombshell that he wants construction to begin at once, even before the plans have been fully drawn up. The Engineer is aghast, but the old Australian’s political nous has convinced him that it’s the only way to prevent the building from being stymied by the “spoilers”.
[7’56”] We transition to the dedication ceremony in 1959. The Premier assures the assembled VIPs and reporters that the Opera House will be “non-political” before introducing the Architect and his family and requesting “a few words”. In trying to communicate his vision he mystifies the uneasy crowd but manages to humbly smooth things over. A siren summons some symbolic jack-hammering and a brass band play the crowd off before the workers start in earnest, driving “deep into the earth”. The Premier longs to see the building rise, but his collapse in pain at the end of the scene presages the loss of the Architect’s greatest ally.
Scene 7
Two years on, on a scorching January day in 1962, Alex’s family are having a barbeque in the modest backyard of the Mason’s suburban home. She is now married to Stephen and heavily pregnant with their first child. We catch her father, Ken, mid- beer-fuelled rant about the Opera House: it’s costing a fortune and is taking forever. Her mother, Eileen and “fairy” godmothers Olive (alias Sky) and Jean (alias Earth) have heard it all before, but there is bristling tension between Ken and his son in law, a blow-in from the more salubrious side of town. Ken eventually blames Stephen for Alex’s stalled career and Eileen has to step in to avoid things getting out of hand.
[5’11”] Father and daughter sing of their vanishing dreams and wonder if it’s too late to rescue them.
Scene 8 [7'39"]
It’s the same afternoon at the construction site. While the foundations are in place the Architect seems no closer to knowing how, or even whether, his vision can be achieved. A fierce storm breaks and the workers look forward to an afternoon off. In the makeshift office an exhausted Engineer has yet another compromise solution rejected by his perfectionist master, but, swayed by the purity of the man’s faith, his frustration is turned to a renewed declaration of loyalty.
[12’51”] The Maestro, now a powerful member of the politically appointed overseeing committee, arrives unexpectedly. His friendly warnings about official displeasure with the speed of progress turn to sinister threats about what will happen if the Architect fails to play the political game.
[18’40”] Finally left alone, the Architect gives way to rage, self-doubt and despair. Then, while peeling an orange, an astonishingly simple solution hits him like an epiphany.
Scene 9
In 1963 a cocktail party is underway on board the royal yacht,
Britannia, which is anchored in the harbour with a view of the opera house under construction. An abundance of well- connected ladies in glittering evening dresses are among those raising their glasses in a toast to the Queen. A few of them remark on the presence of the building’s creator, who it seems has moved from ‘lunatic’ to ‘genius’ on the fickle barometer of public opinion.
[3’47”] Sky and Earth appear in socialite guise and provide an ironic commentary on the celebrities, major and minor, lining up for a brief audience with Her Majesty. Among them are a famous novelist, the Architect and an extremely handsome young Olympic champion.
We meet a leading opposition politician, who is privately lobbied by the Maestro to start the process by which the original purpose of the project can be way laid.
[8’09”] Alex, now a “rising operatic star” performs, with her husband at the piano, a specially commissioned sonnet that contrasts the city’s grubby colonial history with the timelessness of the harbour.
[12’21”] All the protagonists are galvanized by it in different ways: the Architect wonders aloud why this woman is not on the world’s stage, the Maestro appears to appoint Stephen as his orchestral heir while cementing his plans to undermine the Architect, and the Politician suddenly realises that whipping up a scandal about the building just might ensure his electoral victory.
Scene 10 [15’35”]
We jump forward two years, and in the bearpit of Parliament House, the government are under sustained attack over what’s portrayed as their mishandling of the Opera House construction. The Politician sneeringly dismisses the government minister’s attempts to revive bipartisanship on something so important for the nation’s cultural identity, and looks forward to his “new broom sweeping the stables clean”.
Scene 11 [20’01”]
Alex and Stephen, in evening dress, are returning from a Joan Sutherland concert. But it’s also election night and the Politician has won power. On learning that her husband voted for him, Alex is enraged and the row spirals out of control as it emerges that Stephen is not only putting his career ahead of hers, but is covertly acting with the Maestro to ensure the main hall of the building is prescribed for concert music only. She announces her intention to go it alone in Europe but he cynically reminds her of what that implies for their infant daughter, Clare.
Overcome by despair she grabs the car keys and flees into the night.
Scene 12 [23’56”]
An interlude describing her journey alludes musically to the Scene 4 aria before transitioning to the construction site the following morning, where a ceremony is taking place to mark the completion of the roof’s vast concrete vaults. Much to the embarrassment of the new government officials, the workers ironically unfurl their Union’s flag from the pinnacle. The spirit of “Sky” in the guise of a tour guide explains how the arches will be covered in a million white tiles, “glazed and unglazed, like snow and ice”.
[29’02”] The Architect appears and in an ill-judged stunt, throws himself at the Politician’s feet, literally begging for extra funding. His new political master is furious and the departing crowd revoice their original doubts about the foreigner’s sanity. The Engineer is also seething and it becomes clear that this farcical act has come at the peak of a serious rift between the former friends.
[32’25”] In an arioso, he expresses the dilemma of a practical mind having to make concrete another’s utopian fantasies, and tries to argue that his methodology is beautiful in its own way. The Architect’s feelings are hurt and the two depart on uneasy terms.
[35’00”] From the scaffolding in the distance, the strains of the “Britannia” aria are heard. The Architect recognises the voice as Alexandra’s and, as the clearly distraught woman is escorted from the hazard zone by wolf-whistling workers, kindly takes her aside. All too aware of the absurdity of her operatic “mad scene”, she expresses how she was “possessed” by the Architect’s vision but now despairs that her dream has been killed. Having encountered her husband on the Opera House Committee, the Architect guesses the source of tension.
[40’08”] He imparts to her his idealistic belief that all such obstacles shall melt away in the face of those “gifts” that need to be shared with humanity, and she finds comfort and rekindled optimism.
Scene 13
It’s 1966. In a secret meeting the Politician manipulates the disenchanted Engineer to betray his former comrade, and tells him to wait in another room while he confronts the Architect over the perceived lack of progress.
[5’21”] The Architect storms in, glad of this opportunity to resolve the current impasse, but is greeted by his adversary’s blunt refusal of his request for extra funding to finance a prototype of his radical interior designs. The Politician announces his intention to strip the Architect of his authority and have him function instead within a team of government appointees, fully expecting to receive one of the Dane’s habitual resignation threats. When it comes, the Politician greedily accepts it and his opponent is cornered. Efforts to convey how much the public will love his opera house are met with vulgar contempt for him and the value of artistic endeavour. The Architect vows to leave what he sees as a soulless country and never return.
Scene 14
It’s 1973 and the Sydney Opera House is complete, 15 years after work commenced. For seven of those years the Architect has been entirely divorced from the project, and his current local reputation is that of a utopian who lacked the practical skills to follow through. Alex, now an internationally acclaimed soprano, is in one of the building’s dressing rooms with her proud mum, dad and 11-year-old daughter. They are there to wish her well prior to the inaugural performance in the Opera Theatre, the smaller of the two halls. She is still married to Stephen and it becomes clear that he has followed her to Europe and achieved some success conducting her performances.
[2’50”] A chuffed and charming Maestro, about to front the opening orchestral concert in the major hall, stops by and Alex expresses her profound disappointment with what should have been her triumphant return. The place in which she dreamed of singing has been compromised and traduced. His patronising and chilling response prompts her to imperiously dismiss him and decide to dedicate her performance to proving such critics wrong. After reading a cryptic message “from Denmark” she takes her place on stage as an Aztec princess in doomed love with a sacrificial warrior.
Scene 15 [7’20”]
The (fictional) opera “The Feathered Serpent” reprises the music of Scene 2 with the tenor part replaced by soprano. Near its climax, the Architect appears, ghostlike, as an embodiment of the soul of his building. He revoices his observation about the ancient temple: “Whoever dreamt all this, dreams on in each stone; in its stone heart, the dreamer’s heart still beats”.