Bold new opera reimagines ‘Old Man and the Sea’

As colleagues in the city’s arts community, Opera Columbus General Director and CEO Julia Noulin-Mérat and Wexner Center for the Arts Executive Director Gaëtane Verna discovered they had a shared love of opera.

That connection helped forge a close partnership between the two organizations. Together with Ohio State’s Office of Academic Affairs, they’ll soon present an operatic reimagining of Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea in October at Mershon Auditorium.

Produced by national opera presenter Beth Morrison Projects, the work also has received critical support from the College of Arts and Sciences. Department of Dance PhD student Sidra Bell is collaborating closely with the presenter. Eric Gibson, opera stage director at the School of Music, organized auditions for the beginning of the school year to select a chorus of Ohio State students and alumni. They’ll learn the show in about 10 days, Wex Performing Arts Producer Elena Perantoni says.

“The moment I saw the pitch for ‘The Old Man and the Sea’ at a conference, I immediately texted Gaëtane and said, ‘I found the perfect first opera for us to collaborate on,’” Noulin-Mérat recalls. “It feels more like an immersive art installation than a traditional opera.”

“I was very impressed with her way of rethinking and developing a younger audience for opera,” Verna says. “We’ve been working on different ways to support students and faculty. And this community chorus idea, which I really love, continues the work that our Learning and Public Programs Department has been doing with the School of Music.” Another example: the ongoing gallery performance series Counterpoints.

The unique staging features video projections, treadmills, a rowing machine, multiple pools of water and moving scenery. “The stage picture changes throughout,” Perantoni says. “The performers are the ones transforming the space.”