Trivia / Tosca

• All-Star Cast: Tosca has had many famous opera singers recording and performing on stage together as Tosca, Cavaradossi, and Scarpia:
  • Recordings:
    • 1953, conducted by Victor de Sabata: Greek soprano Maria Callas as Tosca, and Italians Giuseppe Di Stefano and Tito Gobbi as Cavaradossi and Scarpia, respectively.
    • 1957, conducted by Erich Leinsdorf: Croatian soprano Zinka Milanov as Tosca, Swedish tenor Jussi Bjoerling as Cavaradossi, and American baritone Leonard Warren as Scarpia.
    • 1963 Decca recording, conducted by Herbert von Karajan: African-American soprano Leontyne Price as Tosca^note at her young age she'd already mastered the part, she'd already done it on TV back in the '50s and southern stations tried to keep it off the air, Giuseppe di Stefano as Mario^note his acting here much better than his singing and Giuseppe Taddei^note smooth and urbane as ever as Scarpia. One of the most beautiful orchestral renditions by the Vienna Philharmonic.
    • 1964 EMI recording, conducted by Georges Prêtre: Maria Callas as Tosca^note in vocal decline by this time, but superb acting, Carlo Bergonzi as Mario^note at the top of his game, he sounds positively lush and Tito Gobbi^note what, him again? as Scarpia.
    • 1966, conducted by Lorin Maazel: Swedish soprano Birgit Nilsson as Tosca, Italian tenor Franco Corelli as Cavaradossi, and German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau^note best known for subtle nuance, with a velvety, lyric-baritone voice, but here he's frighteningly cold, menacing and downright nasty as Scarpia.
    • 1972, conducted by Zubin Mehta: Leontyne as Tosca, Spanish tenor Plácido Domingo as Cavaradossi, and American baritone Sherrill Milnes as Scarpia.
  • Films/Productions:
    • Benoît Jacquot's 2001 film casts Romanian soprano Angela Gheorghiu as Tosca, French tenor Roberto Alagna as Cavaradossi, and Italian bass-baritone Ruggero Raimondi as Scarpia.
    • Gianfranco De Bosio's 1976 film casts Bulgarian soprano Raina Kabaivanska as Tosca, Spanish tenor Plácido Domingo as Cavaradossi, and American baritone Sherill Milnes as Scarpia.
    • The famous 1992 film by Brian Large (a performance that takes place at the exact locations and times of day according to the libretto) casts American soprano Catherine Malfitano as Tosca, Plácido Domingo as Cavaradossi, and Ruggero Raimondi as Scarpia.
• Corpsing: Literally in this case. Even in this intensely tragic melodrama, sometimes things just happen. Maria Callas was blind as a bat without her glasses and in one production the set was so damn dark after Tosca kills Scarpia that at the premiere she found herself literally bumbling around trying to find her way off the stage. Tito Gobbi (who was supposed to be dead) gallantly tried to discreetly point to the exit, but started giggling, which set her off, along with people in the front row. In subsequent performances he was able to whisper some directions to her.
• Dawson Casting: This isn't as bad as other examples in opera, since Tosca is at least twenty according to Sardou's play, but she's still generally played by singers with a lot of experience under their belts.
• Fanvid: Tosca as seen by Lerner and Loewe is a culture-jamming Genre Mashup setting music and dialogue from My Fair Lady to the old Covent Garden film of Tosca's Act II with Maria Callas and Tito Gobbi. Not only brilliantly funny, it got compliments from Cecile Gobbi, who wrote to the creator to say her dad would have loved it.
• Fatal Method Acting: While there have been no confirmed fatalities connected with Tosca, there have been plenty of injuries over the years, to the point where people talk about a Tosca curse:
  • Scarpias have been stabbed for real with malfunctioning prop knives (This happened, for instance, to Maria Callas' longtime co-performer Tito Gobbi).
  • Cavaradossis have been struck by shrapnel from prop guns. See an agonizing example here (at 1:58).
    • This was Fabio Armiliato, who had recently been grazed by a sword in Carmen. He refused to cancel subsequent performances and continued with crutches for the next one. While he was waiting backstage to come in for Act II, he fell and broke the other leg.
    • Gianni Raimondi was another firing squad casualty. A misfiring gun left him with facial burns.
    • A very early performance with Lina Cavalieri is said to have ended with the tenor playing Cavaradossi actually being killed. Cavalieri apparently reacted calmly and called for help. This all may be an Urban Legend.
  • Toscas have missed the mattress in the final jump. Poor Elisabeth Knighton Printy, for instance, fell thirty feet and broke both her legs, her pelvis and ribs.
  • Placido Domingo fell off the ladder of the painter's scaffold and crashed against the wall of the Attavanti Chapel. He was okay, other than a broken nose. Well, that and it was on live television.
• Heartwarming Moments: At curtain calls on the final night of performances for Tosca at the San Francisco Opera, Sept. 5, 2021, Soloman Howard, who played Angelotti, held up his hand to ask the audience to hold their applause for a minute. He then knelt in front of an astonished Ailyn Pérez, that night's Tosca, and asked her to marry him. Amid cheers and applause, she fervently accepted.
• Throw It In!: One night on stage, the famous soprano Maria Jeritza tripped and fell, just before Tosca's great aria Vissi d'arte. Rather than climb awkwardly back up again to sing, she chose to remain on the floor for the duration of the aria. This worked so well that it has become traditional that Tosca sings Vissi d'arte while lying on the floor.
  • Similarly, the aforementioned stabbed Scarpias did very realistic death scenes. When Antonio Scotti was stabbed by Maria Jeritza back in The Roaring '20s at the Old Met, his cries of pain were real. And when Tito Gobbi was stabbed by Maria Callas, he acted out his death scene with his own blood.
  • Gobbi doesn't say where or when, but as Callas was shoved by a guard, she fell backwards over a small step behind her. Gobbi gave her a quick "are you okay?" look, she looked back reassuringly, and the two of them proceeded to use it. He held out his hand to her. She went for it, clutching his arm and pleading "Salvatelo"! (Save him!) He responded "Io? Voi!" (I? You!) and dropped her.
  Whereupon she dropped back despairingly on the ground with such apparent helplessness and pathos that a slight gasp of indignant sympathy ran through the house. She needed no instructions, no hint of what was in my mind theatrically speaking. She knew and made the perfect completion of what I had started. With Maria it was not performing but living.
• Troubled Production: Sir David McVicar's production at the Met Opera for the 2017-18 season turned out to be this.
  • First off, this production was set to replace 2009's notoriously godawful Luc Bondy abortion with its Brutalist sets and crude sexual antics. The pressure was on everybody, big time, to give the public a return to the classic story in all its splendor. The designers went out of their way to create an experience of beauty as well as historical accuracy. Fine so far. Then things started going pear-shaped:
    • Jonas Kaufmann, the original Cavaradossi, withdrew only weeks after the production was announced, and was replaced by Vittorio Grigòlo, who had never sung Cavaradossi before.
    • Then, Kristine Opolais, the original Tosca, withdrew a few months later for personal reasons, and was replaced by Sonya Yoncheva, who had never sung Tosca before.
    • After that, Andris Nelsons, the original conductor and Opolais' then-husband, also dropped out. James Levine was then planning to replace him when his career was abruptly destroyed in a major sexual abuse scandal, resulting in Emmanuel Villaume to take over.
    • And lastly, Bryn Terfel, scheduled to play Scarpia, withdrew due to apparent vocal fatigue, and was replaced by Zeljko Lucic. At least he had some experience with the role. Fortunately all went well once the dust settled. Sir David's production is still playing at the Metropolitan in 2022 and is loved for its "extravagance and historical accuracy".
  • Another Troubled Production occurred soon after the premiere, when the great Neapolitan conductor Leopoldo Mugnone took a dislike to the tenor playing Cavaradossi. He couldn't fire him, because he'd been engaged by Puccini's publisher, Ricordi, who were extremely powerful and exerted a lot of control. So Mugnone put up with the guy until the night of the general dress rehearsal^note a run-through of the entire work with the technicians, crew and cast (in full costume) doing it exactly the way they will at performances, this is to smooth out any last-minute problems. As the firing squad came in, Mugnone shouted: "HEY! SERGEANT!! USE LIVE BULLETS!!!"
• Write Who You Know: Tosca the character is a singer, and she's obviously played on stage by a singer. We only have to assume that she doesn't sing all the time when she's not at work.