Image via River Road Entertainment via Buzzfeed.
The beloved short story (and the equally hot 2005 movie) Brokeback Mountain is getting the musical treatment. Opening at Madrid’s Teatro Real at the end of the month, the show will run through February 11th. Thanks to composer Charles Wuorinen and Annie Proulx who both brought the short story to life. Don’t expect any hokey Western tunes, the show is actually an opera that makes few alterations to the original story and includes the operatic voices of Canadian bass-baritone Daniel Okulitch and tenor Thomas Randle.
Wuorinen creates a grittier atmosphere. The story and characters have been tightly condensed by Proulx, a ghost and a chorus have been added, and nature itself introduced as the underlying element of the narrative. Wuorinen’s score evokes the mountains with its swells and strains, bringing to life the harshly imposing Wyoming landscape from which the story was born.