RIVERSIDE THEATRES AND BLUSH OPERA PRESENTs

a new australian opera by julie koh & paul smith

CHop chef

>> press release

concept and story by paul smith & julie koh

Librettist Julie Koh
Composer Paul Smith
Directors Kenneth Moraleda & Nicole Pingon
Conductor Luke Spicer Set & Costume Designer Keerthi Subramanyam
Lighting Designer Kate Baldwin
Video Designer Susie Henderson
Production Manager Tyler Fitzpatrick
Stage Manager Hannah Crane
Deputy Stage Manager Chris Starnawski
Creative Consultant Courtney Stewart
Guest Conductor Harrison Collins

The MasterChef meets Hunger Games satirical opera Chop Chef is the quirky brainchild of author Julie Koh and composer Paul Smith

Chop Chef is an ensemble opera in which six contestants from around Australia enter the cooking battlefield of a fictional reality television series Chop Chef. Faced with unusual and extreme cooking challenges, Kitty (Jermaine Chau), Tom, (Benjamin Caulkwell) Andy (Gavin Brown), Victoria (Ayako Ohtake), Kale (Nicholas Geddes) and Renée (Lisa Cooper) must compete to remain alive in the game and avoid facing the chop – literally.

Three omipresent judges (David Hidden) presiding over the shiny kitchen arena will decide the fate of each contestant — but not all is as it seems. Perhaps the tables will turn…

Composer Paul Smith mashes together the driving sonic world of MasterChef and Hunger Games on the operatic stage where reality television can be pushed to its absurd conclusions. In mind blending arias and melodramatic ensembles, each contestant is pushed to their limit and will stop at nothing to be the last chef standing. In the game of Chop Chef, there is only one rule – eat or be eaten. Are you ready to join our live audience?

Blush Opera is one of Sydney’s most fun-loving boutique opera companies, out to make opera going a serious pastime for future generations. The artistic partnership between directors Jermaine Chau and Paul Smith has been thriving on the festival circuit since 2015. Their unique blend of humour, theatricality and great storytelling makes old fashioned opera new again.

NOTES FOR presenters

Duration 90min (and 20min interval)

Age M15+

Genre satirical opera

Instrumentation 6 voices + chamber ensemble

Chop Chef satirises racist and cultural attitudes and tropes, and therefore contains material that may be confronting to some audience members. This production includes strong language, adult themes, misogyny, sexual references, suicide and death.

Performance History

Premiere 22—24 April 2021, Riverside Theatre, Parramatta

CONTACT DETAILS

For media information and interviews contact Jermaine Chau
blushopera.sydney@gmail.com  // 0438 128 336

>> reviews

“The setting in a cooking competition studio allows extended fun with not just culinary obsession and television “reality”, but also racial and sexual stereotypes, and operatic musical forms with extended arias, satisfying choruses, and women, and the world, dying at the end. ~ Michael Symon Meals Matter

“The entire cast is rich with natural talent, not only vocally but they, with the work of their directors Kenneth Moraleda and Nicole Pingon, have created incredibly well-rounded portrayals, with the actors working so well individually and as a cohort. This cast work together, and it really is one of the biggest highlights of the show.” ~ Kathryn Thomas Theatre Travels

Keerthi Subramanyam’s cleverly designed minimalist set created the impression of a kitchen (without the mess) and the cast’s simple but extremely effective gestures of cooking added a strong sense of action to the small stage. ~ Pepe Newton Classikon

>> ARTISTS’ RATIONALE

Opera companies around the world attempt to solve the issue of diversity by employing their notion of ‘colourblind casting’, where a Madama Butterfly can be sung by an African American woman in the role of the Japanese girl Cio-Cio-San. To me, this does not solve the problem of the narrative—her words, her decisions and her destiny are still written by Western men. We realise that no amount of interpretation and reinterpretation can change these classics. There will always be inherent racism and misogyny baked into the work, so we need a more radical approach. We must write new operas now. What happens if the words of an opera are written by a woman, and that woman is Asian? ~ Jermaine Chau, Co-Artistic Director of Blush Opera

Read more here:

https://www.liminalmag.com/5-questions/chop-chef

CHOP CHEF IS THE FIRST OPERA WRITTEN BY AWARD WINNING AUSTRALIAN AUTHOR JULIE KOH

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