An Interview with Stage Director David Gately who has recently completed his 27th Opera in Canada - Bizet's Carmen.

Stage Director - David Gately Interview

Calgary, April 2007

Calgary Opera (www.calgaryopera.com)

Opera Bizet's Carmen

By: Kindah Mardam Bey

Nothing appears to be more depressing, in a good way, then a person who appears youthful (even rakish) and has become and auteur in their field; amassing a resume that would wallpaper rooms. David Gately, stage director extravaganza, has accomplished such a task, with charm, pragmatism, ease and essence. The world of Opera can be a somewhat quicksand existence, anyone who loves opera often is an ardent supporter of traditionalism and frowns severely upon change. However, with only a couple dozen traditional Operas that North America has seemed to embrace, it is the task of the singers and the director to make the well trod path anew.

Gately has run the gammit of those traditional Operas and delved into innumerable Musical theatre classics as well, but he has managed to etch a name out for himself as one who walks that delicate balance between the traditional and the inventive; this is where his effortless appeal is most apparent. While Gately prepped for a production of Bizet’s Carmen for the Calgary Opera (Alberta, Canada) I was fortunate enough to catchup with Gately in the Opera Companies new building and discuss such subjects as the realm of traditionalism in Opera, the emergence of new Opera, North American comparative to European Opera, and most of all the thought of embarrassing confessions about Altar-Boy-Boy-Bands!

Originally America’s North West was where Gately was born and raised; Portland, Oregon to be precise. It was in Cleveland Ohio, at Oberlin College of Liberal Arts where Gately majored in theatre that he found he had a talent for directing. Although being a stage director for musicals and opera was perhaps not Gately’s passion from birth he is a natural evolutionist and believes that was is meant to be will occur naturally. Following his own flow of life, he seemed to be directing more productions until a Stage Director for the New York City Opera noticed Gately’s talent and recommended Gately to pursue the art of directing. The Stage Director aided in a blossoming talent by getting Gately assistant director jobs, ‘and the rest is history,’ Gately asseses ‘I always say ‘Opera chose me, I didn’t choose it. I didn’t know languages, repertoire, I wasn’t prepped for the opera world, I really had to learn on my feet, but one thing led to another and I’ve really never had to do anything else.’

Gately continues ‘My philosophy about life is that I’ll go where life leads me, I never really had a master plan, I believe this has made me pretty happy because I believe you can be restricted and frustrated if you set goals or milestones for yourself and you can’t get there. I just said ‘let’s just see what happens and it has led me to a great amount of happiness.’

  I suspect it is this crossover between the practical and surrendering that has made Gately a sought after director of the stage. Gately lives in Saettle now, but does productions across the United States and Canada. He has done eleven productions for the Vancouver Opera company alone, and is his 27^th production up in Canada. Gately confirms ‘I consider Canada to be a second home for me.’

With such an amassed collective of productions, really if you name a popular operatic production or Broadway musical, chances are Gately has it on his resume, I felt inclined to ask more about the differences between Canadian and American productions. David Gately tells me ‘The US is bigger and has a lot more levels; they have a lot of smaller companies where people can really get started, which doesn’t occur so much in Canada. If you are in a company in Canada you are already at a very high level of expertise and it doesn’t so much allow room for the newcomer trying to break in. However, on the flip side those who do work in Canada in opera companies appear to be the cream of the crop because there is such a small margin to work within. Especially French speaking Quebec, there are only four or five companies within that province, so I have discovered some fantastic artisans in Quebec working for relatively small companies. The technical level in Canada is first rate, and the US seems to be more encompassing, but other then that, whether we are Canadian or American members of the Opera world, we all seem to draw from the same pool of singers and people all the time. We are a small community in the world of opera and you tend to see similar faces all the time.’ 

Then Gately tells me something of great interest, not is there a large comparison between US and Canadian opera companies, as there is between North American and European. Gately explains further ‘it is a much greater difference between North American Opera and European Opera. Here we are much more traditional in what we want to see on the stage. In Europe you would be booed for the traditional and over-revisited operas. I’ve done little work in Europe, but they are pushing a lot of boundaries and experimenting a lot in Europe.’ 

I see a great enthusiasm emerge from Gately when discussing the way of Opera in the future, so I let him continue ‘for example, there is a new general director of the New York City Opera who is known for doing outlandish productions in Europe, so I look forward to seeing what he’ll bring to the more conservative repertoire of the New York City Opera.’

According to Gately’s estimation, North American opera is on the verge of being infused with some of the more contemporary pulse of European productions. Gately says ‘Opera is going in an exciting direction, particularly in the last few years. Opera was a dead art form and it was hard to get new works performed, but now everywhere companies are trying to bring in newer productions, by doing this the art form will be enlivened and people will be drawn to it. Composers will be able to get their music performed, whereas before it was virtually impossible. Even five years ago if you said new productions were going to be showcased I’d say you were crazy, but a definite trend has formed quite quickly. This is perhaps a change in regime; newer, younger people in the companies looking to reform the old, I can’t put my finger on it exactly, I’m just very pleased it is happening.’ 

A key example that springs to my mind, and that Gately postulates himself is Adamo’s Little Women, Gately explains ‘Little Women is part of the standard repetoire now, even though it was created less than twenty years ago. It is an easy sell because we all know and love the story of Little Women, it is an instance of a brand new piece becoming an instant classic making; this will make producers more adventuresome and allow for newer productions and ideas.’

With such new productions just starting to emerge, where does the traditional production land? Gately seems to have a strong understanding of traditionalism without irreverence, which affords him that walk along the fine line I mentioned earlier between the traditional and inventive. ‘I really listen to the piece and let the music lead me. If I end up going into an offbeat direction, or if my approach is traditional, it’s not because I’m trying to be traditional, it’s because that is what is speaking to me in the piece. I’m very text oriented and I always delve heavily into the text…particularly with something like Carmen which is rich in storyline and so much drama. I really try to respond to what is there. Then it depends on what the production is, if it is new, then the designers you work with, and that sort of thing. I have some new productions coming up that are very far away from traditional.’

Sadly a large part of changing the realm of Opera has a less romantic and creative element to it; production value is of key importance to the future look of Opera ‘with a rental production I’m stuck with what I’m given. Companies can’t do all new productions because they can’t afford it because opera is so expensive; costumes, sets and multiple performers to name but a few. So a whole system of rentals and companies who own sets is organized and quite often the sets are traditional because that is easier to rent out then a newer set for a newer production. It’s simply against my own grain to do something non-traditional on a traditional set. I always think traditional has a bad connotation to it, as if it is boring or the same, I personally don’t think that when I approach a piece that is traditional, I believe I can still take an interesting approach to it and make it, its own. When people ask me if my productions are traditional I will normally say no, but that doesn’t mean they are set on Mars either!’

We discuss Gately’s style of directing ‘I am a storyteller; that is what I do. Telling the story clearly and logically so that the audience has a clear understanding is where I seek to be in the process of directing,’ and what Gately prefers to direct in the case of opera ‘I prefer opera post 1900, they have better librettos, but I also love a lot of the contemporary operas. Pieces I’d love to do would be Benjamin Britten’s operas like Peter Grimes, Billy Budd or Janacek operas like The Makropulos Affair, which don’t get done very much which I’d love to revisit them.’ He also explains the best and worst parts of his creative job description ‘early rehearsals are the most exciting part of the work I do, especially when you work with others who are likeminded; for me that is the most gratifying part. Working out the story with the performers in rehearsals is so gratifying. The work prior to the rehearsals where you are trying to figure out your approach is the worst. It is like a writer, and can be a lonely experience; you sit in a room on your own and try to flesh it out.’

 David Gately may have been chosen for Opera instead of searching it out himself, but it is clear enough to me in this brief interaction that he has the heart of Opera inside all that he directs. As in opera, and so too in life, David Gately seems to follow a natural journey and with the statement ‘I do my thing, I do my best, and the chips will fall where they may,’ you know he is on the right path.

David Gately Recommends Armistead Maupin’s Series Tales Of The City: ‘I read about seventy books a year, I’m a veracious reader, but I do love the series of books by Armistad Maupin called Tales of the City. They were wrote in the 1970s/1980s and compiled into six books that follow the same characters over six years. It follows the beginnings of the AIDS crisis; the first book is witty and light and as the books progress they become dark as the characters start to die off. It is an amazing series of books, but that series affected me a great deal. Make sure you read them in order! Tales Of The City is the first one.’

David Gately Recommends The Altar Boyz Musical Soundtrack: ‘I can’t even tell you what I’m listening to right now because it is so embarrassing! It is so embarrassing, and I will say it anyway because this CD I’ve been listening to puts me in the most wonderful mood. The Altar Boyz, is a musical about a catholic boy band, having been raised a catholic and yet the music is very ABBA, very cheerful, how can you listen to that and not be happy! I have about 3500 musical comedy songs on my IPod, so that is my genre of preference. I can’t listen to opera on my IPod, it is too much like work! I’m too busy analyzing it.’

For More About David Gately’s Productions, including upcoming ones go to his website at: www.davidgately.com