Les implications du travestissement dans I Capuleti e i Montecchi de Vincenzo Bellini

Abstract

My concern for transvestite parts stems from the Shakespearean drama conventions in which all female roles were performed by young men and apprentice boys for decency’s sake. Bellini and Felice Romani, his librettist, were certainly not influenced by the English bard, but by a common source, book 4 of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, when they composed the score and lyrics of their opera in the 1820s. According to baroque Italian operatic conventions, the part of the lover should have been performed by a castrato so that his voice could merge perfectly with that of the soprano heroine. However Bellini preferred a female singer, Giuditta Grisi, who specialised in a repertoire of young male lovers called musico, to play against her own sister, Giulia, as Julietta. Both women met with great success as appears from contemporary reviews, which praise their vocal performances but ignore the change from the tradition of the castrato, as well as the physicality of the show. An analysis of some photographs from a series of recent productions of the opera sheds some light on this visual dimension and on the choices made by several stage directors in their own approach to the opera.