''The Temptation of St. Anthony'' is an opera rooted in the gospel tradition based on the novel '' The Temptation of Saint Anthony'' by

Gustave Flaubert Gustave Flaubert ( , , ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. Highly influential, he has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flauber ...

, directed by Robert Wilson with book, libretto and music by

Bernice Johnson Reagon Bernice Johnson Reagon (born Bernice Johnson on October 4, 1942) is a song leader, composer, scholar, and social activist, who in the early 1960s was a founding member of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee's (SNCC) Freedom Singers in t ...

and costumes by

Geoffrey Holder Geoffrey Lamont Holder (August 1, 1930 – October 5, 2014) was a Trinidadian-American actor, dancer, musician, and artist. He was a principal dancer for the Metropolitan Opera Ballet before his film career began in 1957 with an appearance in ' ...

. The production debuted in June 2003 as part of the

Ruhrtriennale The Ruhrtriennale (compound of ''Ruhr'' and ''triennale'' "lasting 3 years"), also known as Ruhr Triennale, was founded in 2002 and is a music and arts festival in the Ruhr-area of Germany which runs between mid-August and mid-October, and happens ...

festival in Duisburg Germany with

Carl Hancock Rux Carl Hancock Rux () is an American poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, recording artist, journalist, curator and conceptual installation artist working in text, dance, ritualized performance, audio, video, and photography. Described in the NY T ...

as Saint

Anthony Anthony or Antony is a masculine given name, derived from the ''Antonia (gens), Antonii'', a ''gens'' (Roman naming conventions, Roman family name) to which Mark Antony (''Marcus Antonius'') belonged. According to Plutarch, the Antonii gens were ...

and Helga Davis as Helarion. Subsequent performances included the Greek Theater in Siracusa, Italy; the Festival di Peralada in Peralada, Spain; the Palacio de Festivales de Cantabria in Santander, Spain; and Sadler's Wells in London, Great Britain; the

Teatro Piccinni Teatro Piccinni is a theatre in the city of Bari, Apulia on the east coast of Italy. It was founded in 1854 and opened on 30 May of that year. It was named in honor of eighteenth-century composer Niccolò Piccinni Niccolò Piccinni (; 16 J ...

Bari Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy a ...

, Italy; the Het Muziektheater in Amsterdam, Netherlands; the Teatro Arriaga in Bilbao and the Teatro Espanol in Madrid, Spain. The opera made its American premiere at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's BAM Next Wave Festival in October 2004. The official "world premiere" was held at the

Paris Opera The Paris Opera (, ) is the primary opera and ballet company of France. It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the , and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and officially renamed the , but continued to be ...

Garnier becoming the first all African American opera to perform on its stage since the inauguration of the Académie Nationale de Musique - Théâtre de l'Opéra in 1875.

References

Operas 2003 operas English-language operas Operas based on novels Operas based on works by Gustave Flaubert Cultural depictions of Anthony the Great {{English-opera-stub