This weekend, Long Beach Opera will host its first film festival, where the intersection of film and opera will be explored through a mixture of live performances and digital media.
The festival is the first its kind for Long Beach Opera, Creative Director James Darrah said. He co-curated the show with curator Bradford Nordeen in hopes of highlighting the importance and history of opera and film through short films, documentaries, live music and dancing performances, pre-recorded music—and of course, live opera.
“I really believe that the next frontier for opera is in digital media and film and sort of thinking about ways to reach people through the use of television and film,” Darrah said. “Opera is a place where all the arts collide and I think it should include film and cinema more.”
It’s the necessary next step for the medium, Darrah explained, as opera has evolved over time to include pre-recorded music, sound effects and projection design. The two-day event will feature 12 hours of programming, including a handful of unreleased films that will be premiering at the festival.
To curate the program for the festival, Darrah and Nordeen had to learn more about each other’s craft in order to find films that honored opera’s history, properly utilized the film format, included “operatic experiences,” and stayed true to LBO’s mission of creating “innovative and exploratory opera” for all communities.
“So it’s kind of intentionally pulling performances from other mediums and you know, other communities and other, I would say artistic mediums and outlets, and sort of inviting them to make work within the operatic space,” Darrah explained. “And that feels really exciting, just to think about inviting artists in a genre they’ve never really been invited to be part of. Letting them create within that space is an exciting, exciting beginning.”
Long Beach Opera will be premiering the film “Entry” on Sunday, which they commissioned last year in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The short film follows the journey of a woman struggling to reenter the world following the pandemic and was made with local Native directors, composers and a poet and dancer whom the film follows.
“Entry” uses various mediums—dance, poetry, electronic music, operatic sopranos and different instruments—and was made by the Native collaborators taking full creative reign in order to create “an authentic” story.
“Long Beach also is on Tongva land, and I’m excited that this is the first step in creating a more meaningful partnership with our Native communities, as well as artists and artisans and makers who are in those communities,” Darrah said. “‘Entry’ was really made with that as the guiding principle. We tried to think of a way to generate something that is an opera, but was written by somebody who doesn’t write traditional opera who had never been invited in that space.”
Ron Athey, who specializes in extreme performance art and body art, will be premiering his 10-minute short film “Pasiphaë” which will include a live performance piece. Athey is one of three live performances slated for Saturday, however his is the only that invites the public to participate.
Athey will lead performers—and anyone else who chooses to participate—in a pageant wrapping around 4th Street leading up to the premiere of his film. Performers will be donning “gowns and gear” from Athey’s 30-year performance archive, and participants are invited to dress in “fancy or kink” wear, flowers, herbs and any “small instruments” of their choosing, according to the festival’s press release.
Another live performance, which Darrah recalled as “one of the most electrifying live performances I’ve seen,” will feature a live piano composition from Dorian Wood of Teo Hernandez’s “Salomé” soundtrack.
The festival will show more than 10 other short films, documentaries and music videos, many of which feature modern twists or retellings of classic stories.
“I’m excited for people that might come to this that have never been to an opera before … or people from the art world who follow Ron [Athey] or Dorian [Wood’s] work, like I want them to come to this and realize that Long Beach Opera is a home for everyone ready to make art that pushes boundaries,” Darrah said.
Long Beach Opera’s inaugural Film Festival will take place at The Art Theatre in Long Beach at 2025 E 4th Street on Saturday, July 16 from noon to midnight and Sunday, July 17 from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets ($45) can be purchased at the company’s website for individual days ($45 for Saturday and $30 for Sunday), although current LBO subscribers will receive free access to both days.
