Francesca Zambello

talking about

The Fiery Angel

"The first piece of classical music I knew by heart was Peter and the Wolf from a scratchy 33rpm recording that I wore out as I directed a version of the classical tale in our living room at age seven.

I used all my friends to perform not only all the characters, but also the trees and all the other animals. We designed and built the forest and the animal costumes, and we even created our own special effects.

So, subconsciously and consciously, I have been fascinated by Prokofiev's work throughout my life.

When asked to direct The Fiery Angel for the Bolshoi, I marvelled at how amazing it was to think that now, after almost eighty years, the composer's work would arrive on his own doorstep.

Having directed a number of Prokofiev’s other works, I was drawn to The Fiery Angel because of its uninhibited explorations of passion and obsession. I have always thought that Renata's driven nature places her clearly outside conventional society.

Some would consider her unnatural - crazy or possessed - yet I found her passions to be like those of an artist. I believe Prokofiev identified with her personally, seeing himself as an outsider to the changing world around him.

The world surrounding Renata represents the ‘evil’ world of mediocrity, group mentality and oppressive forces, while her mind and visions are one with the notion of the individual, the original, and the creative soul.

With my collaborators Tanya Noginova and George Tsypin, we chose to look back to the world of Russia or the USSR at the time when Prokofiev wrote this work. He left for exile in the 1920s and left behind a world upturned by obsessive passions, a society torn by powers of questionable good and evil. We sensed this context would connect us to the complex themes Prokofiev was grappling with as he confronted the surrealistic journey of Renata."

Francesca Zambello