Rigoletto on Film: A Century of Verdi's Jester at the Movies

Verdi's 'Rigoletto' first reached the screen in 1918, as a Hungarian silent film, and its film history has been stranger than most. OperaWire's four-part series on opera and cinema turns to the jester in its second instalment, tracing adaptations that range from Italian melodrama to an independent Canadian bluegrass musical.

The wider context matters here. Certain operas attracted filmmakers early and often. Bizet's 'Carmen' hit screens as the silent film 'Gypsy Blood' in 1920. Leoncavallo's 'I Pagliacci' followed in 1915, Offenbach's 'The Tales of Hoffmann' in 1923, and Verdi's 'La Traviata' via George Cukor's 'Camille' in 1936. Others got one shot and vanished: Lukas Foss's 'Griffelkin' (1955), Manuel Moreno's 'El gato montés' (1916), and Smetana's 'Dalibor' (1868).

When did Verdi reach the screen?

The earliest Verdi film, per the OperaWire survey, was the Italian silent 'Otello' (1906). The American silent 'Aida' (1911) and the Hungarian films 'Masked Ball' (1917) and 'Rigoletto' (1918) followed. Cukor's 'Camille' (1936) opened the gates for sound-era Verdi, and post-WWII Italian cinema embraced him fully.

Carlo Celli and Marga Cottino-Jones note that Italian pre-WWII cinema was saturated with melodrama and opera-based musicals. The three most popular opera melodramas all arrived in 1953 — 'Verdi: King of Melody,' 'Puccini,' and 'Aida' — each starring famous singers of the day. Director Carmine Gallone anchored the trend, with the biofilm 'Giuseppe Verdi' (1938) and 'The Young Caruso' (1951).

The writer's own verdict on the modern era is blunt: 'there doesn't seem to be any corollaries to Bonnard and Gallone within the 21st-century.'

What are the five Rigoletto films?

The non-opera adaptations span nearly a century and several countries:

• The King's Jester (Il re si diverte, 1941) — Mario Bonnard's Italian film, the first non-opera take.
• Rigoletto (1946) — Carmine Gallone's version, featuring prominent singers including Tito Gobbi, Mario Filippeschi, Lina Pagliughi and Anna Canali.
• Rigoletto and his Tragedy (1956) — Flavio Calzavara's continuation, sharing actors Aldo Silvani and Renato Chiantoni with the 1941 film.
• Rick (2003) — Curtiss Clayton's American update with Sandra Oh, which 'went generally unnoticed.'
• Rigoletto... in Bluegrass (2006) — Rob Swales's Canadian indie, recasting the jester as a folk musician.

The 1941 and 1956 films stay close to Francesco Maria Piave's libretto while adding heightened fictional drama. The 2003 and 2006 films take opposite liberties: 'Rick' 'failed to keep what made Verdi's opera legendary through explosive dramatics and uncontrolled mania,' while the bluegrass version's 'unpolished nature' undercuts it — 'it's an endearing project!' the writer concedes.

What about filmed opera versus adaptation?

The series treats both categories under one umbrella. Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's internationally acclaimed filmed 'Rigoletto' (1982) restored the opera's screen currency, in a decade that also produced Zeffirelli's 'La Traviata' (1982) and 'Otello' (1986), Dario Argento's 'Terror at the Opera' (1987), and Claude d'Anna's 'Macbeth' (1987).

The 2011 'Rigoletto from Mantua' was 'possibly one of the closest realizations of Verdi's opera.' Leo D. Paur's 1993 family film sanitizes the tragedy so radically that the writer finds it 'hardly' an adaptation at all. Even the record itself has gaps: the writer warns that other adaptations and filmed productions sit outside the historical record, and open-source lists 'ought to be double-checked.'

Where does Verdi go from here?

Screen interest in Verdi slowed after the 2000s, with films borrowing his music — 'Wall Street' (1987), Woody Allen's 'Match Point' (2005) — rather than adapting the operas. William Friedkin staged a new 'Rigoletto' in 2015 for the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Theatre, but that's theatre, not film.

With opera-based projects like Tom Ford's 'Cry to Heaven' and Pablo Larraín's 'Maria' stirring fresh energy, the writer argues it's time for a new cycle of Verdi adaptations — while doubting current directors can follow Zeffirelli and Rosi. 'Maybe we need good ol' patience.'

By Grace Kim