Tempo Sketch Artists: Thomas Boguszewski

Tempo invites sketch artists to dress rehearsals at MNOpera to create an artistic rendering of how they perceive each opera. Here is Thomas Boguszewski's vision of Silent Night (more available at http://thisisartinprogress.blogspot.com/2011/11/silent-night-at-opera.html):

"I am a history enthusiast and a fan of the film Joyeux Noel, which the opera Silent Night is based on.  I thought the staging of this opera was magnificent.  The costumes were spot-on, the stage (which used a rotating circular platform in the center) was ingenious, the acting and blocking were well-thought-out.  Any person who knows about or would like to learn more about the Christmas Truce of 1914 should see Silent Night.  Watching this production warms the heart a little, but also gives one a sense of the terrible irony of war —where humanity is looked upon as "weird" and violence is the norm.  I think the message of this play is not only that "Artists make bad soldiers" as Lieutenant Horstmayer points out at the beginning of the play, but also that good human beings make bad soldiers."