Master Class

Synopsis

1971. New York. You are invited to a master class with the great soprano, Marie Callas. In five years time her death will transport her to legendary status, worshipped as the greatest diva of them all. Now she is witty, bitchy and flamboyant, demanding and insecure. She recalls the soaring highlights of her own career and her disastrous private life. She takes you back to her childhood in Nazi-occupied Greece, relives scenes with envious colleagues, insulting dressers, her elderly husband and her treatment in the hands of Onassis, one of the richest men in the world and her lover. She will transport you to the scene of her greatest triumph at Milan's La Scala opera house and thrill you with the magic of her voice. Master Class was a huge hit on Broadway where it won a Tony Award and enjoyed a West End run.

Our Review:

Karen Bussell - 4 November 2010

Stephanie Beacham commands the stage as flawed diva Maria Callas in the Theatre Royal Bath Productions’ revival of Master Class. Terrence McNally’s award-winning script, inspired by the master classes a fading Callas gave in New York’s Juilliard School of Music in the 1970s, portrays the turbulent and passionate diva as self-absorbed and acerbic.

‘La Divina’ tells her tale of triumph and tragedy in intense monologues which Beacham (Dynasty, The Colbys, Celebrity Big Brother) manages to pace perfectly.

It’s all there: from passion and sacrifice for the boorish tycoon Aristotle Onassis, through the striving to be La Scala’s ultimate to the all-consuming absorption with her art. And no place to hide with only a handful of minor characters and a minimal set – a piano, chair, footstool and two small tables.

Directed by Chichester Festival Theatre’s artistic director Jonathan Church, this Mast...