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It's very common in operas
to have mezzo sopranos play
playing what we call pants roles or playing men.
Usually they're younger men who are passionately in love.
Actresses who play these characters
have to develop a certain skill set and a physicality
that can subtly suggest that they are not the gender that they actually are.
Women are very curvy.
Their bodies are curvy, their thought processes are curvy.
Where as men are straight forward.
A man will tell you what he thinks,
their bodies are straight forward, in more ways than one.
[opera singing]
This is the first time I've don't a pants role.
My biggest challenge is making sure that I don't stand and move like a woman
even the smallest things like the slight movement of your hip
or the way that you move your arms
can be indicative of you being a woman.
If you notice a man's center of gravity,
it's from here.
And women don't have something in between there,
and if you do, you're going to sit differently,
you're going to stand differently,
you're even going to walk differently.
And so as an actress, I do sometimes go to that point
and I put something in between my legs.
I bind down my breast,
I wear what a man would wear.
This is the first time that I've ever designed for a pants role.
The audience knows that it's a woman playing a man,
we know, everybody knows.
So my goal wasn't to try and deceive the audience
but instead using touches of things
that are noticeably more masculine.
So we did add shoulder pads just to give more of a broad silhouette
and of course it's enhanced by their behaviors and
their attitudes on stage.
[opera singing]
It's definitely interesting, I mean
getting to explore the psyche of a straight man in love
When you open the opera you find Sesto with Vitellia
in her dressing room
and I think that's really important because the audience
needs to see your utter adoration for her.
And she is trying to get him to kill his greatest friend,
who he is very loyal to.
So that really is what the entire role hinges upon,
is can you convince the audience that you would do this.
I really have loved being double cast with Vera.
We've been able to help each other with out own questions about Sesto
and I think what I have come to, and I think what Lauren has come to as well is
the infatuation with this woman has to just be the strongest thing in the world.
I think all artists bring a great deal of their own humanity to how they interpret characters.
You can't create it without a piece of your soul being in it.
And so to transform from a woman to a man
what a delightful challenge that is as an actor.