Oscar winner Angelina Jolie will star in a film about the life of “la divina” Maria Callas, the world’s greatest opera singer. unconventional about former US First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and Princess Diana, respectively in “Jackie”, with Natalie Portman (2016), and “Spencer”, with Kristen Stewart (2021). great international projection: “Tony Manero” (2008), “No” (2012), “O Clube” (2015) and “Neruda” (2016). following the assassination of her husband John F. Kennedy, while “Spencer” took place over Christmas 1991, when Princess Diana decided that her marriage to Prince Charles was not working and needed to veer off the path that would put her in line to one day be the Queen of England. The new film about Callas will address her “turmoil, b she is tragic”, but revived and reimagined during her last days of life in 1970s Paris. The screenplay is by Steven Knight, who wrote “Spencer” and films like “Dangerous Promises” and “Locke”, and is the co-creator of the series “Peaky Blinders” and “Taboo”. “Having the opportunity to combine my two deepest and most personal passions, cinema and opera, has been a long-awaited dream. Doing this with Angelina, an extremely courageous and intriguing artist, is a fascinating opportunity. A real gift”, highlights Larraín in the official statement. “I take my responsibility for Maria’s life and legacy very seriously. I will give everything I can to meet the challenge. Pablo Larraín is a director I have long admired. To have the opportunity to tell more of Maria’s story with him, and with a screenplay by Steven Knight, is a dream come true,” adds Angelina Jolie.
Maria Callas: 45 years after her death, her star still shines like few others
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Born on December 2, 1923 in New York as Sophia Cecilia Anna Maria Kalogeropoulou, of Greek parents, Callas debuted in Athens in 1939/1940 with “very hard roles, such as Cavalleria rusticana, Tosca, which require a lot of voice, projection and strength”, recalled in 2017 Stéphane Grant, producer of a series of broadcasts in France about the artist. Elegiac voice, to which she gives her strength. After her, no one has done anything like it! At that moment the Callas revolution began”, he added. “It changed the way opera is interpreted”, recalled Australian soprano Jessica Pratt at the same time.” For me, as for many young singers today, she continues to be a formidable source of inspiration”, said the artist about the singer who died on September 16, 1977, aged 53. One of her main legacies was to have revalued the ” bel canto” Italian (Bellini, Donizetti, Ros sini), combining virtuosity and power of expression.” It made it possible to hear a part of the repertoire that had not been heard for a century – with a few exceptions – because it had fallen into oblivion or because the interpreters were coloraturas, sopranos with voices light, sweet, high notes that didn’t have the dramatic force needed for these roles,” Grant said. “Callas had just that, in addition to the tragic quality in the setting, which he gave to even his stupidest roles. I am referring to Bellini’s ‘A somnambule’, sublime in terms of music but quite silly as a story. She turned it into an extraordinary opera”, stressed the producer. She also adopted a role of tragedy in her life: she separated from her husband Giovanni Battista Meneghini, with the hope of marrying her great love, the Greek magnate Aristote Onassis , but he preferred Jackie Kennedy.