Registrare lo spettacolo dal vivo, tra documentazione e artefatto filmico. L’Oedipus Rex di Julie Taymor

The essay analyses the filmed rendition of the “Opera-oratorio” Oedipus Rex by Stravinsky, directed by Julie Taymor in 1992. The rendition is a text document of the show, but it also fits into a film tradition as an independent artefact. Taymor conceals the theatrical dimension through the omission of images denouncing it in a recognizable manner. However, she does not deny the “performance space”, which becomes the meeting point between theatre and film. The case shows that the recording of a live show, which can give shape to a filmic artefact in and of itself, can combine the experience of the television viewer and that of the theatre spectator.