Gay Icons - The Divas: Maria Callas

Today's story is dedicated to my sweet Angel.

While researching this series of portraits, I have often wondered what exactly is a Gay Icon? There are criteria, like being larger than life, both in their art as well as in their personal life, having creative gay people around them, challenging the social mores of their era, as well living on the edge. Ideally, they would project a delicate mixture of vulnerability and strength. Our last subject, Judy Garland, was one such person. Today's subject, Maria Callas, is probably the prototype of the 20th century Gay Icons.

Many countries lay claim to Callas. First and foremost, Greece. Her parents were Greek: Γιώργος Καλογερόπουλος (George Kalogeropoulos) and Ευαγγελία "Λίτσα" Δημητριάδου (Evangelia "Litsa" Dimitriadou). Also, Athens, Greece, is where Maria received her musical education and had her public debut.

The history of her parents included its fair share of drama. George and Evangelia were an ill-matched couple from the beginning; he was easy-going and unambitious, with no interest in the arts, while his wife was vivacious and socially ambitious, and had held dreams of a life in the arts for herself, which her middle-class parents had stifled in her childhood and youth. Evangelia's father had warned his daughter, "You will never be happy with him. If you marry this man, I will never be able to help you". Evangelia had ignored his warning but soon realized that her father was right. The situation was aggravated by George's philandering and was improved neither by the birth of a daughter, named Yakinthi (later called Jackie), in 1917 nor the birth of a son, named Vassilis, in 1920. Vassilis' death from meningitis in the summer of 1922 dealt another blow to the marriage. In 1923, after realizing that Evangelia was pregnant again, George made the unilateral decision to move his family to America, a decision which Yakinthi recalled was greeted with Evangelia "shouting hysterically" followed by George "slamming doors". The family left for New York in July 1923, moving first into an apartment in Astoria, Queens.

Which leads us to the second country laying claim to Callas, the United States. Maria was born in New York on December 2, 1923. She was christened Άννα Μαρία Σοφία Καικιλία Καλογεροπούλου (Anna Maria Sofia Cecilia Kalogeropoulou). Callas' father eventually shortened the surname Kalogeropoulos first to "Kalos" and subsequently to "Callas" in order to make it more manageable.

Around the age of three, Maria's musical talent began to manifest itself, and after Evangelia discovered that her youngest daughter had a good voice, she began pressuring "Mary" to sing. Callas later recalled, "I was made to sing when I was only five, and I hated it." George was unhappy with his wife favoring their elder daughter, as well as the pressure put upon young Mary to sing and perform. The marriage continued to deteriorate and in 1937 Evangelia decided to return to Athens with her two daughters. Maria would return to the States much later, already a Diva.

Callas's relationship with Evangelia continued to erode during the years in Greece, and in the prime of her career, it became a matter of great public interest, especially after a 1956 cover story in Time magazine which focused on this relationship and later, by Evangelia's book My Daughter – Maria Callas. In public, Callas blamed the strained relationship with Evangelia on her unhappy childhood spent singing and working at her mother's insistence, saying, "My sister was slim and beautiful and friendly, and my mother always preferred her. I was the ugly duckling, fat and clumsy and unpopular. It is a cruel thing to make a child feel ugly and unwanted... I'll never forgive her for taking my childhood away. During all the years I should have been playing and growing up, I was singing or making money. Everything I did for them was mostly good and everything they did to me was mostly bad."

Her biographer, Petsalis-Diomidis, asserts that it was actually Evangelia's hateful treatment of George in front of their young children which led to resentment and dislike on Callas' part. According to both Callas' husband and her close friend Giulietta Simionato, Callas related to them that her mother, who did not work, pressed her to "go out with various men", mainly Italian and German soldiers, to bring home money and food during the Axis occupation of Greece during World War II. Simionato was convinced that Callas "managed to remain untouched", but Callas never forgave Evangelia for what she perceived as a kind of prostitution forced on her by her mother. In an attempt to patch things up with her mother, Callas took Evangelia along on her first visit to Mexico in 1950, but this only reawakened the old frictions and resentments, and after leaving Mexico, the two never met again. After a series of angry and accusatory letters from Evangelia lambasting Callas's father and husband, Callas ceased communication with her mother altogether.

Callas received her musical education in Athens, Greece. Initially, her mother tried to enroll her at the prestigious Athens Conservatoire, without success. In the summer of 1937, her mother visited Maria Trivella at the younger Greek National Conservatoire, asking her to take Mary, as she was then called, as a student for a modest fee. In 1957, Trivella recalled her impression of "Mary, a very plump young girl, wearing big glasses for her myopia."

Callas studied with Trivella for two years before her mother secured another audition at the Athens Conservatoire with the Spanish coloratura soprano Elvira de Hidalgo. Callas auditioned with Ocean, Thou Mighty Monster from Weber's Oberon. De Hidalgo recalled hearing "tempestuous, extravagant cascades of sounds, as yet uncontrolled but full of drama and emotion". She agreed to take her as a pupil immediately, but Callas' mother asked de Hidalgo to wait for a year, as Callas would be graduating from the National Conservatoire and could begin working. On April 2, 1939, Callas undertook the part of Santuzza in a student production of Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at the Olympia Theatre, and in the fall of the same year, she enrolled at the Athens Conservatoire in Elvira de Hidalgo's class.

This is Ocean, Thou Mighty Monster, performed by Callas, in 1962:

After several appearances as a student, Callas began appearing professionally in secondary roles at the Greek National Opera. De Hidalgo was instrumental in securing roles for her, allowing Callas to earn a small salary, which helped her and her family get through the difficult war years.

Callas made her professional debut in February 1941, in the small role of Beatrice in Franz von Suppé's Boccaccio. Soprano Galatea Amaxopoulou, who sang in the chorus, later recalled, "Even in rehearsal, Maria's fantastic performing ability had been obvious, and from then on, the others started sabotaging her." Despite these hostilities, Callas managed to continue and made her debut in a leading role in August 1942 as Tosca.

Tosca was a very important opera in Maria's life; as well as being her first leading part, it was also the part with which she ended her stage career, on July 5, 1965, in a production designed and mounted for her by Franco Zeffirelli and featuring her friend and colleague Tito Gobbi. It was also the triumphant debut of Maria Callas in France, in Palais Garnier, Paris, in 1958, which was also transmitted on French TV and, thankfully, stil exists as a document of her power as an actress, as well as a singer.

Also, a live television transmission of act 2 of the Covent Garden Tosca of 1964 was broadcast in Britain on February 9, 1964, giving a rare view of Callas in performance and, specifically, of her on-stage collaboration with Tito Gobbi. This has now been preserved on DVD.

Finally, it was on that performance at Palais Garnier, in Paris, in 1958, that Aristotle Onassis first laid eyes on Callas, as part of the audience. It appears that there and then, he decided that he would conquer this woman, to whom he was introduced three months later. But we're getting ahead of ourselves...

This excerpt includes one of the two most famous arias from Tosca, Vissi d'Arte. With her is Tito Gobbi. It's the famous Palais Garnier performance, in Paris, France, in 1958. Observe the part around the 10-minute mark, where, after knifing the villain Scarpia, she wills him to die (Muori dannato! Muori! Muori! Muori!... È morto!):

... And this is in Covent Garden, London, UK, 1964:

This is the finale of the 2nd act (including Vissi d'Arte), in New York, 1956 - the conductor is Dimitri Mitropoulos:

I can't resist sharing my favorite aria from Tosca, E Lucevan Le Stelle, even though it's a male aria. This is Placido Domingo in 1992, in Rome, Italy, conducted by Zubin Mehta:

But we digress... Since we've already mentioned Italy and France, these countries also claim La Callas as their own. Italy, because this is where she became an international star, this is where she met her husband, and this is where she worked (and became friends) with the most famous directors - Visconti, Pasolini, and Zeffirelli. Finally, France (Paris in particular), was the place that she decided to retire to and this was the place where she died, only 53-years-old, on September 16, 1977.

We're fast-forwarding again... By 1944, Callas was opera's biggest star in Greece. After the liberation of Greece, de Hidalgo advised Callas to establish herself in Italy. Callas proceeded to give a series of concerts around Greece, and then, against her teacher's advice, she returned to America to see her father and to further pursue her career. When she left Greece on September 14, 1945, two months short of her 22nd birthday, Callas had given 56 performances in seven operas and had appeared in around 20 recitals. Callas considered her Greek career as the foundation of her musical and dramatic upbringing, saying, "When I got to the big career, there were no surprises for me."

After returning to the United States and reuniting with her father in September 1945, Callas made the round of auditions. In December of that year, she auditioned for Edward Johnson, general manager of the Metropolitan Opera, and was favorably received: "We offered her a contract, but she didn't like it - because of the contract, not because of the roles. She was right in turning it down - it was frankly a beginner's contract."

In 1946, Callas was engaged to re-open the opera house in Chicago as Turandot, but the company folded before opening. Basso Nicola Rossi-Lemeni, who also was to star in this opera, was aware that Tullio Serafin was looking for a dramatic soprano to cast as La Gioconda at the Arena di Verona. He later recalled the young Callas as being "amazing - so strong physically and spiritually; so certain of her future. I knew in a big outdoor theatre like Verona's, this girl, with her courage and huge voice, would make a tremendous impact." Subsequently, he recommended Callas to the retired tenor and impresario Giovanni Zenatello. During her audition, Zenatello became so excited that he jumped up and joined Callas in the act 4 duet. It was in this role that Callas made her Italian debut.

This is a later recording (in 1952) of the aria Suicido! from La Gioconda:

Upon her arrival in Verona, Callas met Giovanni Battista Meneghini, an older, wealthy industrialist, who began courting her. They married in 1949, and he assumed control of her career until 1959 when the marriage dissolved.

After La Gioconda, Callas had no further offers, and when Serafin, looking for someone to sing Isolde, called on her, she told him that she already knew the score, even though she had only looked at the first act out of curiosity while at the conservatory. She sight-read the opera's second act for Serafin, who praised her for knowing the role so well, whereupon she admitted to having bluffed and having sight-read the music. Even more impressed, Serafin immediately cast her in the role. Serafin thereafter served as Callas's mentor and supporter.

From Tristan und Isolde, this is Callas in Liebestod (in Italian):

According to Lord Harewood, "Very few Italian conductors have had a more distinguished career than Tullio Serafin, and perhaps none, apart from Toscanini, more influence". In 1968, Callas recalled that working with Serafin was the "really lucky" opportunity of her career, because "he taught me that there must be an expression; that there must be a justification. He taught me the depth of music, the justification of music. That's where I really really absorbed all I could from this man".

The great turning point in Callas' career occurred in Venice in 1949. She was engaged to sing the role of Brünnhilde in Die Walküre at the Teatro la Fenice, when Margherita Carosio, who was engaged to sing Elvira in I Puritani in the same theatre, fell ill. Unable to find a replacement for Carosio, Serafin told Callas that she would be singing Elvira in six days; when Callas protested that she not only did not know the role but also had three more Brünnhildes to sing, he told her "I guarantee that you can." In Michael Scott's words, "the notion of any one singer embracing music as divergent in its vocal demands as Wagner's Brünnhilde and Bellini's Elvira in the same career would have been cause enough for surprise; but to attempt to essay them both in the same season seemed like folie de grandeur". Before the performance actually took place, one incredulous critic snorted, "We hear that Serafin has agreed to conduct I Puritani with a dramatic soprano ... When can we expect a new edition of La Traviata with [baritone] Gino Bechi's Violetta?"

After the performance, one critic wrote, "Even the most skeptical had to acknowledge the miracle that Callas accomplished... the flexibility of her limpid, beautifully poised voice, and her splendid high notes. Her interpretation also has a humanity, warmth, and expressiveness that one would search for in vain in the fragile, pellucid coldness of other Elviras." Franco Zeffirelli recalled, "What she did in Venice was really incredible. You need to be familiar with opera to realize the size of her achievement. It was as if someone asked Birgit Nilsson, who is famous for her great Wagnerian voice, to substitute overnight for Beverly Sills, who is one of the great coloratura sopranos of our time."

This is from the 2nd act of I Puritani, recorded in Basilica di Santa Eufemia, Milano, Italy, and conducted by Serafin:

Throughout her career, Callas displayed her vocal versatility in recitals that pitched dramatic soprano arias alongside coloratura pieces, including in a 1952 RAI recital in which she opened with Lady Macbeth's "letter scene", followed by the "Mad Scene" from Lucia di Lammermoor, then Abigaille's treacherous recitative and aria from Nabucco, finishing with the Bell Song from Lakmé capped by a ringing high E in alt (E6). Here she is as Lady Macbeth:

This is the "Mad Scene" from Lucia di Lammermoor:

This is Ben Io T'Inventi from Nabucco:

This is with the Bell Song from Lakmé:

Although by 1951, Callas had sung at all the major theatres in Italy, she had not yet made her official debut at Italy's most prestigious opera house, Teatro alla Scala in Milan. According to composer Gian Carlo Menotti, Callas had substituted for Renata Tebaldi in the role of Aida in 1950, and La Scala's general manager, Antonio Ghiringhelli, had taken an immediate dislike to Callas.

Menotti recalls that Ghiringhelli had promised him any singer he wanted for the premiere of The Consul, but when he suggested Callas, Ghiringhelli said that he would never have Callas at La Scala except as a guest artist. However, as Callas' fame grew, and especially after her great success in I Vespri Siciliani in Florence, Ghiringhelli had to relent: Callas made her official debut at La Scala in Verdi's I Vespri Siciliani on opening night in December 1951, and this theatre became her artistic home throughout the 1950s. Here she is, singing Merce, Dilette Amiche from I Vespri Siciliani:

The day she married Meneghini in Verona, she sailed for Argentina to sing at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. Callas made her South American debut in Buenos Aires on May 20, 1949, during the European summer opera recess. Her debut in the United States was five years later in Chicago in 1954, and with La Callas as Norma, the Lyric Opera of Chicago was born. Her Metropolitan Opera debut, opening the Met's seventy-second season on October 29, 1956, was again with Norma. Her London debut at the Royal Opera House in 1952 was also with Norma. Also, her debut in the ancient theatre of Epidaurus in Greece was, you've guessed it, with Norma. Here she is, singing Casta Diva, from Norma:

In the early years of her career, Callas was a heavy woman; in her own words, "Heavy - one can say - yes I was; but I'm also a tall woman, 5' 8½" [174 centimeters], and I used to weigh no more than 200 pounds (91 kilograms)]." Tito Gobbi relates that during a lunch break while recording Lucia in Florence, Serafin commented to Callas that she was eating too much and allowing her weight to become a problem. When she protested that she wasn't so heavy, Gobbi suggested she should "put the matter to test" by stepping on the weighing machine outside the restaurant. The result was "somewhat dismaying, and she became rather silent." In 1968, Callas told Edward Downes that during her initial performances in Cherubini's Medea in May 1953, she realized that she needed a leaner face and figure to do dramatic justice to this as well as the other roles she was undertaking. She added,

"I was getting so heavy that even my vocalizing was getting heavy. I was tiring myself, I was perspiring too much, and I was really working too hard. And I wasn't really well, as in health; I couldn't move freely. And then I was tired of playing a game, for instance, playing this beautiful young woman, and I was heavy and uncomfortable to move around. In any case, it was uncomfortable and I didn't like it. So I felt now if I'm going to do things right - I've studied all my life to put things right musically, so why don't I diet and put myself into a certain condition where I'm presentable?"

During 1953 and early 1954, she lost almost 80 pounds (36 kg), turning herself into what Rescigno called "possibly the most beautiful lady on the stage". Sir Rudolf Bing, who remembered Callas as being "monstrously fat" in 1951, stated that after the weight loss, Callas was an "astonishing, svelte, striking woman" who "showed none of the signs one usually finds in a fat woman who has lost weight: she looked as though she had been born to that slender and graceful figure, and had always moved with that elegance."

Some believe that the loss of body mass made it more difficult for her to support her voice, triggering the vocal strain that became apparent later in the decade, while others believed the weight loss affected a newfound softness and femininity in her voice, as well as a greater confidence as a person and performer. Tito Gobbi said, "Now she was not only supremely gifted both musically and dramatically - she was a beauty too. And her awareness of this invested with fresh magic every role she undertook. What it eventually did to her vocal and nervous stamina I am not prepared to say. I only assert that she blossomed into an artist unique in her generation and outstanding in the whole range of vocal history."

Callas' most distinguishing quality was her ability to breathe life into the characters she portrayed, or in the words of Matthew Gurewitsch, "Most mysterious among her many gifts, Callas had the genius to translate the minute particulars of a life into tone of voice." Italian critic Eugenio Gara added:

"Her secret is in her ability to transfer to the musical plane the suffering of the character she plays, the nostalgic longing for lost happiness, the anxious fluctuation between hope and despair, between pride and supplication, between irony and generosity, which in the end dissolve into a superhuman inner pain. The most diverse and opposite of sentiments, cruel deceptions, ambitious desires, burning tenderness, grievous sacrifices, all the torments of the heart, acquire in her singing that mysterious truth, I would like to say, that psychological sonority, which is the primary attraction of opera."

Ethan Mordden writes, "It was a flawed voice. But then Callas sought to capture in her singing not just beauty but a whole humanity, and within her system, the flaws feed the feeling, the sour plangency and the strident defiance becoming aspects of the canto. They were literally defects of her voice; she bent them into advantages of her singing." Giulini believes, "If melodrama is the ideal unity of the trilogy of words, music, and action, it is impossible to imagine an artist in whom these three elements were more together than Callas." He recalls that during Callas' performances of La Traviata, "reality was onstage. What stood behind me, the audience, auditorium, La Scala itself, seemed artifice. Only that which transpired on stage was truth, life itself." Sir Rudolf Bing expressed similar sentiments:

"Once one heard and saw Maria Callas - one can't really distinguish it - in a part, it was very hard to enjoy any other artist, no matter how great, afterwards, because she imbued every part she sang and acted with such incredible personality and life. One move of her hand was more than another artist could do in a whole act."

This is Libiamo from La Traviata (a duet with Giuseppe di Stefano):

The latter half of Callas's career was marked by a number of scandals. Following a performance of Madama Butterfly in Chicago in 1955, Callas was confronted by a process server who handed her papers about a lawsuit brought by Eddy Bagarozy, who claimed he was her agent. Callas was photographed with her mouth turned in a furious snarl. The photo was sent around the world and gave rise to the myth of Callas as a temperamental prima donna and a "Tigress". In the same year, just before her debut at the Metropolitan Opera, Time ran a damaging cover story about Callas, with special attention paid to her difficult relationship with her mother and some unpleasant exchanges between the two.

This is Un Bel Di Vedremo from Madama Butterfly:

In 1957, Callas was starring as Amina in La Sonnambula at the Edinburgh International Festival with the forces of La Scala. Her contract was for four performances, but due to the great success of the series, La Scala decided to put on a fifth performance. Callas told the La Scala officials that she was physically exhausted and that she had already committed to a previous engagement, a party thrown for her by her friend Elsa Maxwell in Venice. Despite this, La Scala announced a fifth performance, with Callas billed as Amina. Callas refused to stay and went on to Venice. Despite the fact that she had fulfilled her contract, she was accused of walking out on La Scala and the festival. La Scala officials did not defend Callas or inform the press that the additional performance was not approved by Callas. Renata Scotto took over the part, which was the start of her international career.

This La Callas in Ah! Non Giunge from La Sonnambula:

Callas' relationship with La Scala had started to become strained after the Edinburgh incident, and this effectively severed her major ties with her artistic home. Later in 1958, Callas and Rudolf Bing were in discussion about her season at the Met. She was scheduled to perform in Verdi's La Traviata and in Macbeth, two very different operas which almost require totally different singers. Callas and the Met could not reach an agreement, and before the opening of Medea in Dallas, Bing sent a telegram to Callas terminating her contract. Headlines of "Bing Fires Callas" appeared in newspapers around the world. Nicola Rescigno later recalled, "That night, she came to the theater, looking like an empress: she wore an ermine thing that draped to the floor, and she had every piece of jewelry she ever owned. And she said, 'You all know what's happened. Tonight, for me, is a very difficult night, and I will need the help of every one of you.' Well, she proceeded to give a performance [of Medea] that was historical."

This is the finale from Medea, recorded a year earlier:

In 1969, her friend, great Italian gay director Pier Paolo Pasolini, persuaded her to reprise the role of Medea, but this time as a non-singing actress. She was great in it. It was, however, her only film role. This is an excerpt:

From October 1971 to March 1972, Callas gave a series of master classes at the Juilliard School in New York. These classes later formed the basis of gay playwright Terrence McNally's 1995 play Master Class.

Although La Callas sang the Habanera from Bizet's Carmen in various recitals, she never performed the whole opera on stage; she felt that she couldn't accurately portray the passionate gypsy girl. Her only performance of the complete opera occurred on an EMI recording in 1964, conducted by Georges Prêtre. This is from a recital in Covent Garden, London, in 1962, also conducted by Georges Prêtre:

In 1957, while still married to husband Giovanni Battista Meneghini, Callas was introduced to Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis at a party given in her honor by Elsa Maxwell after a performance in Donizetti's Anna Bolena. The affair that followed received much publicity in the popular press, and in November 1959, Callas left her husband. Michael Scott asserts that Onassis was not why Callas largely abandoned her career, but that he offered her a way out of a career that was made increasingly difficult by scandals and by vocal resources that were diminishing at an alarming rate. Franco Zeffirelli, on the other hand, recalls asking Callas in 1963 why she had not practiced her singing, and Callas responding that "I have been trying to fulfill my life as a woman." According to one of her biographers, Nicholas Gage, Callas and Onassis had a child, a boy, who died hours after he was born on March 30, 1960. In his book about his wife, Meneghini states categorically that Maria Callas was unable to bear children. Furthermore, various sources dismiss Gage's claim, as they note that the birth certificates Gage used to prove this "secret child" were issued in 1998, twenty-one years after Callas' death. Still, other sources claim that Callas had at least one abortion while involved with Onassis.

The relationship ended in 1968 when Onassis left Callas in favor of Jacqueline Kennedy. However, the Onassis family's private secretary, Kiki, writes in her memoir that even while Aristotle was with Jackie, he frequently met with Maria in Paris, where they resumed what had now become a clandestine affair.

Callas spent her last years living largely in isolation in Paris and died of a heart attack at age 53 on September 16, 1977. Heart failure as a possible outcome of dermatomyositis or a side effect of the steroids and immunosuppressants which she took for the disease were cited as possible causes of death. Another explanation offered was that Callas' death was due to heart failure brought on by (possibly unintentional) overuse of Mandrax (methaqualone), a sleeping aid.

A funerary liturgy was held at Agios Stephanos Greek Orthodox Cathedral on rue Georges-Bizet, Paris on September 20, 1977. She later was cremated at the Père Lachaise Cemetery and her ashes were placed in the columbarium there. After being stolen and later recovered, they were scattered over the Aegean Sea, off the coast of Greece, according to her wish, in the spring of 1979.

During a 1978 interview, upon being asked "Was it worth it to Maria Callas? She was a lonely, unhappy, often difficult woman," music critic and Callas' friend John Ardoin replied:

"That is such a difficult question. There are times when certain people are blessed - and cursed - with an extraordinary gift, in which the gift is almost greater than the human being. Callas was one of these people. It was as if her own wishes, her life, her own happiness were all subservient to this incredible, incredible gift that she was given, this gift that reached out and taught us things about music that we knew very well but showed us new things, things we never thought about, new possibilities. I think that is why singers admire her so. I think that's why conductors admire her so. I know it's why I admire her so. And she paid a tremendously difficult and expensive price for this career. I don't think she always understood what she did or why she did it. She usually had a tremendous effect on audiences and on people. But it was not something she could always live with gracefully or happily. I once said to her 'It must be a very enviable thing to be Maria Callas.' And she said, 'No, it's a very terrible thing to be Maria Callas because it's a question of trying to understand something you can never really understand.' She couldn't really explain what she did. It was all done by instinct. It was something embedded deep within her."

I will leave you with an interview of La Callas with Bernard Gavoty, in Paris, 1964: