From the WSJ Opinion Archives
LEISURE & ARTS
Hazing Rituals
San Francisco divas demand a ban on fog.
As we know too well, nearly everyone today has a complaint, and often a lawsuit, whether legitimate or not. Last week, someone else piped up.
Responding to complaints from San Francisco Opera singers and the American Guild of Musical Artists, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors held a hearing on whether to ban the use of fake fog in performances. The singers have complained that theatrical fog--a mixture of alcohol and mineral oil--is a health hazard. Twenty-three out of 44 members of the opera chorus have reported experiencing adverse effects. One, Alexandra Nehra, has gone so far as to file suit against the opera company over damage to her voice and breathing.
How important is fog to opera? Not, perhaps, as important as swords, tights and fake blood, but it's up there. In order to capture a certain mood, you just have to make the fog roll in.
You need it--or it's nice to have--for "Lucia di Lammermoor," based on a novel by Sir Walter Scott, and set in those foggy Scottish moors. You need it for "Macbeth" (another Scottish affair). You need it for nautical operas like "The Flying Dutchman" and "Billy Budd." And the Metropolitan Opera uses a ton of fog for its "Ring" cycle. They are surely sympathetic in foggy London, and they should be fog-friendly in San Francisco, too.
And yet if any city were to ban fake fog, it would likely be the one by the Bay. In the early 90s, they were on the verge of outlawing perfume at public meetings. This was in deference to those with MCS (multiple chemical sensitivity) and EI (environmental illness--a rather broad designation, it would seem). At the time, the city's "disability coordinator" said, "Fragrances and chemicals constitute the same type of barrier as a set of stairs for someone in a wheelchair." A smirking columnist in Chicago wrote a piece entitled "The Tyranny of the Phew."
In the end, fragrances were not proscribed, but the city "requested" that San Franciscans refrain from spraying or dabbing. A few years later, the city issued a "Sustainability Plan," part of which urged citizens to reduce their "personal impact on the shared indoor environment by limiting the use of scented personal-care products." So this is a city where the quality of fake fog would be a hot agenda item.
Fog is actually a fairly old issue in opera. It has even been a subject of litigation before. In 1993, a singer sued the opera company in Columbus, Ohio, and won a six-figure settlement.
Some years back, there was a question about theatrical fog at the New York City Opera. They resolved it by switching to dry ice. (Certain singers are sensitive to dry ice too.) As for the Metropolitan Opera, its fog system, according to a spokesman, is different from the one used in San Francisco, and there has never been a complaint about it.
Over the years, opera singers have been unhappy about more than fog. They have objected to flowers, incense (in the church scenes in "Tosca," for example), and, yes, perfume.
Then there was the Jessye Norman recital in Detroit I attended. It was a sweltering summer (or summerlike) day, but Miss Norman had decreed that there be no air conditioning--because the hall's system had bothered her during a run-through. So the audience sweated as the great soprano sang. But hers are diva demands that must be accommodated, always.
In this new environmentally aware age, it's interesting to remember that, not so long ago, many professional singers were less solicitous of their pipes. Some actually smoked, and regularly. Maria Callas enjoyed her cigarettes. And Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the great German baritone, smoked like a fiend. Some people used to joke that he was a natural tenor but smoked, in part, to "keep his voice down."
I know serious-minded singers who say that fake fog is a real problem; I know others who roll their eyes at the idea. In any case, members of the San Francisco Opera chorus won't have to worry. The city, for now, has refused to ban the use of fake fog. (Their decision may have been influenced by testimony from a representative of the International Alliance of Theatrical Employees, who argued that any ban would cost jobs not only in opera but also in the theater and movie industries, affecting the city's shaky finances.)
But the San Francisco Opera has said that, even though it considers its fog perfectly safe, it will allow singers to opt out of any production that uses it. "They are not only excused," promised director Peter Markle, "but they are also paid."
Nice work if you can get it, as Ira Gershwin once wrote, with his brother. They also wrote, "A Foggy Day (in London Town)."
Mr. Nordlinger is managing editor and music critic of National Review. He is also music critic for The New Criterion and the New York Sun.
