Opera #1

    This week I watched the opera "Rigoletto",  Rigoletto is an opera based on three acts written by Guiseppi Verdi. Rigoletto was not only Verdi’s first ever masterpiece but this opera has been known for almost two centuries as being one of Guiseppi Verdi’s most greatest masterpieces in operatic history. This opera take place at a church, where a ball is being held, it shows Rigoletti (a hunch-backed court jester for the Duke of Mantua) making fun of the husbands whose ladies are being being noticed by the Duke and then Rigoletto suggested to the Duke to either send the husbands to prison or kill them; which makes the Duke happy, but husbands aren’t amused by the court jester’s foolish behavior. The Duke of Matuna is a womanizer who cares about one thing and that’s chasing after every woman he sees and he thinks that would be horrible for him if he doesn’t keep doing it. As a matter of fact, the Duke notices a beautiful lady named Gilda walking into the church the first time, and swears that he would do anything to seduce her. What no one is aware of is that Gilda notices the Duke at the ball and is in love with him, and that she’s Rigoletto’s daughter. During the ball while the Duke was seducing the Countess of Ceprano, Rigoletto makes fun of the Countess’s husband Count Ceprano which enraged him, after the courtiers were gossiping about the court jester having a mistress and her name was Gilda. Suddenly, Count Monterone appears at the ball and exposes the Duke for seducing his daughter, then the the court jester was making fun of him and that made the Duke laugh out loud and has Count Monterone arrested, which made Count Monterone so angry that he invokes a curse upon the court jester, that frightened Rigoletto so bad that he rushed out of the church. While walking home, Rigoletto was approached by an assassin named Sparafucile, and the assassin would offer his services to the court jester, if he ever needs him. Sparafucile notice that were similarities between him and the court jester, and that was that the assassin kills men with his sword and Rigoletto uses a “tongue of malice” to stab his victims, then the assassin walks away. Rigoletto started to feel better when he got home and greeted his daughter Gilda, and she asked her father what her mother was like before she died, and Rigoletto told his daughter that her mother was beautiful and lovely like an angel. Rigoletto always try to shield her from the outside world, because he didn’t want his daughter to know what he does for a living, and his daughter promised him that the only place she would go is to the church every Sunday. Hours later, Rigoletto heard a noise below in the courtyard and warns Giovanna (Gilda’s nurse) not to let anyone come into the house. After Rigoletto leaves to investigate, the Duke sneaks into the house and bribed Gilda’s nurse to let him see Gilda, and she did. As disguising himself as a poor student, the Duke declares his love to Gilda, who also saw him at church every Sunday. Giovanna quickly comes in, and warns them that someone’s coming. As the Duke leaves. an enchanted Gilda starts having memories of the beauty of their romantic encounter. Afterwards, the courtiers gathered outside of the streets to discuss how are they going to kidnap Gilda, whom they think is Rigoletto’s mistress but when Rigoletto appears, they told him that they’re going to kidnap Count Ceprano’s wife, who lives nearby. The court jester agrees to help and is tricked into wearing a blindfold and unknowingly helps them to kidnap  Gilda. While laughing, the courtiers break into the house and carry Gilda away. Realizing that the courtiers tricked him, Rigoletto removes the blindfold and runs to the house. After discovering Gilda’s gone, Rigoletto collapsed as he shouts the curse that Count Monterone invoked upon him.

           The next day in his palace, the Duke was alone and upset when went back to Gilda’s house and found it empty. His courtiers come in and after they tell him about last night when they tricked the court jester into kidnapping Gilda and put her in the Duke’s chamber, the Duke thought was very funny, but was shocked to know it was Gilda, however knowing that this is a great chance for him to have sex with her, the Duke rushed to his chamber (where Gilda’s at). Rigoletto comes into the palace to anxiously search for his daughter. The courtiers were shocked and amused to learn that Gilda is the court jester’s daughter, but they refuse to take him to her, before someone appear on the balcony saying that Gilda is with the Duke alone in the Duke’s chamber. With fires of rage in his eyes, Rigolette tries to save her but he was outnumbered, so he decided to beg for her release or to save her before she gets hurt. The Duke shows Rigoletto where his daughter is and he rushes to embrace her, then Gilda told her father about what happened last night when he left, and that the Duke  was having sex with her. Also, Count Monterone was led through the room on his way to be executed. Rigoletto swears that he and Count Monterone will get their vengeance, while Gilda pleads with her father to forgive the Duke.

          Rigoletto was still obsessed about getting revenge against the Duke for what he did to his daughter, went to go talk to Sparafucile, and the assassin came up with a brilliant plan: he wanted him and Rigoletto to lure the Duke to Sparafucile’s bar, where the assassin will murder him, knowing that the court jester wants revenge against the Duke; Gilda, who despite everything that happened to her last night, is still love with the Duke, pleads with her father not to kill the man she loves. Rigoletto takes his daughter to Sparafucile’s bar and makes he watch the Duke, dressed as a poor student again to seduce the assassin’s sister Maddalena. Gilda was very upset and he sends her away, so he and Sparafucile can finish their plan to kill the Duke. Meanwhile, Maddalena pleads with her brother not to kill the poor student (the Duke) and kill the court jester instead. Sparafucile refused to kill Rigoletto, so instead he told his sister that he’ll kill the next the person that comes through the door. When Gilda returned, she overheard the assassin talking to his sister, so she decided to sacrifice herself to save her father and the man she loves. Gilda comes in and was killed. Rigoletto returns to the bar to get the Duke body,  after the assassin puts Gilda’s body in heavy sack, Rigoletto to the body bag and put in the boat and paddled to the river to get rid of the body. Then he hears the Duke singing from a distance, he quickly opens the sack, and much to his sadness to find out it was his daughter Gilda, almost dead. As she dies, Rigoletto cries out Count Munterone’s curse.

      I thought that this opera, was very emotional and amazing, to me it was kind of, arguably similar to William Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet”, like in the end, how someone would do the anything to protect the person they love, and to me that is one of the defining symbols of true love.

    I’m trying to convert this into a game by using Adobe Dreamweaver, the game would have the Duke to get the girls before time runs out (because in the opera, it shows that the Duke is a playboy), and for the background, I was thinking of using images of the inside of a theatre or an opera house, women, a Duke, a symbol of death, and of people doing play about “Rigoletto”. For the background of the start game, It would show the title Rigoletto, and for the end game I thought for the background would show a symbol of death. It would be similar to this game http://art310.utarts.com/fa15/okonkwo/GAME/CO_GAMEFINAL.html

    I tried creating it a few months ago, but something went wrong and I don't know what.

                                                              References 

                         https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFtu9VV9f1o 

                         http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253590/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl 

                         https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigoletto 

                       http://www.vancouveropera.ca/whats_on/2015-2016_season/rigoletto/rigoletto_synopsis