The story of Salome and John the Baptist may be the most twisted tale in the Western canon. Oscar Wilde’s take on the story, with music by Richard Strauss added, didn’t make it any less twisted. Nor did Atom Egoyan’s production of the opera for the COC and its several remounts. How, one might ask, could one ramp the twistedness up a notch? The answer, and a very successful one, is to have Egoyan make a film based around his production. And so, Seven Veils, which had its avant-premier, ahead of TIFF, at the Four Seasons Centre last night.
Ambur Braid as Salome (top left), Michael Kupfer-Radecky as Jochanaan (below), and Frédéric Antoun as Narraboth (top right) in the Canadian Opera Company’s production of Salome, 2023. Photo: Michael Cooper
The new season starts to ramp up in September. My month will start at Factory Theatre on the 7th with Mary Beath Badian’s The Waltz; a coming of age drama set in Saskatchewan. That runs until the 17th. The following night there’s a screening at the Four Seasons Centre of Atom Egoyan’s new film Seven Veils that was created in conjunction with last season’s production of Salome. A young woman is tasked with remounting her former mentor’s production of Salome. It stars Amanda Seyfried, Ambur Braid, Michael Schade and Michael Kupfer-Radecky. It’s a chance to see the film ahead of the official premier at TIFF. More details and tickets 
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