Post-Script: Manon and Don Carlo

Earlier today, the latest "Backstage with Matthew" email from San Francisco Opera dropped into my in-box. If you're not familiar with these, you should be: they are behind-the-scenes glimpses of life at an opera house, written by Matthew Shilvock, general director of SFO. (And, yes, I've heard him speak and seen enough of his tweets and chatted with him enough to be quite sure that he writes them himself....or it's someone who is extraordinarily good at channeling another person's style.)

Anyway, this edition, which will eventually appear on the company's blog, is all about the wig department, which raises a question: why on earth is Michael Fabiano going wigless these days?  This seems pretty darned ahistorical for the settings of both Manon and Don Carlo:

Michael Fabiano as Des Grieux in Manon

Photo Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

Michael Fabiano as Don Carlo; Marius Kwiecien as the Marquis of Posa

Photo Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

With those deep-set eyes of his, it just makes no sense; what he needs is a wig and make-up that brings out his eyes and gives his face and head more definition.