Works&Process Presents Experiments in Opera

Works & Process presents Experiments in Opera: The Lives and Dreams of Nikola Tesla as summoned by the Honorable Spirits of the Grand Gotham Hotel by Phil Kline and Jim Jarmusch, featuring Anthony Roth Costanzo on Monday, April 15, 2024 at 7pm at the Guggenheim’s Peter B. Lewis Theater, 1071 Fifth Avenue, NY. Tickets $35 to Choose-What-You-Pay. To purchase tickets, visit http://www.worksandprocess.org.

In an abandoned New York City near the end of time, a small group of survivors gather for a seance in the ruined ballroom of the once mighty Grand Gotham Hotel. Here they encounter the ghost of the hotel’s most famous resident, Nikola Tesla, whose last years were spent in Room 3327. One by one, they join Tesla, acting out his dreams in a ritual circus of life, conveyed in a series of vignettes that mix elements of spectacle, absurdity, avant-garde film, blackout comedy, and musical theater. 

A striking figure—tall, elegant in dress, and grandiloquent in speech—Tesla was a brilliant scientist and engineer whose view of the physical world was imbued with mystical spirituality. He once dined daily at the famous Delmonico’s, seated among the barons of Wall Street, who celebrated and profited mightily from his inventions. As his dreams of the future were thwarted by the powers of big money and government, he gradually retreated into a parallel world of his imagination, watching over the pigeons in Bryant Park, especially the one he said was his true love, “a creature of purest white, with silver traces on her wings.” 

See the culmination of this new opera’s first development workshop, incubated in a Works & Process LaunchPAD residency at Bethany Arts Community. Members of the artistic team will discuss their creative process and highlights will be performed.

Music and words by Phil Kline

Story concept by Phil Kline and Jim Jarmusch

Films by Jim Jarmusch and Deco Dawson

Emma Griffin, Director/Dramaturg

Dave Cook, Sound Engineer

Jenn DeSimone, Production Stage Manager

Cast

Anthony Roth Costanzo - Nikola Tesla

Jennifer Zetlan - Katharine Johnson

Amanda Lynn Bottoms - Sissieretta Jones, Djuka Tesla

Timothy Stoddard - Thomas Edison

James Harrington - J. P. Morgan

Clementine Kline - Young Tesla, Young Girl

Eric Brenner - Ensemble, Tesla understudy

Orchestra

Ensemble LPR:

David Bloom, Conductor

Conrad Harris, violin

Tom Chiu, violin

William Hakim, viola

Carolina Chan, viola

Alex Waterman, cello

Felix Fan, cello

Tristan Kasten Krause, bass

Sam Yulsman, keyboard

Violetta Norrie, harp

ABOUT WORKS & PROCESS

A non-profit without walls, Works & Process champions performing artists and their creative process from studio to stage. We platform artists from the world’s largest organizations and amplify underrecognized performing arts cultures. We provide rare, longitudinal, and fully-funded creative residencies, and commissioning support. We present at the Guggenheim Museum, Lincoln Center, and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, with the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Each summer Works & Process curates and presents free dance programs with City Parks Foundation’s SummerStage and NYC Parks.

Works & Process LaunchPAD “Process as Destination” provides artists multi-week residencies with 24/7 studio availability, on-site housing, health insurance enrollment access, industry-leading fees, and transportation to residency partners spanning counties in New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts.

“An exceptional opportunity to understand something of the creative process.” —The New York Times

Stay connected: @worksandprocess

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