COVENT GARDEN, LONDON, NEW YEAR’S DAY, 1964
The queue around the opera house had started forming on Boxing Day. By the day of the performance, it stretched all the way along Floral Street and around the Piazza. It was bitterly cold, but the fans had come prepared with sleeping bags and thermoses, and their spirits had been lifted when they caught a glimpse of their idol arriving for the dress rehearsal.
The diva had been gracious and had stopped to sign autographs, smiling as she told them not to get pneumonia. “I won’t be able to sing for you in the hospital.”
One young man at the head of the queue had knelt in front of her and had kissed her hand. “I would die happy if I had heard you sing Tosca, Madame Callas.”
This moment was captured by one of the television crews that hovered outside Covent Garden, hoping to get a glimpse of Callas, and was shown on the evening news. Maria asked the house manager to make sure that the young man got a ticket. She did not want his early death on her conscience.
The dress rehearsal was a fever dream. Maria had performed Tosca more times than she could remember. She had sung it at the Athens Conservatoire, for Italian soldiers in Patission Street, and in opera houses around the world, but she knew this was the first time she really understood Floria Tosca. In the past she had always found the moment when Floria becomes jealous when she sees that her lover, Cavaradossi, is painting another woman farfetched, but now she understood exactly where the music was taking her. Tosca’s jealousy turned out to be groundless, but Onassis was betraying her, and anything she was able to imagine would most likely be true. Onstage though, Ari’s betrayal was a gift: there was no difficulty in summoning the pain she needed. She was playing herself, an opera singer, a diva, tormented by her feelings.
In the second act she wore the empire-line dress in red velvet with gold fillets in her hair, a gold lace stole, and long gloves that buttoned at the wrist. It was the perfect costume, one suitable for the diva she was playing and for the diva she was. As she began to sing the duet with Scarpia, where she asks him what it will take to save her lover’s life, she could sense the heat in her performance building, and she felt as if she would explode when she hurled the word “quanto” (“how much”) at Scarpia.
But instead of singing, Scarpia rushed toward her and, snatching the stole out of her hands, he threw it over her head and started to pat her head firmly with his hands. The conductor silenced the orchestra.
She tried to pull away, but he held her there, batting at her head, until finally he stopped.
She was about to shout at him for ruining her performance when he said, “Your head, Maria, was on fire.”
And he held up the remains of the long curly black hairpiece that hung down her back. The sweet smell of singed hair filled her nostrils. She understood that she must have gone too close to one of the lighted candelabra on the table and her wig had caught fire without her realizing.
“Your hands! Are they all right?”
The baritone nodded, and she put her head on his shoulder. “Grazie, I was somewhere else.”
Gobbi smiled. “I know, cara. You were getting ready to stab me.”
She heard Franco’s voice from the auditorium. “Do you want to stop, Maria?”
She shook her head and nodded to the conductor to start again.
Franco burst into her dressing room as she was taking off her makeup.
“Maria, you crazy genius. Didn’t you smell your hair burning?”
He shook his head and then he kissed her roughly on both cheeks, undeterred by the cold cream and greasepaint.
“No opera is worth killing yourself for, darling. And if you are going to burn yourself alive, save it for the first night so that the audience gets its money’s worth.”
He winked at Maria, whose eyes were huge and dark.
“I had no idea, Franco.”
Franco put his hands on her shoulders. “You must be careful, Maria.”
He looked around the dressing room, which was full of red roses that in January must have cost a small fortune. He picked up a flower and held it to his nose, discarding it with disgust when he discovered that it had no smell.
“Is Ari coming to the opening?” Franco couldn’t keep the disapproval out of his voice.
“I hope so.” Maria’s voice was flat.
“If Onassis misses the chance to hear you give the performance of your career, then he definitely doesn’t deserve you.”
Maria wiped a streak of cold cream from her face. “He gave me an apartment in the Seizième for my birthday.”
Franco spread out his hands. “If I were in his shoes, I would give you Versailles and still I would feel that I hadn’t done enough. He is a philistine, Maria; he doesn’t understand that you are a great artist and your Tosca will be the one by which all Toscas are judged.”
“You thought it went well tonight?”
Franco caught her eye in the mirror. It was easy to forget how vulnerable Maria was and how much she needed reassurance.
“You know it did, cara. The only performance that will surpass it is the one you will give on the opening night.”
Maria nodded obediently.
“Now go home and go to bed and I will come and have breakfast with you tomorrow.”
Maria put up the collar of her silver fox coat as the doorkeeper opened the stage door, but it was not enough to fool the crowds that were gathered outside hoping to catch a glimpse of her.
“Madame Callas.”
“Maria!”
The voices surged around her, the hands reaching out with photographs and autograph books. It was the last thing she wanted after a performance, yet she looked at the eager faces fondly. Floria Tosca would have stopped to sign the books of her fans, and she would too. So she smiled and signed until the stage doorkeeper came out and shooed the fans away.
In her suite there was another monstrous bouquet of red roses in the sitting room and on the table a box from Wartski, the jeweler in St. James’s. She hesitated before opening the box. If Ari had sent her a gift already, he must be feeling guilty about something.
Inside the box was a brooch made of flowers and butterflies that trembled on tiny springs. It reminded her of the piece she had worn in Turandot that had vibrated every time she moved her head, but that had been made of tin, and this was made of white gold and diamonds.
It was exquisite, the sort of thing that would have been worn by a Russian archduchess.
But its beauty meant that it was more than a good luck present, she thought. There was a card inside the box.
The message was written in Greek. “Forever and always, your Ari.” She knew that meant he wasn’t coming.
The day of the performance she woke early and felt the constriction in her throat immediately. She opened her mouth, and no sound came out. She pressed the bell and Bruna came running in. Maria pointed to her throat, and Bruna touched her hand to Maria’s forehead and looked grave.
“I think you have a temperature, madame. Shall I send for the doctor?”
Maria nodded and whispered to tell Franco to call the understudy. Then she turned her face to the wall in despair. The doctor came and gave her a shot of B12, several aspirins, and an anesthetic throat spray. Maria tried to sit up, but she felt too dizzy.
“Your blood pressure is very low.” The doctor looked at her with compassion. “I can’t say whether you have an infection or if your body is reacting to the stress of your upcoming performance. I suggest that you try to relax and see if anything improves. Of course, it’s very easy to tell a patient to relax but much harder to do it.”
“Do you think I can sing tonight?”
The doctor shook his head. “I’m afraid I am the wrong person to ask, Madame Callas, as I have tickets for tonight’s performance.”
The phone rang, Bruna picked it up. Maria knew from the expression on her face that it was Onassis on the other end.
She reached out her hand to take it.
“Agapi mou, are you looking forward to the show?”
“I have a fever. I don’t think I can sing.”
She heard the wet rattle as Ari took a puff of his cigar.
“Well, that is a pity, Maria, as I have come a long way.”
Maria felt her heart beat faster. “You are in London?”
“I am just on my way from the airport. Did you get my present?”
“It’s beautiful,” she croaked, “but even better is knowing that you are here.”
“Of course I am here. But you must sing.”
Maria closed her eyes. “I will sing for you, Ari.”
“Good. I will see you after the show. I want to meet Princess Margaret.”
Maria felt the tightness in her chest dissolving.
Franco came to wish her luck in her dressing room. “Are you feeling better, carissima?”
She looked at him in the mirror. He looked very handsome in his dinner jacket.
“I think so, but, Franco … I am scared.”
He put his hands on her shoulders and squeezed them.
“Of course you are. That is why you will be a great Tosca tonight.”
Maria was silent. It was not stage fright she was feeling but the intimation that she would not be on a stage much longer. This would be the last time that she would open a new production with Franco. The golden coins were nearly spent. So tonight would be a beginning and an ending. But knowing that Ari would be there made it less painful. She had another life beyond the stage that would still be there when she stopped singing. But tonight, if it were a swan song, would be a magnificent one. Tosca was a part that demanded an actress, not a vocal acrobat; and while she was no longer sure of her high Cs, she knew how to play Floria Tosca.
“Just try to not set fire to your wig.” Franco smiled. Maria smiled back.
“And remember this is Covent Garden, not La Scala. If you miss a note or two, no one will notice.”
“I will notice, Franco!” Maria looked horrified.
“Which is why you are la Divina. You could be singing to an audience that was stone-deaf, and still you would be worried about the wrong notes.”
Maria turned to look at him. “Ari rang me this morning. He is going to be there tonight—he came back specially.”
Franco tapped her on the shoulder. “No wonder you have made a miraculous recovery.”
He kissed her lightly on the cheek, so as not to disturb her makeup, then left.
The beginners bell sounded, and Maria started her vocal exercises as Bruna and the dresser helped her into her act one costume.
As she worked her way through the arpeggios, she wondered idly where Ari would be sitting. Knowing him, he would have wangled his way into the Royal Box and would be whispering into the ear of Princess Margaret. Perhaps even now he was inviting her for a cruise on the Christina. Maria sang the last arpeggio and felt her voice slip on the high C.
She tried again, clenching her stomach muscles to push her voice higher. This time she got the note, but the tone was shrill. Her heart began to beat rapidly, and she took a deep breath to calm herself. She tried to remember what Elvira had taught her: “See past the note and it will not seem so daunting. You are making music, not climbing a mountain.” Maria made her shoulders relax and tried again; this time she scaled the top C with ease. If Ari had come to hear her sing, then he would be rewarded.
In the foyer a TV reporter was talking to a middle-aged couple who had queued for twenty-four hours for a place in the gods, the seats right at the top of the opera house.
“Do you think you will be able to see anything?” the reporter asked.
The man held up a pair of binoculars. “That’s why I brought these. And I will be able to hear her well enough.”
“Have you queued like this before?”
The couple shook their heads. “But we have all Callas’s recordings, and we didn’t want to go to our graves without seeing the real thing, and this may be the last chance we get.”
“Are you worried that there might be a problem tonight? Madame Callas has a reputation for not fulfilling her engagements.”
“No point in worrying over something like that. I reckon singing is like everything else,” the man said, putting his arm round his wife’s shoulders. “You’ve got to be in the mood. Isn’t that right, Joan.”
Joan gave her husband a nudge. “Stop that, Eric—we’re on television. Anyway, I know everything is going to be all right.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because I read the leaves this morning and they never lie.”
Maria stood in the wings as Cavaradossi and Angelotti his revolutionary friend sang. They were both in magnificent voice, but Maria could feel the anticipation of the audience. It was waiting for her. Would Callas appear, and when she did, how would she sound? All her performances were battles but this would be the bloodiest. Tonight she had not just to win but to conquer. There could be no second chance.
She heard the theme from the orchestra that signaled her entry and she crossed herself three times, and then another time for luck, and picked up the basket of flowers that Floria Tosca had just bought in the Campo de’ Fiori and, banishing every thought from her head except the thoughts of a diva going to meet her lover, she sang “Mario, Mario” from the wings and then stepped lightly onstage.
The applause was thunderous with joy and relief. Callas was there in front of them, looking like a goddess. Some singers might have stopped to acknowledge the audience’s excitement, but Maria was Tosca, intent on the man she loved. The conductor signaled to the orchestra to slow down until the applause faded.
As she knelt before the altar with her flowers, singing of her plans for the evening, she knew that the audience was relaxing and paying total attention. No coughs, no rustling, it was just Tosca and her Mario and two thousand others listening in the dark. As Cavaradossi protested that the only eyes he loved were dark and furious like hers, she sang the line, “You who can make any woman love you,” thinking of the bracelet in the safe in Avenue Foch.
Maria hardly knew how she got through the grimy corridors to her dressing room. The dresser and Bruna knew not to say a word as they got her into costume for the second act. As she got ready to go back onstage, she looked for the Madonna that had always lived in her dressing room, and then remembered that Meneghini had kept it out of spite. The box containing Onassis’s diamond brooch was on the table, as she was planning to wear it to the after-party. She opened it and, touching one of the diamond flowers, set its petals trembling, filling the grimy dressing room with pinpoints of light. “Vissi d’arte, vissi d’amore” thought Maria as she made her way back to the wings. For thirty-five years she had lived only for art, and now she lived for love, but which did she need more?
The somber velvet drapery, heavy furniture, and shadowy lighting of Scarpia’s room gave the set the feel of a luxurious torture chamber. Scarpia was resplendent in the costume of the ancien régime, with powdered wig, gold brocade waistcoat, satin breeches, and silver-buckled shoes with heels that made him loom over Tosca. As they tangled with each other, Maria as Tosca felt the familiar push and pull of repulsion and desire. She hated Scarpia; she wanted to save the man she really loved, Cavaradossi. She would do anything for the man she loved, even give herself to Scarpia. When Scarpia came up behind her and spread out her arms as if he were crucifying her, she was Christlike in her submission. But as she sang “Vissi d’arte” she knew that the battle she was fighting was not whether she should submit to Scarpia but with the pleasure she felt in anticipating that submission.
Singing the great aria, she knew that the tears in her eyes were being reflected in the darkness. She was singing an elegy onstage to her own career. Like Tosca, she was singing for something greater than herself; she could see the end in sight. The audience understood and could not look away.
After he signed the letter that guaranteed her lover’s release, Scarpia came toward her with a wolfish smile, one that she had seen so many times before on the Christina. She could pretend to cower, to be horrified at what lay ahead, or she could take arms against the author of her misfortunes. The knife lay on the table that was laid with a meal for two, plastic caviar and fizzy water disguised as Dom Pérignon. As Scarpia came toward her, his arms outstretched, ready to claim his prize, she picked up the knife and plunged it into his chest. He staggered away and she pursued him, holding the dagger like a spear, standing over him, ordering him to die. And then finally Scarpia went still, and Maria remembered she was Floria Tosca and she fluttered about the stage gathering her belongings, her stole, her reticule, the gloves that she had taken off so provocatively; and just as she was about to blow the candles out, she hesitated. She picked up two candlesticks and placed them to the left and right of the body. Then she took the crucifix from the desk and put it gingerly on Scarpia’s chest, shrinking away from him as if she feared him still.
She did not sing a note in those last five minutes, but the audience was completely rapt, understanding every nuance of her emotions from her face and body. As the curtain came down there was a cathedral-like stillness, and then an eruption of sound that felt like a blessing to Maria.
She took her curtain call with Renato Cioni, who played Cavaradossi, and Tito Gobbi as Scarpia, standing between them, holding their hands with outstretched arms. She was grateful for their presence; if they had not been there, she might have fainted. Maria smiled as if her face would split while the fans threw flowers onto the stage, and as Gobbi kissed her hand. Everyone knew that they had seen something that night which could never be repeated.
Franco had to fight his way into Maria’s dressing room after the performance. Maria was hemmed in by the flock of well-wishers, who were vying with one another to find the right superlative. Maria looked a little dazed, as if she had been brought round from an anesthetic. Franco shouldered his way past a minor royal, a newspaper proprietor, and a theatrical knight to get to her.
He didn’t say anything, he just knelt at her feet, took her hand and kissed it.
“You were even better than I imagined in my wildest dreams, carissima. There will never be another Tosca like you.”
He saw that Maria’s eyes were full of tears. And he understood—how could he not?—why she was crying. This perfect performance, this great artistic triumph that would never be rivaled, meant that she would now always be looking backward. Her acting skills would still be there, but the voice would slowly shred until it became just an echo of its former glory.
He said, “You know, cara, the best moment for me was the last five minutes of the second act, when you placed the candles around Scarpia—what a piece of acting. You didn’t sing a note, but no one could look away.”
“Perhaps I should make a silent movie,” she said, trying to smile. Then the door opened, and she looked up in hope.
Franco knew whom she was looking for, but he knew that Onassis would not be walking through the door.