Volkswacht Bodensee - Sandra Oh trades the small screen for the grand stage of the Met Opera

In "La Fille du Regiment," Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti's comic opera, the Canadian-American actress plays the Duchess of Krakenthorp, who reluctantly marries off her son. The role is spoken rather than sung -- and in French.

"She's very stern and she's very angry, and I find it very, very difficult to keep that face when the most beautiful music is happening right in front of me," Oh says with a laugh during an interview with AFP after Tuesday's dress rehearsal.

Her first foray on the Metropolitan Opera stage was the result of a happy accident: the storied institution's general manager offered her the role after seeing her perform Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" in the open-air theater in Central Park this summer.

"To move into a stage this grand, and to move into the heights of what opera is, and really it's to be in rehearsal with some of the greatest artists...is something that's very, very rare," she reflects.

"I wanted to try that experience. And I do try and do that in my life and in my career, to just try things that are new, things that mostly scare me," added the 54-year-old.

What surprised her most was the "crazy" pace of the production, at odds with the "slow or gentle" way audiences experience opera: "You have sets that are moving all the time, people who are just coming, and you have people who are telling you exactly where to be all the time. And while it is divine, it's bananas," she said.

- 'I'm in my comedy phase' -

There's little doubt that the presence of a bona fide small screen star at the Met will attract a larger audience than usual -- a boon for an institution struggling financially since the Covid pandemic and eager to modernize its programming.

Sandra Oh's entrance on stage -- in a purple gown, her hair adorned with feathers, and waving a fan -- drew cheers and excited shouts from New York schoolchildren invited to the dress rehearsal.

The winner of two Golden Globes, among other awards, for her roles as a talented surgeon in "Grey's Anatomy" and an intelligence agent obsessed with an assassin in "Killing Eve" is delighted by the prospect of these youngsters and her fans to "see the opera and to experience what storytelling is in a grand scale, what music is, and to see the top artists in the world."

On the wide stage, the actress herself more than holds her own. Far from the subtlety required before a camera, her powerful voice and exaggerated gestures fill the space -- and draw peals of laughter.

"In a special stage this big, you do have to be very conscious of all your gestures," she sums up, noting that on screen, it's the quality of an actor's expressions that the lens captures. "As an actor, you should be able to do all of it."

As it happens, Oh is also set to appear in US theaters starting Friday, alongside Keanu Reeves, Seth Rogen, and Keke Palmer in the comedy "Good Fortune."

"I'm in my comedy phase, and everything is like, feel good, it's a comedy. And, you know, bring a bit of joy," she concludes.

G.Haefliger--VB