Brenna Corner wishes you a Happy International Women’s Day!
This season, Brenna Corner made our eyes pop and our imaginations soar with Hansel and Gretel, pairing a familiar fairytale with extraordinary storytelling and design by The Old Trout Puppet Workshop.
On International Women’s Day, we’re celebrating Corner as one of the four women directors who bring our stages to life this season. We caught up with her about director’s “bucket list” (hint: musicals!), and the impossible question of naming her favourite project to date:
What is your favourite part of the production process in opera?
Brenna Corner: “I have two: I love the initial ideas phase. You get the call from a company about a piece, and then you dig in. Your brain ignites with concepts, questions, research, approaches, problems, more research… You meet with your creative design team and they bring their own list of concepts, questions, etc… and you just start chatting. I love that part. A bunch of passionate storytellers in a room (even a Zoom room) together searching for what they understand the heart of the story is.
“I also love the second week of rehearsal. Week one, it’s the first day of school so everyone is a bit nervous, and then you just jump into staging. But by week two connections and comfort have formed, and ideally we are reviewing scenes we have loosely staged the first week. I love this moment because now we can dig in, everyone feel comfortable with the music, with each other, and has a basic idea of shape, so now we can play. We experiment and explore the characters and craft a world and a story together as a team.”
A scene from Brenna Corner’s production of Hansel and Gretel, designed by The Old Trout Puppet Workshop, Calgary Opera, 2026. Photo: Benjamin Laird.
What would be your opera "elevator pitch" for someone who's never been before?
BC: “Opera is the epitome of all the art forms, it is theatre, and symphony, and dance and visual art. But at its heart opera is human sharing. There is something so powerful about the unamplified voice (yes, I realize that there is lots of opera with amplification intended, but go with me here). One human onstage (with 20-60 of their nearest and dearest in the pit) can take you on a emotional journey is impossible in any other way. Yes, many artforms can effect us, but opera is the only artform I know of that can effect us in all the ways at once.”
What's an opera that's on your "bucket list" to direct?
BC: “I would love to direct some musicals, I must admit. I am dying to direct The Man of La Mancha. In the opera world, I am doing a lot of the Italian rep these days (Puccini, Verdi, Donezetti, Leoncavallo); I would love to get into some Russian rep, though.”
Out of the operas you've directed, what's your favourite?
BC: “Generally, whichever opera I am working on at the time. First of all, because how can it not be? You have to love the story you are working on and telling. Second, each time I work on a piece I find new elements, colours, or moments in the music that I didn’t know or understand before, which is exciting. I’ve done La bohème something like six or seven times, and each time I fall in love with it again. And each time by opening night I am ready to have a Bohème break.”