Chapter 12 - Puccini and Early Film

Summary

This chapter examines Puccini’s relationship with early film. The composer’s career coincided with nearly the first thirty years of the cinematic art form, and it was a form of technology with which Puccini had an ambivalent relationship. The chapter begins with an account of Puccini’s known thoughts about film and cinema going. There follows an extensive discussion of Puccini’s and Ricordi’s legal efforts to prevent the use of his music as film accompaniment, and of the difficulty in recouping royalties. By the 1920s, however, Ricordi was including a clause about film usage in opera contracts, including that for Turandot. From the 1930s, with the arrival of the ‘talkies’, commercial opportunities became apparent and the company pursued a more liberal course. The chapter also considers how Puccini’s operas were brought to the screen during his lifetime and shortly after – there was a particular vogue for Tosca films – and discusses the ways in which the composer’s works might be considered ‘cinematic’.