Lyric Opera 2023-2024 Issue 6 - Champion

Lyric Opera of Chicago | 22 ACT I In his apartment in Hempstead, Long Island, in the early 2000s, Emile Griffith is struggling to get dressed. Suffering from dementia, he is confused and haunted by his past. Luis, his adopted son and caretaker, reminds him to be ready for an important meeting with Benny Paret, Jr. In the late 1950s, Emile is a young man in St. Thomas. He yearns to find his mother, Emelda, and make it big in America as a singer, a baseball player, and a designer of hats. Emile moves to New York. When he finds his mother, she is confused, not sure which of her seven abandoned children he is, but overjoyed. Hoping to find Emile a job, she takes him to meet Howie Albert, a hat manufacturer who gave up on his own dreams of being a boxing coach—dreams that are rekindled when Howie notices Emile’s impressively muscular build. Howie determines that Emile is meant to be a boxer, not a hat maker, and starts training Emile for the ring. Giving up his other dreams, Emile quickly develops into a talented boxer. Lonely and confused by his success, Emile finds his way to a gay bar in Manhattan. Kathy Hagen, the owner, welcomes Emile to a world that frightens and attracts him. Emile confides in Kathy and an attentive young man, revealing some demons from his past. As a boy, left in the care of his cruel fundamentalist cousin Blanche, he was beaten and forced to hold cinder blocks above his head as punishment for having the devil inside him, a punishment that made him into a man of great physical strength. In 1962, Emile encounters Benny “Kid” Paret at a weigh-in for their upcoming fight. Paret taunts the charismatic Emile, calling him “maricón,” a disparaging Spanish word for a homosexual. Alone with Howie, Emile tries to talk to him frankly about why this word hurt him so deeply, but for Howie this is something that no one in the fight business wants to hear about. Howie leaves him, and Emile wonders what it means to be a man. Emile and Paret prepare for the big fight. During the bout, Paret continues to taunt Emile, who ultimately corners his opponent and delivers 17 blows in less than seven seconds, knocking Paret into a coma. INTERMISSION PRODUCTION SPONSORS Zell Family Foundation Gramma Fisher Foundation of Marshalltown, Iowa Ethel & Bill° Gofen The Pritzker Foundation and the Pritzker Traubert Foundation The Joyce Foundation David W. Carpenter° and Orit K. Carpenter, in loving memory of David W. Carpenter * Virginia Tobiason* Alice & John Butler + H. Gael Neeson + Sylvia Neil & Daniel Fischel + Robert and Penelope Steiner Family Foundation + * Lori Ann Komisar & Morris Silverman Roberta L. & Robert J.Washlow * The New Work Fund + The Enrique Circle Members ° Deceased Champion is a co-production of Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Metropolitan Opera. Commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera. Originally commissioned by Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, co-commissioned by Jazz St. Louis. Additional costumes provided by The Tailor’s Square, The Costume Shop, and Seams Un- limited. Lyric Opera of Chicago thanks its Official Airline,American Airlines. Lyric Opera of Chicago wishes to thank its preferred physical therapy provider, Athletico. APPROXIMATE TIMINGS This production will be performed with one intermission. Act I 1 hour 10 minutes Intermission 25 minutes Act II 1 hour 10 minutes TOTAL 2 hours 45 minutes LYRIC’S 2023/24 SEASON IS PRESENTED BY and Julie & Roger Baskes Synopsis