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Doctor Atomic
Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with a libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on October 1, 2005. The work focuses on how leading figures at Los Alamos dealt with the great stress and anxiety of preparing for the test of the first atomic bomb, the "Trinity" test.
In 2007, a documentary was made by Jon H. Else about the creation of the opera and collaboration between Adams and Sellars, titled Wonders Are Many.
The first act takes place about a month before the bomb is to be tested, and the second act is set in the early morning of July 16, 1945 (the day of the test). During the second act, time is shown slowing down for the characters and then snapping back to the clock. The opera ends in the final, prolonged moment before the bomb is detonated.
Although the original commission for the opera suggested that U.S. physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the "father of the atomic bomb", be fashioned as a 20th-century Doctor Faustus, Adams and Sellars deliberately worked to avoid this characterization. Alice Goodman worked for two years with Adams on the project before leaving. She objected to the characterization of Edward Teller, as dictated by the original commission.
The work centers on key players in the Manhattan Project, especially Robert Oppenheimer and General Leslie Groves. It also features Kitty Oppenheimer, Robert's wife. Sellars adapted the libretto from primary historical sources.[citation needed]
Doctor Atomic is similar in style to previous Adams operas Nixon in China and The Death of Klinghoffer, both of which explored the characters and personalities of figures who were involved in historical incidents, rather than a re-enactment of the events themselves.
Sellars adapted much of the text for the opera from declassified U.S. government documents and communications among the scientists, government officials, and military personnel who were involved in the project.[citation needed] He also included poetry by Charles Baudelaire and Muriel Rukeyser, the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, quotes from the Bhagavad Gita, and a traditional Tewa native song.
Marvin Cohen, professor of physics at UC Berkeley and president of the American Physical Society at the time, criticized some parts of the libretto for not being strictly scientifically correct. In particular he took issue with the original opening lines, which were excerpted from the 1945 Smyth Report:
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Doctor Atomic
Doctor Atomic is an opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with a libretto by Peter Sellars. It premiered at the San Francisco Opera on October 1, 2005. The work focuses on how leading figures at Los Alamos dealt with the great stress and anxiety of preparing for the test of the first atomic bomb, the "Trinity" test.
In 2007, a documentary was made by Jon H. Else about the creation of the opera and collaboration between Adams and Sellars, titled Wonders Are Many.
The first act takes place about a month before the bomb is to be tested, and the second act is set in the early morning of July 16, 1945 (the day of the test). During the second act, time is shown slowing down for the characters and then snapping back to the clock. The opera ends in the final, prolonged moment before the bomb is detonated.
Although the original commission for the opera suggested that U.S. physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the "father of the atomic bomb", be fashioned as a 20th-century Doctor Faustus, Adams and Sellars deliberately worked to avoid this characterization. Alice Goodman worked for two years with Adams on the project before leaving. She objected to the characterization of Edward Teller, as dictated by the original commission.
The work centers on key players in the Manhattan Project, especially Robert Oppenheimer and General Leslie Groves. It also features Kitty Oppenheimer, Robert's wife. Sellars adapted the libretto from primary historical sources.[citation needed]
Doctor Atomic is similar in style to previous Adams operas Nixon in China and The Death of Klinghoffer, both of which explored the characters and personalities of figures who were involved in historical incidents, rather than a re-enactment of the events themselves.
Sellars adapted much of the text for the opera from declassified U.S. government documents and communications among the scientists, government officials, and military personnel who were involved in the project.[citation needed] He also included poetry by Charles Baudelaire and Muriel Rukeyser, the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, quotes from the Bhagavad Gita, and a traditional Tewa native song.
Marvin Cohen, professor of physics at UC Berkeley and president of the American Physical Society at the time, criticized some parts of the libretto for not being strictly scientifically correct. In particular he took issue with the original opening lines, which were excerpted from the 1945 Smyth Report: