Cinema's Illusions, Opera's Allure

From Richard Wagner and George Lucas to Alfred Hitchcock and Maria Callas, Schroeder provides a fascinating account of the entire absorbing history of the interdependence of opera and film, demonstrating how opera can be found lurking in the background of a wide range of films.The allure of opera to cinema early in the century held up through the silent era, into sound films, through the golden age of movies, and into the most recent approaches to moviemaking. Cinema's Illusions, Opera's Allure explores the numerous ways - some predictable, some unexpected, and some bizarre - that this has happened.

David Schroeder holds a PhD from Cambridge University, and is Professor Emeritus at Dalhousie University. His books include Haydn and the Enlightenment (Oxford UP, 1990), Mozart in Revolt (Yale UP, 1999), Cinema's Illusions, Opera's Allure: The Operatic Impulse in Film (Continuum, 2002), and Our Schubert: His Enduring Legacy (Scarecrow, 2008).