Premiere October 16, 2010
Musical. Master of Musicals Andrew Lloyd Webber visits The Göteborg Opera. In Sunset Boulevard we will hear our great Swedish musical star Gunilla Backman sing the principal role.
When the film Sunset Boulevard was to be filmed in 1950 Greta Garbo was first offered the lead role as Norma Desmond. When the musical with the same name premiered in the US in 1994 Norma was performed by Glenn Close. In The Göteborg Opera production Gunilla Backman, famous for Mamma Mia amongst other musicals, sings the role of faded silent film star.
Norma Desmond lives in a luxury house on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles with her butler. In the heydays of silent film she was one of the most celebrated actresses in Hollywood, but the transition to sound motion pictures caused her fall from grace. Insistent on making her comeback she writes her own screenplay. When the young, unemployed author Joe Gillis by chance turns up at her door she persuades him to help her. This becomes the start of a story of romance and tragedy. Norma falls in love with Joe, at the same time as he falls in love with the young Betty. The drama escalates in the elegant Hollywood settings and the border between dream and reality gets ever more blurry for the increasingly desperate Norma.
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical first premiered in London in 1993. It was an immediate success and was performed 1529 times. The musical has a thriller-like story and fantastic melodies. One of the most famous songs is Norma Desmond’s As if we never said goodbye.
It is a great pleasure for us to be able to introduce Gunilla Backman in the female leading role while at the same time being able to present a young shooting star, Jonas Eskilsson, in the male leading role. As Max, Norma’s butler, we see Fred Johansson, who last played the Beast in our production of the Beauty and the Beast. Director Vernon Mound and choreographer Anthoula Papadakis were responsible for the success of The Göteborg Opera production of Miss Saigon in 2004/2005.
Set design models
Costume skteches by Emma Ryott.
Gunilla Backman (Norma Desmond)
Gunilla Backman got her big break-through in the role as Donna in the musical Mamma Mia! at Cirkus in Stockholm. She received a Golden Mask (Guldmask) for best female principal role for her performance as Donna in 2006. The production was also performed at Scandinavium during the spring of 2007.
Gunilla Backman has been educated in classical dance at Kungliga Operans Balettelevskola (The Royal Swedish Ballet School) in Stockholm and has studied singing since the age of 17. Previous principal roles include Les Misérables and Miss Saigon in London; Sunset Boulevard in Germany; Chess in Denmark; and the title role at the original premiere of Garbo The Musical at Oscarsteatern (The Oscar Theatre) in Stockholm.
Gunilla has also participated in concerts and theatre productions, and has also sung on records and dubbed films. She is also a familiar face on television, having participated in (for example) Allsång på Skansen (Sing Along at Skansen), Så ska det låta (The Lyrics Board), Sing-a-long and Doobidoo. She has also released the solo album Nära mig (Close to Me) and participated in The Best of Andrew Lloyd Webber at Oscarsteatern (The Oscar Theatre), been a guest performer in Rhapsody in Rock and performed in concerts with Kungliga Filharmonikerna (The Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra) and Broadway concerts at Berwaldhallen with Sveriges Radios Symfoniorkester (The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra).
During the spring of 2009 she participated in the show PrimaDONNOR at Hamburger Börs in Stockholm with her fellow Mamma Mia! performers Sussie Eriksson and Charlotte Strandberg, among other performances. Gunilla Backman also performed as the guest soloist of the Epiphany Concert at The Göteborg Opera in 2008.
Jonas Eskilsson (Joe Gillis)
Jonas Eskilsson makes his debut at The Göteborg Opera in the role of Joe Gillis, which is also his first major leading role. He graduated from the Academy of Music and Drama at the University of Gothenburg in 2009. During his last year at the academy he performed as Magaldi in Evita at Åbo Svenska Teater (The Swedish Theatre of Turku) and as Hanschen in Spring Awakening at the Malmö Opera. During the autumn of 2009 he performed the leading role of Peter in the one act musical Kontaktannonsen (Connect/Disconnect) at Regionteatern Blekinge Kronoberg in Växjö.
