In opera, the director stands as a vital creative force alongside the librettist and the composer, shaping the interpretive and aesthetic dimensions of the stage. The 2006 production of the Asian version of Verdi’s Rigoletto, directed by Soodong Chang, garnered critical acclaim for its innovative localization of the canonical Western work. Recontextualizing the opera’s original 16th century European setting, Chang transposes the narrative to a fictional Asian port city, “K,” situated at the close of the 21st century and engulfed by the forces of global capitalism.
Chang reimagines Rigoletto, originally portrayed as a court jester serving a duke, as a clown-cook of diasporic origin. Likewise, Gilda, the protagonist’s daughter in Verdi’s original, is reinterpreted as an adopted child—an orphaned refugee whom Rigoletto encounters aboard a smuggling vessel. Through these narrative transformations, the production foregrounds the anguish of Asian refugees and depicts Rigoletto’s existential despair as he becomes a servile byproduct of the violence and moral decay perpetrated by capitalistic excess.
Chang’s directorial vision, as revealed in this production, may be characterized by three thematic pillars: the pursuit of contemporaneity and modernization; the exploration of socially engaged messages; and the search for culturally grounded, pan-Asian values. He effectively rearticulates the socio-political critiques inherent in Verdi’s original through a distinctly modern lens, offering a dramaturgical framework that resonates with contemporary Asian audiences.
By recasting Rigoletto within an Asian sociocultural context, Chang not only challenges Eurocentric operatic conventions but also contributes meaningfully to the discourse of operatic globalization. His work expands the interpretive possibilities of opera as a transcultural art form and serves as a compelling model for Korean opera’s engagement with the global stage.