Tosca: Meet The Creatives- P Burton-Morgan

P Burton-Morgan is a librettist, director and Artistic Director of Metta Theatre. You can read the full version of this interview in the Opera Programme for Oxford International Opera’s production of Tosca.

First of all, how would you describe what you do as the Director?

Well initially I’m where the creative vision is born – in this case a contemporary Tosca where patriarchal power structures and corruption are still very much at play, and an aesthetic that draws from Bauhaus and brutalism to create a starkly dramatic, masculine and minimalist world on stage where shadows loom large and there is quite literally nowhere to hide. But that dream was dreamt over five years ago now (operas take a long time to bring to fruition). The rest is essentially midwifery – helping deliver that vision in collaboration with an enormous team of fellow artists and ensuring that we’re all, as it were, delivering the same baby. So it’s huge amounts of communication between all the respective departments – lighting, costume, set etc, and managing my two brilliant assistant directors who each take on their own directorial responsibilities in managing the chorus and the kids chorus. It’s a lot of people management! And then the best part – rehearsals. We have an exceptionally short rehearsal process so I have entirely staged the opera in advance (on paper), but even in our brief time together I hope the singers and I will still carve out space to co-create something together. The joy of directing for me is both in having an incredibly clear vision which is then brought to life, but also adapting that vision to accommodate the ideas that every other member of the team brings to the process. 

You’ve spoken before about retelling stories in new ways which resonate with our times. How has this manifested in this production of Tosca?

Our Tosca is unapologetically contemporary. Sadly we still live in a world where powerful and corrupt men exert their control and abuse their power in a way that is most damaging for women. We are non-specific in our geography but this could be any of at least half a dozen supposedly liberal democracies in which a power-hungry man is wreaking havoc supposedly in the name of a morality that he himself spectacularly fails to uphold. It’s actually mildly terrifying that this concept has become more rather than less prescient in the five years since I began discussing it with Marios and the team. Welcome to 2026.

While the visual aspect of the opera is very different, the orchestration, the characters and the lyrics are much the same. Placing those aspects in a new context, how can parallels be drawn between 19^th-century Rome and this 21^st-century setting?

What’s interesting to me is that Tosca is a deeply pious and religious woman (and even Scarpia, problematic as he is, does at least wrestle with the ethics of his actions in relation to how they go against the tenets of his faith). We obviously live in more secular times, but I think what translates from then to now is the searing injustice felt by Tosca – flawed certainly, jealous and headstrong, but fundamentally a good woman, an ethical woman, living a morally engaged life, and how she is placed in such a morally compromised and compromising position in spite of this. The power of the church is certainly less now than it was in 19th century Rome, though it is interesting that we yet again find ourselves living in times of increased Police presence, a presence that in some countries is certainly heavily influenced by the resident political regime. The rest is pretty universal really – jealousy, betrayal, lust – in many ways it’s more impressive that Puccini was so ahead of his time as to write these characters with such nuance and compassion. But that’s arguably why such works are still being performed now and will continue to be performed for hundreds of years to come. 

Read the full version of this interview in the opera programme for Oxford International Opera’s production of Tosca.

Photos by Alex Brenner

Find tickets to the Oxford International Opera’s performance of Tosca here

Join the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra alongside international opera stars for the brand-new, fully-staged production of Oxford International Opera, where we will bring Puccini’s Tosca to the stage of the New Theatre in Oxford. Featuring internationally renowned opera singers such as Sir Bryn Terfel, Carmen Giannattasio and Saimir Pirgu, the Oxford Philharmonic will be the fourth protagonist and extra voice on the stage.

The Principal Donor of this production is the Laidlaw Opera Trust.