About the film

“Babette’s Feast” (1987), directed by Gabriel Axel, starring Stéphane Audran. Film Duration : 1h43. In English.

In 1871, Babette flees the Commune of Paris and is taken in by Martine and Philippa, two elderly sisters in a small Norwegian town. The sisters are the daughters of the town’s late minister and maintain the strict lifestyle of their father’s Lutheran sect. Babette is instructed to cook simple northern dishes, but after winning the French lottery, she prepares a magnificent French feast for the sisters and their friends.

Themes
The story explores themes of human and cultural interaction, and how food prepared with intention and gratitude can transform people.

About the music

Concert duration: 20m

The New York Opera Society’s “Babette’s Feast” is a new story about Nordic sobriety and French passion. When this collides, both comedy, tragedy, and sweet music ensue. Karen Blixen’s story is a very popular and much-loved story about a remote community in the far north of Norway which attains a taste of the big world through Babette, a French exile. The story is about life, love, earthly and spiritual emotions, French cooking and opera, virtue and morality.

The New York Opera Society (NYOS) develops new audiences for opera by commissioning, creating, and funding exemplary productions. To that end, NYOS serves as a conduit to the public by disseminating important messages, musical inspiration, and seminal artistic performances via partnerships with major performance venues, corporations, nonprofits and governments to present the work of our artists. In its most recent season, NYOS co-produced the world premiere of “Letters from Ruth” by Gisle Kverndokk and Aksel-Otto Bull with Musical Fruehling Gmunden), winning 4 major prizes from the German Musical Theater Academy in 2024 for Best Composer, Best Production of a Musical, Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress. Additionally, NYOS has commissioned and produced the world premiere of “Upon this Handful of Earth” with Sacred Music in a Sacred Space in NYC and a highly lauded staged reading of “Letters from Ruth” at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.; both works by Gisle Kverndokk and Aksel-Otto Bull. NYOS has also commissioned the first operatic version of “Tres Sombreros de Copa” (Three Top Hats) by Ricardo Llorca which premiered in Brazil and had its Spanish premiere at Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid in November 2019. NYOS co-produced the 2021 Teatro Real/Madrid premiere and Lincoln Center premiere of its contemporary Spanish opera, “Las Horas Vacias”, by Guggenheim fellow and Juilliard faculty Ricardo Llorca; three tours and world premieres of NYOS’ commissions from Gisle Kverndokk’s and Wiik’s Max & Moritz: A Cartoon Opera in Seven Pranks and Supersize Girl. Other notable NYOS evenings have taken place at the National Gallery of Art, the Chicago Cultural Center, the Embassy of Italy, New York’s World Financial Center, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, and the United Nations. Audiences have included the Royal Couple of Norway, the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington, D.C., Queen Sofia of Spain (at a gala in her honor), Barbara Walters, Stanley Tucci/Martin Scorsese (at a gala in their honor), and nearly every European and South American Consulate. NYOS has been favorably featured in The Washington Post, on PBS, in a feature article in The Wall Street Journal, and Opera News. NYOS is led by Executive Director Jennifer Cho and a dedicated Board of Directors chaired by philanthropist, Lesley Silvester.

Øystein Wiik (1956) is a Norwegian actor, singer, author and playwright. A musical theatre performer he has starred in several musicals in Norway, Austria, Germany and England. He starred as Jean Valjean in the original production of “Les Miserables” in Oslo, Vienna and London’s West End. He is also a very successful author and has written 11crime novels, film scripts and book and lyrics for a wide range of musicals and operas.

Gisle Kverndokk (1967) is a Norwegian composer, conductor and musician. His work list includes operas, musicals, symphonic works, chamber, church- and film music. His opera “Upon this Handful of Earth” was premiered at the St. Ignatius Church in New York City, 2017. His children’s opera “Purriot” was a great hit at The Norwegian National Opera in the 2018 season, and his opera “The Forth Watch of the Night” has been produced several times at The Norwegian National Opera and at The SavonlinnaOpera Festival in Finland, in 2012.His musical “Letters from Ruth”, produced by Musical Frühling in Gmunden, Austria, won several awards at the German Musical Theatre Awards 2023, including Best Composition and Best Musical. His album “Symphonic Dances” – recorded by The Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2020.

Øystein Wiik and Gisle Kverndokk have written 14 musicals and operas together, that have been performed on stages in Germany, Austria, Norway and the USA. Their first musical “Sophie’s World” was hailed as “Musical of the Year” in the German magazine ”Musicals” in 1998, ”Martin L.” was nominated for The Nordic Council’s Music Prize in 2008, and ”Around the World in 80 days” won numerous awards at the German and Austrian Musical Theatre Awards in 2017, among them “Best Musical” at both places.