Muammar el Qaddafi: The Opera

In September 2006, the English National Opera and the BBC produced an opera about the life of Libyan leader and erstwhile terrorist sponsor Muammar Qaddafi titled, “Gaddafi.” (Spellings of Qaddafi’s name have ranged from those used here to Kaddafi, Kadafi, Ghaddafi and more.)

The opera was “an examination of the creation of a myth,” retelling the story of a Bedouin who becomes a powerful political leader. The chorus represented Qaddafi’s all-female bodyguards. The opera was directed by British film director Antonia Bird. The music was written by Steve Chandra Savale, a former guitarist with the group Asian Dub Foundation, on a libretto by playwright Shan Khan.

“It's a brave attempt to create a vision for new opera in 2006 by dramatising the life of one of today's most controversial politicians,” The Guardian wrote, “but sadly the evening is never more than a hodgepodge of musical and cultural influences, with the amplified ENO orchestra augmented by the guitars and ouds of the Third Universal Band and an accompaniment of sampled beats.