Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival

Riverside Studios

1-2 August 2013

Directed by Pia Furtado
Conducted by Adam Gatehouse
Produced by Afsaneh Gray

When Jade Goody died in 2009, her death was consumed like one more episode of the reality television that had created her. Articles were written with titles such as “How Death Will Come”, in which a doctor predicted in what order her organs would pack up and how she would feel as they did; the quote “KILL ME NOW” was emblazoned on the front cover of The Sun. Apparently, we couldn’t get enough of this grim ending for the girl who ‘made it’, whose life spanned a fairy-tale trajectory of rags to riches, saint to sinner and back again.

She was the symbol of the Big Brother generation, the first reality TV star to get widespread recognition, with crews from Germany, the United States and elsewhere standing outside her house, reporting on her final hours.

Part account of the way her life and death were reported, part modern-day fairy tale, and the Crowd (wept) explored the emptiness at the heart of the celebrity dream. It was produced as a work-in-progress showing on 1-2 August 2013 at Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival, Riverside Studios and is currently in development.