The character that many in the opera world associate with Gilfry is the title role in Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd. Although he wasn’t the first to perform it, he has been strongly identified with it in opera circles. A Los Angeles Times review declared, “ … Gilfry owns the role in bearing, manner and vocal force. At the [Los Angeles] opening, he showed nothing to contradict his superiority.” The Times of London said of the Royal Opera production, “Rodney Gilfry has the physique du role for Budd but, more importantly, sings absolutely beautifully.” And of the Dallas Opera performance, Opera News stated, “With his rolling baritone, innocent manner and blond good looks, Rodney Gilfry seems put on earth to portray Billy.”

Billy, however, is a far cry from the mercurial Nathan. What convinced Sophie’s Choice director, Sir Trevor Nunn, to cast Gilfry? “It’s very simple,” Nunn replied. “I needed someone who could play this major baritone role. I had seen a TV broadcast of Don Giovanni and was completely riveted by this particular singer who acted with such freedom and daring and physicality.”

It’s the Monday following Saturday’s premiere of Sophie’s Choice and Gilfry is recalling his feelings prior to the performance in an interview in a Royal Opera House meeting room. “I felt completely at peace; relatively calm, but excited at the same time. I had banished all doubt of anything not going well, and I was expecting to have a really wonderful experience.

“Then we actually did it (laughs). One of my challenges is that I struggle with a tendency to be a perfectionist,” he continues. “Things were going beautifully. [Then] in the library scene, I picked Sophie up off the floor and I got on her left side, and this voice in my head—I heard Trevor saying, ‘No, other side.’ So I went back and suddenly, it made me just a little bit nervous. Things got better—then I do this scene where she wakes up and I cook for her. I got out of sequence, and my head started to swim a little bit and I lost my concentration.

“The problem with having these perfectionist desires is that you don’t stay in the moment. You think about the mistake you just made, and you’re thinking about what’s coming up. At the end of the whole thing, I was kind of pissed off at myself. And then I was pissed off at myself for being pissed off... because, what’s the point? Why beat myself up? It went really well, people loved it, and they liked me.”

“ … the great performances come from [Dale] Duesing and Gilfry, the latter fatally glamorous … and melting our hearts as well as
Sophie’s ...”
—The Guardian