In his apartment in Bologna, the opera singer Moses Mackay, who once moonlighted as a reality TV star, was hosting a soirée. To hold a properly elegant soirée, one must first acquire a salon.
Some salon. He has been living in a 16th-century palazzo in Italy that is as grand and as beautiful as it sounds. There are marble floors and original frescoes. There is a grand piano. There is a mezzanine balcony from which to look down upon a suave geezer in an elegant linen jacket and a crisp white shirt singing an aria or two. The soirée was an early birthday celebration and an arrivederci to Bologna and his Italian mates.
Not too bad, eh, for a boy whose first home was a state-house apartment in Northcote on Auckland’s North Shore? “A prostitute lived in the flat above us and below us lived a drug dealer. Once, there was a drive-by shooting where guns were fired at the house.”
Mackay was so young he doesn’t remember the details, but he does remember a general atmosphere of unease and insecurity. There came a series of state houses and hand-me-down clothes and school lunches of peanut butter sandwiches, which he hated so much he’d leave them in the bottom of his school bag until he got so hungry he’d pick the mouldy bits off the bread and eat the sandwich anyway, shamefacedly. He remembers being always hungry and always tired.
He grew up and bought a house and gave the key to his mum. He said, “This is ours now. No one can take it away from us.”
The reason for the arrivederci is that he is returning to New Zealand for NZ Opera’s production of Rossini’s comic opera, Le comte Ory. He will play Raimbaud, companion to the sex-obsessed Count Ory, who is a sort of 19th-century version of Hugh Hefner – Raimbaud helps him plot tricks to get hot chicks into the sack.
Last October, Mackay won the $50,000 Dame Malvina Major award – the opera equivalent of being given the Moon – and he was, obviously, over the moon about it. That was another “Not bad, eh?” moment. People, including me, saying so might get a bit tiresome, but it follows him around.
A natural introvert
Everyone loves a rags-to-riches story, don’t they? He’s the boy who grew up to be one-third of the much-loved and successful singing trio Sol3 Mio, with his cousins Pene and Amitai Pati. Then he was the bachelor on The Bachelor New Zealand. Is he still the bachelor?
“I don’t think I ever was. When we did the show, I was like, ‘I think you guys chose the wrong guy. I don’t feel natural doing this.’”
No kidding. There is nothing natural about reality TV. Also, he is, like many performing artists, a true introvert. He was a terribly shy child. His mother used to make him and his siblings sing for the rellies in the living room. He used to think: “Where can I hide?”
In a way, he’s still looking for places to hide. And he has found that the perfect hiding place ‒ strange as it sounds until you think about it ‒ is on a stage playing other people, disguised in sumptuous costumes, singing other people’s words in the languages of other cultures. So, you make a career out of people looking at you and listening to you, but it’s not really you. It’s called hiding in plain sight – the ideal career for the introvert.
Still, it’s hard to fathom why he wanted to appear on Celebrity Treasure Island and then The Bachelor NZ. He was already really quite nicely famous through Sol3 Mio. He’s an opera singer, and opera singing is serious business. He says he thought The Bachelor, at least, would be a bit of fun. He was a young single fella and young single fellas are seldom averse to a bit of fun.
“You know that song? Find love in some hopeless places. I can’t believe I’m quoting a pop song! I thought it was lighthearted, a bit of fun.” And, no, he still hasn’t got a girlfriend. Unless you count opera as a girlfriend, and he just might.
He did and he didn’t find reality TV a bit of fun; he thought it was “toxic”. He still does, but “the number of people who watch it is just crazy”. He certainly didn’t regard it as any kind of career move. “I didn’t come at it from a career point of view, I don’t think. I just thought, ‘What an interesting experience ‒ to go through something like that.’”
I said I was trying to imagine Dame Kiri Te Kanawa on Married at First Sight – which, by the way, I would absolutely watch, and so would you. This mad thought went a bit astray between Bologna and my home in Masterton. He thought I was saying Dame Kiri had actually appeared on Married at First Sight. “What? What! She’s appeared on Married at First Sight?” No, no. I was trying to imagine this. Whereupon we both collapsed into giggles at the thought, because she’s rather grand, isn’t she?
A lot of opera singers are. The stereotype of the opera singer: grand, flamboyant, given to being a diva. He is, disappointingly, none of these things, I tell him. Of course people assume he’s going to be that stereotype. “They see you on stage and they automatically go, ‘Wow. He’s so extroverted or she’s so extroverted. They must always live like this.’” Which must be an exhausting expectation. We already realise that he’s an introvert who knows how to put on a performance on and off stage – you just have to see the pictures taken at the soirée.
He knows all about divas. You cannot be an opera singer and not cross paths with divas. “I know exactly who you’re talking about, this type of stereotype. They exist, I know. One in particular.”
Who are you talking about? “No one in particular, my dear. There are always people who want to be the centre of attention. And you know, great, that’s really cool. Happy for them. But that’s never been me.”
From a recent review in the Corriere della Sera newspaper of his debut Italian role, as Dr Dulcamara in a production of Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore: “A true comic genius who elevated the role to new heights, inhabiting it, but above all describing it, not only with his extraordinary vocality, but with his dramatic flair.”
Not bad, eh? Not for a kid whose mum used to make him sing not just for the rellies but also for the dementia patients she cared for. He made an album for them, from his bedroom. “It was called something cheesy, like Welcome to My World.”
Go on, I say, give me a few bars. He does, and manages to make that cheesy old chestnut sound as though it is being sung by an angel. “That was so nice,” I say. He says, “I’ll send the invoice.”
Making opera cool
He is a very down-to-earth angel. Other than that angelic voice (if a baritone can be described as having an angelic voice), his great talent is making opera ‒ often regarded as stuffy and for posh people ‒ as cool and for cool people who are not posh.
It helps to be clever. But not too clever. “You know, you do have to be clever. You have to be switched on but not too switched on where you overthink things. There is a level of dumbness, ha, ha, I guess you could say, in terms of just being part of the collective. And as an artist, that’s the best place to be. So, when you’re there in the moment, with the production company, with other artists … you have the idea in your mind: ‘How can I better the situation? How can I better the opera? How can I better the collective of all of us rather than just me?’”
He believes in alchemy. He has spoken about the lack of money when he was growing up as being “such a defeating subject in our household, demoralising in all senses”.
“There was a lot of shame around that. And you have to adapt to survive. I think a lot of people who come from backgrounds like mine, you know, we tend to be the happiest people in the room. We’re going to laugh at our pain. ‘I’m so hungry we’re going to laugh about it. We’re so poor we’re going to laugh about it.’ And it’s such a beautiful way to alchemise an unfortunate situation. It just is. No one’s at fault, but to turn it into a positive, I think, is just such a gift. I love the concept of alchemising, of taking something and turning it into something else.”
That is a lovely, magical idea. It could be said that he is alchemised. “Ha. I am, I am.”
He believes in God. Here is something else he absolutely believes: after being diagnosed as deaf as a child and fitted with huge hideous hearing aids – for which he was predictably taunted – he was, aged 10, suddenly, yes, magically, undiagnosed. He had perfect hearing. The audiologist said, “I’ve never seen this before in my life.” His nana had recently died. They were very close. “Oh, my nana gave me her hearing,” he says. He truly believes this. It may sound a bit nutty. Or just another example of alchemy.
Star qualities
It takes tenacity and talent, ambition and some luck to become an opera singer. What does it take to become an opera star? “Okay, all of those things. You need audacity, yes. And consistency. Yes, talent plays a big part, but it’s just a little piece of the pie. To get on those big stages – and I’ve seen it first hand and I know people who are able to step into this realm – you know, what it really is is authenticity. It’s when you see an artist, an actor, and anyone can do these roles, but to sing these roles and be authentically you … is that amalgamation of artistry and alchemy that we were talking about before, that’s what separates you from the crowd. That honesty. That authenticity.”
The blunt question: is he a star? “Oh. Have I got that? Ha. Oh, that’s a funny question. The most Kiwi response would be no, because we don’t like talking about ourselves, right? I think what I have is a lot of self-awareness. And I think that’s what makes me a star. I know what I bring to the table and I know what I’m good at. And I know what I’m not.”
That New Zealand inability to talk oneself up, not to be seen as a skite, might get in the way. “I’m definitely not a diva. Maybe that. Maybe that gets in the way. I don’t strive to be the star of the show per se. I love collaborating.”
He’s so disappointing – he needs to be more of a diva. He is endlessly obliging, so: “I’m trying to think of some diva thing to give you and I’ve got nothing. What’s something diva that Moses has done? Aah, he moved to Italy.” Honestly, that’s pathetic. How is moving to Italy in any way diva-ish? “Because it’s taking my needs and putting it in front of everyone else’s. It’s going, ‘World, I’m going to Italy for me.’ That’s quite diva-ish. Isn’t that quite self-centred?”
That “he moved to Italy” line might be a bit diva-ish – referring to himself in the third person. But I’m stretching; I think he did it on purpose. It’s him playing at poking fun at himself. And at me – Kiwi as, eh?
Is he rich? “Oh, god. Hit me! Am I rich? I think not.”
See how hopeless he is? It’s one of the many engaging aspects of him. I’m going to call it: he’s already a star.
NZ Opera’s Le comte Ory: Kiri Te Kanawa Theatre, Auckland, May 30 & June 1; St James Theatre, Wellington, June 13 & 15; Isaac Theatre Royal, Christchurch, June 27 & 29.