The Curse of the SkyDome Opera
Plus new details about The Festival of Bizarre Toronto History, the scandalous lives of the Pickford kids, and more...
It was an absolutely massive spectacle: a colossal production of Verdi's famous Egyptian opera, Aida. There were more than a thousand performers on stage. A hundred musicians played in the orchestra. The set was dominated by a sphinx that towered four storeys high and spewed real flame. A full menagerie of animals was deployed to wow the audience: four elephants were joined by lions, tigers, leopards, camels, horses, a python, and dozens of doves that were released into the air. It was three-and-a-half hours long and performed to crowds of nearly 40,000 people. It took place on Toronto's biggest stage: beneath the futuristic roof of the brand new SkyDome, just months after the stadium opened.
But Aida's visit to our city would make headlines for more than just the spectacle of it all. The production was surrounded by death, controversy and scandal. Some might even say it was cursed.
Aida was first performed a century and a half ago. It was commissioned to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal; the inaugural production was held in Cairo — at the city's new opera house, just across the Nile from the pyramids. It tells the story of an Ethiopian princess enslaved in Ancient Egypt and the Egyptian general torn between his love for her and his loyalty to the pharaoh.
The opera got off to a rocky start. Verdi didn't like Egypt; he initially rejected the commission. He dismissed the country and its heritage as “a civilisation I have never been able to admire.” He refused to visit, claiming he was afraid of being turned into a mummy. The big premiere was delayed; the elaborate sets were built in Paris and got stranded there when the French city was besieged during the Franco-Prussian war. In the 150 years since, the opera has been criticized for its links to colonialism and accused of portraying Egypt in an "exoticised" fashion. As recently as 2019, a soprano made headlines when she refused to wear blackface to perform the title role.
But none of that has kept Aida from becoming one of the world's most popular operas. It has been performed regularly ever since it was first unveiled — though few productions could rival the ambition of the version that came to Toronto in 1989. And if the opera was indeed cursed, it wasn’t some ancient hex unleashed from a tomb, but a uniquely Torontonian phenomenon.
The production was the brainchild of an Italian-Canadian conductor named Giuseppe Raffa. The maestro was determined to bring opera to the masses in a BIG way. His mega-production of Aida travelled all over the world — beginning with a premiere on the banks of the Nile, in the shadow of the pyramids and the sphinx. Everywhere it went, the show seems to have drawn massive crowds and sparked debates about the value of Raffa’s populist approach. Toronto was no exception. "Spectacle is swamping culture," one Toronto Star writer complained. And that was in part because our city provided the operatic extravaganza with a venue befitting its grandiose scale.
In 1989, Toronto was buzzing with excitement over the city's brand new sports stadium. It's easy to forget today, but when it first opened the SkyDome was hailed as one of the wonders of the modern world; there was no other venue like it on the planet. Its pioneering retractable roof suggested Toronto really was a world class city at a time when people here were desperate to believe it. Building the stadium had been a mammoth undertaking. It took nearly three years and more than half a billion dollars. And it was dangerous work, too. Several construction workers were seriously injured during the project; there were broken backs and severed fingers. But no one, thankfully, was killed.
That is, at least, until Aida came to town.
It was just three days before the opera opened that tragedy struck. It happened while two men were inspecting and cleaning the windows along the southern end of the stadium, right above the box office. They were working three storeys off the ground, high up in a cherry picker, when something went terribly wrong. The machine suddenly collapsed and they were thrown out of their basket, falling ten metres onto the concrete below. One of them smashed his head against the curb of Bremner Boulevard and died instantly. The other worker lasted a few more hours, revived during the race to the hospital, only to pass away that evening.
Those two men wouldn't be the last to die.
The very next day, there was another accident. This time, it was one of the people building Aida's gargantuan stage. He slipped from the scaffolding and fell thirteen feet; he was rushed off to the hospital with his own serious injuries. Fortunately, he survived. The next death wouldn't come until after the performances.
I was nine years old while all of this was happening. But I still remember when Aida came to town. The Toronto Star provided schools with more than a thousand teaching kits and tens of thousands of free tickets to attend the dress rehearsal. I was only in Grade Four, but we spent weeks studying the opera in English class. And when the night of the dress rehearsal came, there were 35,000 students in attendance.
From what I remember, it didn't go particularly well. The organizers might have underestimated just how excited those 35,000 kids would be. It had only been four months since the SkyDome opened. For a lot of those students, this was their first visit to the stadium. Getting them to contain their enthusiasm was quite a challenge.
Before the performance had even begun, the kids started doing the wave. It swept around the stadium with a roar — not exactly the reverent atmosphere most operas command. And then, the students did it again. And again.
Eventually, Raffa came out on stage to get the crowd to quiet down. "I've been a kid, so I know what it's like" he told us, according to The Star, "I need complete silence to do a soundcheck."
He didn't get it.
"Not good enough! We're not going to start anything — and I do mean it. It's the biggest spectacle ever in our entire history!"
Some kids booed.
Eventually, the show did begin. And there were two more Toronto performances after that. The reviews, however, were mixed at best. "To see this drama enacted on a football-sized stage," music critic William Littler wrote, "even by such a credible cast, verged on the grotesque." Reviewer Jeremy Brown added, "If this is to be the future of spectacle-entertainment, let me off the ship."
Raffa was undaunted. He promised to return with a production of Carmen that would be even more ambitious — with even more actors and an even bigger stage. But when that opera eventually did come to the SkyDome, he wasn't involved. And in the years to come, when his name appeared in Toronto newspapers, it was usually at the centre of an Aida-based scandal.
Soon, he was being sued — accused of flaking out on a series of American performances. A decade later, The Globe & Mail reported that Raffa was a wanted man in Australia. Authorities claimed he'd sold tickets for an Australian tour of the opera and then left the country with the money — having failed to put on a single show. One promoter claimed the conductor owed him nearly half a million dollars, including money he'd invested in the maestro's plan to mount a hologram-based version of Aida. He called Raffa "an affable con."
Those three shows at the SkyDome, on the other hand, had been a financial success. They grossed $3.8 million. Combined, they drew more than 100,000 people — many of whom had never been to the opera before. It's certainly the first opera I'd ever seen. Raffa always said his goal was to bring opera to the masses, to reach new audiences, to prove the artform could be accessible. At the very least, he does seem to have done that.
He even won over the children of Toronto. They weren't forced to sit through the entire dress rehearsal — it ended early — but according to The Star, once the students grew quiet and the show began, the kids actually got into it. The four elephants were the biggest hit. "When the amiable animals ambled slowly out to take their places… the noise was so resounding you would have thought George Bell had just slammed one over the wall in centre field." It might not have been in response to a stirring aria or a soprano hitting a high note, but children were cheering at the opera.
Little did we know then that one of those elephants would prove to be a killer.
His name was Tusko. He was an eighteen-year-old bull said to be one of the biggest Asian elephants ever to set foot in North America. His life hadn’t been easy. He was born in the wild in Thailand, but was captured and sent to a circus where he was forced to work for years. By the time Aida came to town, he’d been donated to the African Lion Safari, an hour west of Toronto. From there, he was sent into the city for the opera at the SkyDome. His appearances seem to have gone off without a hitch — a big hit with those students. But just a couple of weeks later, he was back in the news for a much more grisly reason.
One terrible November day, Tusko got into a fight with another one of the big bulls at the Safari. He had a history of being aggressive toward other elephants, a rap sheet that seems to stretch back to his days at the circus. The fight must have made for a dramatic scene, with the two enormous, tusked beasts clashing in anger. And it quickly drew the attention of a handler.
Omar Norton was just twenty-one years old, but he had already been working with the elephants at the park for five years. He was studying biology at McMaster University and planned to dedicate his life to animals. His experience meant he knew how dangerous they could be. "If a horse or camel gets mad at you," he once explained to The Cambridge Reporter, "they'll go after you right away. But an elephant will wait — wait for the best time to nail you… They're always watching, always thinking. Very aware, always astute."
When he saw the two bulls fighting, he yelled at them to stop — and they did. But then, he entered their pen to discipline Tusko, hoping to avoid more trouble in the future. That would prove to be a fatal decision.
According to police, Norton retrieved an elephant hook — a loop on a long pole — and approached the giant bull. Tusko responded by violently swinging his head toward him. It connected. The young handler was lifted clear off his feet, flung into the air; he did a full flip before landing hard on the ground. Then, the elephant pinned him down with his head and crushed him. He died soon after.
That night, one of Norton's relatives turned up at the African Lion Safari, upset and looking for revenge. They'd brought a shotgun with them, threatening to the kill the elephant. And while the park’s staff eventually convinced them to go home, it was unclear what would happen to the bull. The Safari delayed the decision over whether or not to put him down until after an inquiry was held. In the end, the elephant was pulled from public performances, but his life was spared. Tusko would live until 2015. He spent his final years at a zoo in Portland.
And so, the killing of Omar Norton would be the last untimely death connected to the SkyDome's notorious opera.
By the time of the attack, Aida had already left town. The immense sets had come down; the sphinx was disassembled. The production had headed off to its next stop in Los Angeles, leaving Toronto behind. That winter, the SkyDome would play host to more musical spectacles: The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, David Bowie and Janet Jackson. When spring rolled around, it was time for the Blue Jays to return. And as the new building became the site of new memories — of home runs and double plays and Joe Carter’s famous walkoff — the memory of that strange, spectacular opera began to fade. And of the death, controversy and scandal that surrounded it.
You can read more about Aida's complicated legacy in Egypt from The Guardian here. You’ll find more about the strange Australian allegations from The Financial Review here. Most of the details about the SkyDome shows, the accidents and deaths come from the archives of The Toronto Star — which you can access through the Toronto Public Library here. You can learn a bit more about Tusko from Wikipedia here.
More Details About My Weird Toronto History Festival!
Last week, I announced that the Festival of Bizarre Toronto History is returning in May! It’s a history festival dedicated to exploring strange stories from our city’s past — a week filled with online lectures, panels, interviews, and walking tours featuring some of Toronto's greatest storytellers.
It will run from May 6 to 12. You can learn more at bizarretoronto.com and get your tickets here.
Now, I get to begin unveiling the line-up!
The Body Snatchers of Toronto
On the festival’s Friday night, I’ll be presenting my own brand new online lecture. Toronto’s dead haven’t always been able to rest in peace. There was a time when our city was plagued by graverobbers. As local medical schools developed a ravenous appetite for fresh bodies, grisly scenes played out under the cover of darkness. Victorian Torontonians were left horrified by reports of empty coffins and missing corpses.
Friday, May 10 at 8pm — held over Zoom
A Bizarre Tour of the Necropolis Cemetery
There are strange secrets hidden among the gravestones of the Necropolis. On the festival’s Saturday afternoon, we'll get to spend some time roaming among them with one of the city's most riveting tour guides. We'll dig up unexpected tales about the dead in a fascinating walk led by Chantal Morris, creator of the wildly popular Toronto Cemetery Tours.
Saturday, May 11 at 1pm
I’m still hard at work putting together the full line-up, so I’ll have lots more details to announce in the weeks to come!
GET YOUR TICKETS TO THE FESTIVAL HERE
The Scandalous Lives of the Pickford Kids
A century ago, Mary Pickford was one of the most famous people in the world. She’d been born in Toronto, in a little house on University Avenue (where Sick Kids is now), and made her stage debut as a five-year-old at a theatre on King Street. But she wasn’t the only one of the Pickford kids who became famous: her little brother and sister both became popular actors in their own right. And they both led very scandalous lives, too. So, for last week’s edition of my Weird Toronto History radio segment on Newstalk 1010, I shared some stories about the three Pickford kids.
It begins around the 10:30 mark here:
Weird Toronto History airs on The Rush every Tuesday afternoon at 3:20pm.
The Toronto History Weekly needs your help! The number of paid subscriptions is verrrry slowwwwly creeping up, but since this newsletter involves a ton of work every week, it’s only by growing the number of paid subscriptions that I’ll be able to continue doing it. Thank you so, so much to everyone who already has — and if you’d to make the switch yourself, you can do it by clicking right here:
QUICK LINKS
The best of everything else that’s new in Toronto’s past…
THERE’S A FINALLY A MUSEUM OF TORONTO NEWS — Myseum has a new name! It is now officially known as “The Museum of Toronto” — which seems appropriate since they now have an exhibition space at 401 Richmond (which you might know from the sports history exhibit that I co-curated, or the kids TV exhibit before that). The new name will hopefully be a big step on the way to establishing an even bigger, permanent city museum for Toronto. Read more.
SAD BULL NEWS — Very sad news on Queen Street. After nearly 200 years, the Black Bull is closing for good this week. It first opened back in the 1830s, but the bar’s most recent owner, former CFL player Bobby Taylor, passed away last summer. The Bull’s future has been in doubt ever since. “I hope the Black Bull continues to be a bar for decades to come,” his granddaughter posted on Facebook while making the sad announcement, “and future owners pay homage to the building’s history.” Read more.
HAPPY ARCHIVE NEWS — The Toronto Public Library continues to recover from the cyberattack it suffered late last year. The most recent news is that their Digital Archive is back up and running. It’s an absolutely massive development for me, since I use it alllllll the time. (Including for today’s post!) It’s absolutely one of the most vital sources for our city’s visual past. Check it out.
Thanks to Jane MacNamara (@wherethestory) for sharing the good news on Twitter!
TORONTO HISTORY EVENTS
THE EARLY HISTORY OF HORSE-RACING & THE QUEEN’S PLATE IN WEST TORONTO
April 3 — 8pm — Online & At Swansea Town Hall — Swansea Historical Society
“Did you know that there was once a race track located between High Park Avenue and Keele Street? The first Queen’s Plate horse races (now called the King’s Plate once again) were held there, starting in 1860. John [Beram] has previously spoken to the Swansea Historical Society on subjects related to the history of West Toronto and the Junction area. We are pleased to welcome him back as our April speaker.”
QUESTIONING TORONTO: CELEBRATING TORONTO’S 190th ANNIVERSARY
April 4 — 7pm — Online & At St. John’s West Toronto — West Toronto Junction Historical Society
“Join us for a special event commemorating Toronto’s 190th anniversary with historian Richard Fiennes-Clinton. Delve into the city’s rich history as we explore its formation in 1834 and the pivotal events that shaped its identity over nearly two centuries. Richard, with over 30 years of experience in local history, will lead an engaging discussion on Toronto’s early governance, the significance of its incorporation, and how it has been commemorated throughout the years.
“Discover intriguing insights into Toronto’s past and gain a deeper appreciation for the city’s evolution. Whether you’re a history buff or simply curious about Toronto’s heritage, this event promises to be enlightening and thought-provoking. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to celebrate Toronto’s milestone anniversary with us.”
A SLICE OF TORONTO HISTORY: HOW ETOBICOKE HELPED POPULARIZE PIZZA 1950–1990
April 18 — 7:30pm — Montgomery’s Inn — Etobicoke Historical Society
“Pizza is far more than its constituent parts of dough, sauce, and cheese; it is used by Alexander Hughes as a lens to explore the history of immigration, business, labour, urbanization, gender, culture, economics, consumption, and food in Toronto. The commodification of pizza, the development of pizza industries, and the culture of consumption in Canada paralleled currents of postwar life in Toronto. How did culture, ethnicity, immigration, and urban economies shape the commodification of pizza, an ethnic food once confined to the food ways of Italian immigrants? And what role did Etobicoke play in shaping the commodification of pizza?”
Free for members; annual memberships at $25
NEW DISCOVERIES DOWN BY THE BAY AT THE ASHBRIDGE ESTATE
April 24 — 7pm — The Beaches Sandbox — The Beach and East Toronto Historical Society
The Beach and East Toronto Historical Society in partnership with the Beaches Sandbox present Dena Doroszenko, senior archaeologist with the Ontario Heritage Trust, for a talk about new discoveries made down by the bay at the Ashbridge Estate.
Free!
BATTLE OF YORK DAY AT FORT YORK
April 27 — 11am to 4pm — Fort York National Historic Site
“Commemorate the 211th Anniversary of the Battle of York with special tours and demos! Traverse the grounds and delve into stories of the battle that took place on-site, its participants and its impact on the land and peoples. Learn about Indigenous contributions in a battlefield tour, titled ‘The Anishinaabeg Defenders of York.’ Excite your imagination by experiencing historic musket demonstrations, historic kitchen animations, displays and more!”
Free!
MIMICO CREEK WALK AT MONTGOMERY’S INN
Various dates until April 28 — 11:30am — Montgomery’s Inn
“Learn about the history of Mimico Creek and its local communities, changing land use around the creek, and the protection of the local watershed as we celebrate environmental sustainability this month. This guided walk through Tom Riley Park is weather permitting.”
Free!
THE BEACHES: NEW FINDINGS ABOUT AN OLD NEIGHBOURHOOD
May 16 — 7:30pm — Montgomery’s Inn — Etobicoke Historical Society
“The Beaches (not the Beach) is one of the city’s best-known neighbourhoods, and its history has been recounted in several excellent local publications. But over the course of researching and writing his new book on the history of the neighbourhood, Richard White found plenty of history – both facts and interpretations – that had not yet been told. Richard will highlight some of the key findings in his book.”
Free for members; annual memberships are $25
Hi Adam, I’m interested in attending the Bizarre Toronto series but I notice the date for the Necropolis tour doesn’t line up - Saturday April 8? Can you confirm? And thanks for another great post!