Classic Play 'M. Butterfly' Opens At Baltimore's Everyman Theatre

BALTIMORE (WJZ)-- A chance encounter in France has led the Everyman Theatre in Baltimore to produce the most ambitious show in its history.

M. Butterfly is the tangled tale of love, deception and betrayal.

"You watch the play like this: 'Oh no!'" said director Vinny Lancisi of Baltimore, who wanted to produce the play for years.

[Reporter: "In your materials you use these words: sprawling, sweeping, torrid, timeless, gripping, intoxicating, you're promising a lot."]

"Lets not forget sexy, intimate," Lancisi said. "Everything is behind a thin veil."

Tiawaneese set designer Yu-Hsuan Chen's ideas consist of 30 set changes, ranging from a prison to an opera house.

"How these things were in your mind and now really look on stage and telling a compelling story," Chen said.

Lancisi had M. butterfly on this year's schedule when he was in France on vacation when his wife found out their driver was the driver for French diplomat Bernard Borseco.

"I said 'you mean to tell me you were the driver for Bernard Borseco, the real-life french diplomat? Who is M. butterfly?' 'Yes! you know him?'" Lancisi said.

The driver then picked up his cell phone and said:

"You want to talk to him? I was like "Uh, yes please. No one has spoken to him, no one has talked to him. It was like the scoop of the century," Lancisi said.

They later met in person.

M. Butterfly has just opened and runs through October 8.

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