The Robots

A World Premiere Chamber Opera

by Carolyn Chen

Bread & Salt Experimental Center for the Arts

San Diego, California
May-June 2024

“Better than nature, God has nothing on modern engineering!”

A genre-bending operatic adaptation of Rossum’s Universal Robots by Karel Čapek, a sci-fi play from 1920 from which the term “Robot” originates. The Robots takes place on an isolated island where a workforce of mass-produced humanoid robots gradually gains self-awareness and revolts against the human creators. Čapek’s play was a strong condemnation of exploitative labor practices in the early 20th Century, and this adaptation maintained this spirit while also retaining the comic absurdity of the piece.

On a secluded island, a mega-corporation uses a top-secret mixture of mechanical engineering and biological alchemy to create and sell a vast workforce of artificial humanoid laborers. Led by the ruthless General Manager Domin, his small team of assistant managers, and a legion of robot factory workers and secretaries, Rossum’s Universal Robot's products flood the global market. The island's routine is disrupted when Helena Glory arrives with a clandestine mission to unionize and liberate the robots, who she fears are being heartlessly exploited. She quickly discovers that it is difficult to tell the difference between the human managers and the robots they produce. She is convinced to join the company staff in order to make changes from within. Years pass, marked by unsettling reports of malfunctioning robots worldwide. Meanwhile, Radius, an exceptionally intelligent and perceptive robot who works in the factory, begins to show signs of an enigmatic “sickness”. As control slips from human grasp, cataclysmic consequences loom over the fate of humanity.