Acting vs. Voice

The voice and the drama are both important. However, the acting must be inthe VOICE. I consider physical acting a bonus, though a very nice bonus. Agreat vocal actor with mediocre physical acting usually achieve more dramain opera than a great physical actor with mediocre vocal acting. Anyonedisagree?Of course the pure voice also matters. However, the beauty of singing (asin apart from the drama) is more than a beautiful sound. It is also in theway the music is handled, which I suppose we call musicality. My operatic life was reared on audio recordings. My first love was Corelli,and I was in love before I even saw a picture of him. Then came Callas andde los Angeles. I was never into DVDs. But seeing the recent Met Oneginboth on HD and live blew me away. I could not sleep for 2 days after thelive experience. And that is a combination of vocalism, acting and goodproduction/directing. That is when I started reconsidering my views aboutphysical acting and visuals in opera. But I have to say that there wasgreat acting in the voice of Hvorostovsky. Finally, I have doubts how knowledgeable people are about acting on an operaboard in general. Just like, I wouldn't expect to find convincingdiscussions about singing on a theater board. I went to Carnige Mellon U.for college and we had one of the best drama schools in the nation. Myfavorite thing to do those days (before I got into opera) was to go to thestudent productions, and I have seen some really good theater. Sometimeswhat people here consider good acting are really just attention grabbing onstage, instead of insightful, thought-provoking portraits.