those are things you want to do that sort of leave your mark after you’re gone.” SOON THE TEAM WAS LOPING OFF, putting the pieces of the production together with a kind of Arizona dream team. After Mell signed on, Arizona Opera announced they would do the world premiere. Then, Atwell rustled Billie Jo and Judd Herberger to become executive producers. In addition to providing significant funding for the opera, they are supporting the film, which will premiere on Feb. 5, 2020 at Scottsdale Center for the Arts. “They were tremendously enthusiastic,” Atwell said. “Judd used to play at the old Zane Grey cabin in Payson and has very fond memories about Zane Grey and the way his stories live in his imagination.” As Bohmler put it, “Without them, this would not have happened.” In 2015, the creative team visited sites in Arizona that inspired the story — Betatakin Canyon in Navajoland and Pipe Spring National Monument, the ranch that Grey modeled “Riders” heroine Jane Withersteen’s ranch on — trying to understand Grey’s artistic process. In doing so, Atwell gained a greater appreciation for the artists bringing “Riders” to the stage, along with some magnificent footage. “The way Zane Grey was influenced by the landscape is very much what I’ve seen in Ed’s work and in Craig’s work. You have these three major artists inspired by the same sunsets, dust and world-class scenery.” That scenery was brought vividly to stage by Mell. Known for his panoramic abstract landscapes, Mell’s work is colorful, hard-edged and angular, with a permanence as if carved in stone. It became his job to translate the West’s towering rock formations and breathtaking vistas for the stage. To do so, he created movable panels — some soaring 28 feet WHEN “RIDERS” RECEIVED ITS WORLD PREMIERE IN 2017 — THE FIRST EVER PRODUCED BY ARIZONA OPERA — IT BLAZED NEW TRAILS AND SHOWED HOW A CLASSIC GENRE COULD SUPPORT A FRESH ADAPTATION. Arizona Opera’s world-premiere production was built on the work of Ed Mell, who created hard sets and digital landscapes for the scenic design. 26 FRONTDOORS MEDIA | AUGUST 2019

high — and a series of digital sky paintings that were projected on a huge high-tech screen. “I was grateful that we could do something 28 feet high, which really is an immense scale. People look small next to it, which you do in the real landscape. To me, that was a great thing, because I’ve dealt with those forms for 40 years,” Mell said. The icing on the cake, according to Mell, was when Arizona Opera brought in a new lighting designer, Greg Hirsch. They had planned to do rear projection, which takes up a lot of the stage and is washed out by ambient light, but late in the game decided to use a 30-by-60 foot LED screen. The Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust funded this state-of-the-art video wall to the tune of $425,000 so the iconic tale of “Riders of the Purple Sage” could be told properly, amid jaw-dropping mountains, vistas, canyons and sunsets. “It changed the show,” Mell said. When “Riders” received its world premiere in 2017 — the first ever produced by Arizona Opera — it blazed new trails and showed how a classic genre could support a fresh adaptation. Not only was it a huge critical success, it was a great commercial success, outselling even the stalwart, “Carmen.” “The opportunity to combine Zane Grey’s visceral storytelling about the American West with the power of opera was incredibly unique and exciting,” said Joseph Specter, president and general director of Arizona Opera. “The cinematic music and words of Craig Bohmler and Steven Mark Kohn, the direction of Fenlon Lamb and the stunning scenery made possible by Ed Mell created such an impact on the communities that Arizona Opera serves. We are deeply proud as a company to have played a role in bringing this work to life, and grateful for the chance to bring it back to Arizona in the season to come.” BUT BEFORE THE OPERA CANTERS BACK over the horizon, Atwell’s film will inform how these artists, influenced by this landscape, translated this story into fine art and literature and music — and how it all came together. “At a very intimate level, I’m fascinated by how artists create,” Atwell said. “What I learned from Craig and Ed more than anything is that they have an amazing work ethic. To get to follow all of these different artists’ processes and see how these pieces come together in a type of collaboration that I think is rare these days — where everyone’s working toward the same goal to make this incredibly huge piece of art — it’s been the greatest honor and biggest challenge of my life.” It’s been eight years since Boemler’s Fossil Creek hike got jumped by a summer rainstorm, but the wild terrain he’s trekked since then has been even more remarkable than the landscape he missed out on that day. Every detour and side trail he found along the journey has led to heroes to guide and to aid. Just like in Western movies. “There were so many things that could have gone wrong,” Bohmler said. “But the right person always showed up at the right time.” To learn more about “Riders of the Purple Sage,” go to azopera.org/performances/riders-purple-sage . To learn more about Riders of the Purple Sage: The Making of a Western Opera , visit ridersoperafilm.com . Zane Grey during filming of the original movie adaptation of “Riders of the Purple Sage” in 1918. AUGUST 2019 | FRONTDOORS MEDIA 27