“I’ve spent all of my career in the theatre choosing work that puts women at the centre and tackles big, complex themes,” Sarks says. “This felt like a really natural fit.”

Alongside set designer Marg Horwell and lighting designer Paul Jackson, Opera Australia’s semi-staged production of Breaking the Waves takes a minimalist approach.

“The three of us made a decision together to create a really simple, gestural world for this story to sit in,” Sarks explains. “Marg is bringing these incredible six-metre string curtains … sometimes they’ll feel like water, or even like rain falling from the sky. It’s this sense of the epic, and we’ve created imagery inside and around those curtains.”

The curtain isolates and spotlights Bess, giving her agency and a vivid emotional life. “The opportunity to lift her out, separate her and foreground her feels really right for this story, to make sure that the audience feels really connected to her,” Sarks says. “We’re investing as much as we can in this woman and her search for what it means to be good.”

The opera doesn’t shy away from the extreme content of the film, but it aims not to be gratuitous.

“I will stop writing pieces about violence against women when there is no more violence against women in the world … I don’t think that illuminating it is condoning it,” Mazzoli says. “I’m telling the whole thing from [Bess’s] perspective… to portray the plight that many women, myself included, have found ourselves in.”

This version being primarily written and directed by women also shifts the perspective. “It’s so important to me to be able to bring the female lens to these stories,” says Sarks. “It influences every choice, particularly around the portrayal of violence on stage.”

These nuances make Breaking the Waves more than just an adaptation. Neither Mazzoli nor Sarks has rewatched the film for years, and other than signing off on the rights, von Trier has not been involved.

“I would love at some point to have a dialogue with him, but I also recognise that my view of the story is very different from his, and I think we’re both totally OK with that,” Mazzoli says.

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For Sarks, Mazzoli’s music turns darkness into light. “By adding this rich, stunning score … [Mazzoli] somehow manages to create these moments of pure beauty or uplift – so what could be dark and distressing becomes almost heavenly,” she says.

“The emotional, psychological storytelling is there in the music. That felt really liberating as a director … that we could do less at times, because there are these other extraordinary elements telling the story.”

Breaking the Waves will be performed at Hamer Hall on July 26.

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