The Magic Flute
If I'm correct, The Magic Flute was originally written in German. So why is it performed in English during the film?
Twenty pounds of brown sugar!share
Because the rest of the film is in English. The point about The Magic Flute is that it's in the vernacular, the language of the people, the language we're hearing throughout the film.
Strictly, of course, the whole film ought to be in German, or rather Austro-German, but that's another matter.
I guess I was just curious because all of the other operas featured in the film are in the original language in which they were written (i.e. The Marriage of Figaro is in Italian).
Twenty pounds of brown sugar!share
Yes indeed, and our characters have a conversation about this very point, with old Kappelmesiter Bonno saying that "German is too brutal for singing", remember? But the film obeys the filmic convention, that the language we are hearing everyone speak is 'German'. The point about The Magic Flute is that it's in the language of the common people and performed in a music-hall, not at the state opera house. Schikeneder calls it a 'vaudeville', a popular entertainment.
shareThis relates to my almost-adjacent thread on the accents of the actors. They all speak in their native accents (American, British), except for Patrick Hines (Bonno) who speaks in a false accent.
It seems unnecessary, therefore, for the opera sequences to be delivered in Italian. In real life, many operas are translated for the sake of the local audience. Following from this, for the sake of the film's English-speaking audience, it would be more appropriate to do the whole thing in English.