Kurt Cobain's Estate Slams 'Unauthorized' 'Last Days' Opera

By Katrina Nattress

October 20, 2022

Photo: Getty Images

Earlier this year, England's Royal Opera House announced it was adapting Gus Van Sant's 2005 film Last Dayswhich tells the story of a fictional musician named Blake who was based on Kurt Cobain, into an opera.

The performance “plunges into the torment that created a modern myth,” the ROH told The Guardian at the time. Blake, its central character, has recently returned home after a spell in rehab. “But he is haunted by objects, visitors and memories distracting him from his true purpose – self-destruction.”

The show already finished its premiere run earlier this month, but the late Nirvana frontman's estate has issue with it running at all. “Last Days has been created and written without permission,” the estate said in a statement. “This show, just like the movie, is an unauthorized attempt to benefit from the brief meeting set up with Kurt and Gus Van Sant. This one meeting has been exploited for profit for thirty years now and enough is enough.”

A spokesperson for the ROH shared their own response. “The Royal Opera’s production of Last Days is adapted from Gus Van Sant’s cult film of the same name, released in 2005," that statement reads. "It is a fictionalized account, and was produced with the permissions of Gus Van Sant and HBO.”

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