What the world's stages demand: Gehan Cooray on becoming an international artist

Gehan A Cooray the island nation’s highly-acclaimed Baritone singer and performer

Sri Lanka may not be widely recognised for producing internationally acclaimed performers in Opera, Broadway-style musicals and Cinema, yet despite its smaller size, the country clearly has the means to create world-class artistic talent. Realising this potential requires opportunities for aspiring performers to develop their abilities, gain international exposure and experience the highest standards of professional performance. Among the few who have successfully navigated this demanding path and established themselves at the highest levels of the performing arts is Gehan Cooray, whose decades-long journey serves as an inspiration to many in the field.

Gehan A Cooray is the island nation’s highly-acclaimed Baritone singer and performer across Opera, Musicals and Solo Concerts. Gehan is also a stage and film actor, as well as the writer-producer-star of the feature film THE BILLIONAIRE. Having lived in the United States for nearly two decades, Gehan spent most of his adult life in Los Angeles (before moving to New York), where he refined his mastery of the craft.

Gehan completed his Bachelor’s degrees in Theatre and Psychology at the University of Southern California (USC), while also doing a minor in Cinema-Television, graduating Magna Cum Laude with Renaissance Scholar and Discovery Scholar Honours, on top of being invited to join several honors societies. “One reason I chose to go to USC and not a conservatory is because USC is a major research university, and so everything I learned was scientifically and empirically validated,” he stated.

Beyond USC, he had a number of private singing coaches in L.A and Manhattan during the many years he lived and performed there. Each coach possessed a different area of expertise. “For instance, one would be a Bel Canto technique specialist, the other would be a go-to for Broadway stars, and still another would know how to adapt a fundamentally classical foundation to other genres like Pop as well,” he explained.

Delving into the question of what it takes for a talented, artistic individual in Sri Lanka to become an international artist, Cooray referred to his own journey and emphasized the importance of one’s ‘artistic home’. He explained, “One of my favourite sayings from the USC School of Dramatic Arts where I obtained my Theatre degree was that ‘Home is where the Art is’. It doesn't matter where in the world I am, but I always feel perfectly content and at home as long as I am artistically and aesthetically engaged, be it a stage production, an album recording, or a film production. I seldom miss Sri Lanka itself when I am away - which is why I've been able to live all alone in the U.S for nearly 2 decades as a single guy. Home to me is not where my family is, but rather wherever my inherently artistic soul is being engaged and nourished. Every artist who has international aspirations needs to cultivate the same mindset that I have.”

Drawing on his background as a Christian, he elaborated, “Christ says in the Bible that one must be willing to leave behind houses, property, parents, siblings, spouses etc for the sake of the Kingdom of God - and the same is true in order to have an international artistic career. I can tell you that the psychological rewards are incalculably enormous, when one goes where the Art takes you, giving us the artistic equivalent of the infinite spiritual rewards a person receives when they sacrifice everything for God.”

One of the proudest moments of Gehan’s career is the Carnegie Hall solo concert, totally unamplified at its second largest auditorium Zankel Hall, which was graced by the presence of the UN Secretary-General's Chef de Cabinet as Chief Guest and several high-profile diplomats including Daniela Bas from Italy, who praised the uncanny authenticity of his Italian diction.

Some singers use microphones even at Carnegie, but the management knew that this was totally unnecessary for him, because nothing can beat the pure protection of a diligently trained classical voice like Gehan's in an acoustic setting. He says his favourite operatic experience to date was portraying the lead Baritone role Escamillo in Bizet's French opera “Carmen” at the Faena Forum, during the Miami Classical Music Festival 2022 - unamplified to 1,000 people.

Gehan also mentions his one-man show THE BARITONE ON BROADWAY at Green Room 42, Times Square, where he was likened by New York critics like Bart Greenberg and other East Coast directors to pioneering leading man Alfred Drake from the Golden Age of Broadway. Reviewing Gehan's performance at length, Mr. Greenberg noted at one point that: “Cooray sang in English, French, and Italian with equal clarity, and he handled all the material with the same fluidity and emotional intent. Whether he was offering up Bizet’s “The Toreador Song” or Cole Porter’s “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” (he has a special affinity for the songwriter and included three of his songs in the show), his delivery was flawlessly smooth and confident.”

From his many opera roles, Gehan's favourites are Escamillo (Carmen) and Count Almaviva (Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro) because both have a noble bearing despite one being a hero and the other almost (but not quite) a villain. Looking back at his Broadway musical roles he mentions Gaston (Beauty and the Beast) - an outright villain - and the romantic male lead Prof. Fritz Bhaer (Little Women), first performed in Los Angeles, as his favourites.

His best-loved theatre role is the arrogant academic Bernard Nightingale (Tom Stoppard's Arcadia) while on screen he points to his title role Victor Ognisanti di Parerga in his feature film THE BILLIONAIRE (a gender-swapped adaptation of Shaw's The Millionairess), and an Evil Sorcerer King in one of his short films THE LAND OF OZ as his most cherished experiences.

Gehan Cooray has demonstrated that Sri Lankan and South Asian artists can not only transcend geographical and cultural boundaries to excel on the international stage - very literally so in his case, within the performing arts sphere in Western countries - but that someone who devotes himself to years of study and training like him can be equally adept at both singing and acting across a whole range of genres and platforms, without being pigeonholed into just one category as only an actor or only an opera singer or only a musical performer for instance.

His accomplishments have brought greater visibility to his home country, challenging perceptions of where world-class artistic talent can emerge, and the boundaries that can be pushed. Beyond his own success, he represents a source of inspiration for aspiring performers in Sri Lanka, showing the next generation that with true talent, dedication and judiciousness, they too can pursue their artistic ambitions and make their mark on the global stage.