United Kingdom Bizet, Carmen: Soloists, Refrain and Orchestra of the Royal Opera Home / Antonello Manacorda (conductor). Broadcast stay (directed by Pati Marr) from the Royal Ballet & Opera, Covent Backyard, to Cineworld Basildon, Essex, 1.5.2024. (JPr)
What a disappointment this was from a director who launched himself early in 2015 with a deeply controversial (and unrevivable?) Guillaume Inform after which later that 12 months staged an astonishing Cav and Pag. Quick-forward to 2024 and he has created a Carmen with little to say that hasn’t been stated earlier than to switch Barrie Kosky’s short-lived 2015 Frankfurt model that proves not all Kosky does is operatic gold. Michieletto now rehashes concepts from earlier – and higher – Carmen productions (presumably Sir Richard Eyre’s 2009 Metropolitan Opera one and definitely that by Calixto Bieito, which dates from 1999 however was first seen within the UK at English Nationwide Opera in 2012) with their components of updating the story to the 20th century. For this coproduction with Madrid’s Teatro Actual and Milan’s La Scala, Michieletto has the identical collaborators as for Cav and Pag so there is similar use of the revolve once more with an outdoor house (the place most of this Carmen occurs) and once more a outstanding constructing; right here functioning – over 4 acts – because the ‘POLICIA LOCAL’, a fairly poky nightclub (brothel?), a corrugated shed for all of the black market cigarettes and booze being smuggled, and a altering room the place Escamillo will get fitted along with his traje de luces by a European model of John Inman’s character from TV’s Are You Being Served?
Elle Osili-Wooden introducing the printed in her traditional cheerful manner instructed us the director imagines what we see as ‘a rural and distant house, all broad horizons, warmth, mud and inescapable daylight’. Director of The Royal Opera, Oliver Mears, added how Michieletto was after ‘the sense of intense warmth, which might generate a lot the fervour and the depth individuals count on from this opera [and] he wished a very naturalistic appearing model from the performers’. Nicely, that may have been potential with an even bigger funds however, for me, he definitely fails on the warmth challenge. A number of townspeople fanning themselves for a part of the primary act was all that steered it was sizzling and the remaining three acts had been within the night when it was fairly darkish! Mears went on to counsel that it’s ‘not a standard manufacturing’ however, in actual fact, it’s a conventional one for 2024!
I had no concept the place we’re speculated to be in Spain – and even Michieletto himself couldn’t clarify the place – nor when, as it’s definitely not this century and Carla Teti’s costumes have been sourced, by the look of it, from a retro clothes retailer. Act I has extra townspeople than troopers, there are cigarette women and little or no ‘smoking’ and worst of all a gaggle of overenthusiastic youngsters (members of the Youth Opera Firm) seemingly attempting to show an opera – ending with the brutal homicide of a girl – into one thing ‘family-friendly’. Their traditional mock-marching in Act I is became some cowboy/cowgirl enjoyable and video games and the bullying of three youthful youngsters, and so they flip up between acts to carry up letters which collectively spell out the passage of time in French. It made me surprise if Michieletto (and his dramaturg) had truly learn the Carmen libretto as a result of Act III was launched as ‘The next night time’ as certainly extra time has handed than that? By the point the joy of the youngsters reached its peak in Act IV I used to be so bored with their antics.
For an opéra comique – supposedly singing and dialogue – Michieletto lower many of the dialogue and upped the comique. He additionally didn’t appear to know what to do with the refrain who usually solely seem when they should sing (although they try this spiritedly), and his massive concept is to have Don José’s mom, an aged determine in a black costume and veil (Ruth Alfie Adams), onstage nearly each time Bizet’s ‘destiny’ motif is heard. She has a deck of tarot playing cards and holds up the Loss of life card at first and can ‘deal’ it out to others in the course of the opera.
Elsewhere – I repeat – every part was pretty ‘conventional’ in what we noticed, and I didn’t significantly discover something unusually ‘naturalistic’ concerning the appearing, with the motivation of the characters showing to be what they all the time are in Carmen. José is commonly the doe-eyed and lovesick corporal and Carmen is all the time conscious of her bodily attract, wishes and fickleness. Nevertheless, even now when she has set her sights on Escamillo in Act III she is reluctant to let José go. Apparently – since we’re not positive the place we’re in Spain – was it deliberate that José was seduced by Carmen stripping all the way down to her basque (!) and at that time she had her legs wrapped spherical him as a rule. One in all Michieletto’s higher concepts is the ransoming of the captured Zuniga, Jose’s commanding officer, although I can’t condone the sadistic manner Carmen meets her finish at José’s arms within the full glare of 100 spotlights and in virtually complete ignorance of the #MeToo motion’s marketing campaign in opposition to violence to girls.
There was a lot consideration given to Aigul Akhmetshina returning ‘residence’ – to the home the place she was on the Jette Parker Younger Artists programme – to sing Carmen once more. Akhmetshina has been making a reputation for herself within the position not too long ago and was now again at Covent Backyard the place she first sang it when she was solely 21 and this very night was her twenty eighth birthday. She has simply sung Carmen at New York’s Metropolitan Opera (additionally with Piotr Beczała as Don José) and can sing it quickly at Glyndebourne. Akhmetshina’s mezzo-soprano voice is undoubtedly expressive, in addition to darkish, sultry and sensuous, ideally suited for Carmen after all. Maybe I have to see her once more, maybe it was what Michieletto wished, however Akhmetshina appeared uncomfortable displaying Carmen’s overt sexuality; although we noticed from her most of Carmen’s rebelliousness, capriciousness, ardour and fatalism proper by way of to her demise by the hands of a rejected and determined lover. Akhmetshina carried out as you may count on a 28-year-old younger singer would, although Carmen has been a lot better portrayed by many different singers previously; Elīna Garanča to call only one.
I all the time get pleasure from seeing and listening to Piotr Beczała, even when I didn’t suppose his voice sounded as contemporary as I’ve heard it previously, nonetheless his Flower Tune was the spotlight you’d count on of his early acts. He too appeared uneasy as a naïve, simply led astray soldier, although Beczała got here into his personal displaying José’s Otello-like jealously within the ultimate act, suggesting he should certainly add that Verdi position to his repertoire quickly. Olga Kulchynska introduced some beautiful phrasing and a purity of tone to Micaëla, the plain, homely woman from Don José’s village, whose love for him by no means stands an opportunity as soon as Carmen units her sights on him. Kostas Smoriginas was Don José’s rival Escamillo – wanting extra like a drug seller than bullfighter in Act II – and he had none of braggadocio the position calls for and even much less of its important charisma. Right here his attraction to Carmen may solely be the standing she would obtain by being related to the favored toreador.
The supporting solid was exceptionally sturdy; bass Blaise Malaba (alumnus of the Jette Parker programme) was an boastful Zuniga and present Jette Parker Younger Artists Sarah Dufresne and Gabrielė Kupšytė had been remarkably assured and fascinating as Frasquita and Mercédès. Two French singers within the United Nations solid, Vincent Ordonneau and Pierre Doyen, relished their roles as Remendado and Dancaïre, the leaders of the smugglers and possibly the women’ pimps. The effectively sung quintet in Act II was one other musical spotlight of this Carmen.
Alongside this superb singing, Antonello Manacorda’s conducting of the luxurious Royal Opera Home orchestra performed a full half in bringing a modicum of success to this in any other case disappointing new Carmen. There was a quick tempo proper from the beginning and all through it sounded – by way of the cinema’s loudspeakers – as if Manacorda had a assured grasp of all of the work’s lyrical and dramatic components. Every little thing constructed to the gripping however disturbing climax because the disastrous endgame of all of the sexual want we had witnessed reaped two victims.
Jim Pritchard
Creatives:
Director – Damiano Michieletto
Set designer – Paolo Fantin
Costume designer – Carla Teti
Lighting designer – Alessandro Carletti
Dramaturg – Elisa Zaninotto
Refrain director – William Spaulding
Solid:
Moralès – Grisha Martirosyan
Micaëla – Olga Kulchynska
Don José – Piotr Beczała
Zuniga – Blaise Malaba
Carmen – Aigul Akhmetshina
Frasquita – Sarah Dufresne
Mercédès – Gabrielė Kupšytė
Escamillo – Kostas Smoriginas
Dancaïro – Pierre Doyen
Remendado – Vincent Ordonneau
Bohemian – Dawid Kimberg
Marchande d’oranges – Louise Armit
