Halévy La Juive Bieito - too close for comfort post-Brexit

Fromental Halévy La Juive at the Bayerisches Statsoper, Munich last night - horribly, frighteningly pertinent to events this week - and last week, too,  when MP Jo Cox was murdered.  Yet already Farage claims "no shots were fired" in his adventure. Now it seems that the whole country has been murdered, too, poisoned by an eruption of dishonesty and sheer bloody-minded pettiness. This isn't "democracy" but a spilling out from the hell of the Universal Troll. In La Juive, everyone gets destroyed, whatever their faith, whatever their station.  

This production, by Calixto Bieito, pulls no punches. No comic-book costumes to distance us from the brutal message. These terrible things can happen anywhere, at any time and on all sides of the political spectrum.  No one is immune. Just as conductors have individual styles, so do opera directors. Bieito is the one to go to for insights on social issues. His Carmen (more here) highlighted the cruel objectification of women. His Aida reminded us that there are slaves in modern society : we  call them the underclass, especially if they're the wrong race.  And his Fidelio (more here)  was so powerful that audiences couldn't figure it out, though it was a lot truer to Beethoven than they realized.  Bieito shocks, but he does so for constructive purpose.

So we don't see a palace, but that kind of luxury can hide the brutality within? Instead we see hard "stone" walls and massive columns that lean down oppressively over proceedings, a subtle reference to the Gothic arches in the stage directions.   Roberto Alagna, singing Eléazar, looks anonymous, moving furtively, almost in disguise behind hat and dark glasses. As a hunted refugee would.  When he does start to sing, however, the glory of his voice asserts itself, conquering the grimness around him. Alagna is an idol but here he's a true artist.  Eléazar shines, not the "star".  He's a decrepit old man but what he represents is something finer than what the Emperor and Cardinal de Brogni stand for.  Aleksandra Kurzak sings Rachel,. She's dressed in green, so she stands out from the hard black and white around her. Green, too, symbolic of freshness and renewal.  When she's killed. a lot dies with her, including the Cardinal's soul.  John Osborn sang Prince Léopold and Vera-Lotte Böcker sang Princess  Eudoxie.   The simplicity of Bieito's set concentrated attention on the human drama , and on the music.  Bertrand de Billy conducted well, but the singers - especially Alagna - were able to dominate.  

Last night someone who doesn't have prejudices about what opera "should" be, wondered why Bieito is considered controversial. A perceptive observation, since Bieito's approach  goes straight to the heart of the opera, no messing about.  This was an overwhelming experience, so strong in fact that I couldn't bring myself to write about it, in view of the events of this weekend.  But read Opera Traveller's account HERE. he says it so well.

Verdi's ironies : a thoughtful Force of Destiny, ENO

At the ENO Verdi The Force of Destiny last night someone remarked: "What pretty tunes! Why can't the show be cheery?" Perhaps that's the measure of audiences today, but, quite inadvertently, this stabbed through to the heart of what Verdi might have intended. The music in the Overture surges, as a screaming protest at La forza del destino - relentless fate - a folly which destroys individuals, families, whole nations.  Yet in the midst of this carnage, the Fate theme dances seductively. Is it a "pretty tune" or something disturbing?

Is Verdi telling us that appearances deceive?  The Marquis of Calatrava (Matthew Best) hates Don Alvaro with an irrational fury because Don Alvaro (Gwyn Hughes Jones)  is a half breed. Identities constantly change. Don Carlo (Anthony Michaels-Moore) impersonates a student. Don Alvaro becomes Friar Raffaello. Leonore (Tamara Wilson)  becomes a mysterious hermit but chooses a male monastery. Delusion dominates, not reason.  Don Carlo has been hunting a half breed for years but whern he meets his soldier friend, he doesn't notice ? So much for blind prejudice.  He's obsessed to psychotic extremes even though he doesn't actually know what really happened, or care enough to find out.  The monk, too, collude in delusion, too cowed to wonder why the hermit must be shielded. They're obeying orders. Like soldiers, like Don Carlo, like the racist Marquis, they get caught in the lockstep of doing as they're told, without thinking for themselves.

What is war itself, but delusion on a grand scale? Preziosilla (Rinat Shaham) isn't a simple
gypsy.   Her very first words are "Viva la guerra" . She whips the crowd into bloodthirsty frenzy. Yet as a war widow and a teller of fortunes, she ought to know better. She has a pretty name but a malevolent, almost demonic presence. Wars don't happen without folks like this.  Verdi didn't, I think, write the part to give a bit of tacky local colour. In la forza del destino, the delusions of society are complicit in its destruction.  Even the Church, which distributes alms but not the genuine piety that Jesus taught, "Love their neighbour as thyself". When Friar Melitone (Andrew Shore) tells a woman tthat she could solve her problems by having fewer children, he's being realistic. In Verdi's time, such sentiments would have been even close to blasphemy for they suggest that God doesn't control fate, butb that human beings have responsibility, too.  Melitone has a mellifluous name but it's not ironic like Preziosilla's. He is not a villain but the voice of reason. Suffering is wrong, it should upset us.

Calixto Bieito's La forza del destino is deeply perceptive because it addresses the fundamental forces whch shape what we might call destiny, but which might lie in the human psyche  and an almost Nietzschean will for evil. His Spanish Civil War references are relevant, though probably lost on English-speaking audiences. In any case, they're fairly generic. The focus remains on the Calatrava mania for mindless vendetta.   So we don't see Don Carlo stab Leonore ? She dies because she's caught up in the emotional barbed wire of the craziness around her. By sacrificing herself, she redeems Don Alvaro. Her actions thus break the cycle of selfish, obsessive hatred which has really destroyed the proud house of Calatrava.

The set, designed by Rebecca Ringst, is very effective - Spanish-style facades, seen in strange angles, their underpinning revealed. Video projections (Sarah Derendinger)  suggest what Don Alvaro,and Leonore might have been as children, developing their backstories more than the libretto does, but extend our appreciation of the characters. A little girl draws crazy circles with a mechanical hand: Leonore didn't love Don Alvaro enough to run from her father when she had the chance.

This ENO Force of Destiny moves on to the Met as La forza del destino, which is perhaps why it's fairly muted, and includes a cast of Americans and honorary Americans like Anthony Michaels-Moore. Tamara Wilson created the part of Leonore well, nice warm roundness in her voice, emphasizing the savagery of her fate. Gwyn Hughes Jones sang Don Carlo  even more persuasively. His voice is a treasure, and he has great acting skills, No surprise that he's an ENO favourite, and a reason why the ENO, with its programme of supporting singers with an English (or Welsh) background is to be welcomed. So Wilson and Hughes Jones are generously proportioned? So are their voices, which is what opera is about. It's theatre, the art of imagination, not legally binding documentary. In any case, the theme of feast and fasting runs throughout the opera. Leonore and her father are at dinner when he gets killed. Friar Melitone feeds the starving, though not enough to make them whole. In the monastery, Leonore and Don Alvaro pray and fast but they will not solve their problems until they find spiritual resolution.

If opera should merely be a collection of pretty tunes, then a drama about hate, war and madness  should merit pretty staging.  But Bieito's production deals with the drama and the irony that runs throughout.  Bieito's La Forza del Destino isn't pretty though it's not outrageous. But anyone genuinely interested in Verdi, and the ideas and emotions that motivated him, will do well to learn from this production.

Kaufmann Kampe Fidelio live from Munich

Last week I posted a link to the Bayerische Staatsoper Beethoven Fidelio.  (Use this link for photos). Jonas Kaufmann, of course, plus an eyeful/earful of him at the interval. No need for costume and makeup when you're playing a decrepit prisoner?  Very good singing - Anja Kampe, Franz-Josef Selig (Rocco), Wolfgang Koch (Don Pizarro), Steven Humes (Don Fernando), Laura Tatulescu and Jussi Myllys. I liked Kampe's solid, resourceful Leonore - the woman is no wimp. Nice firm intonation, purposeful. Shame she had to go put on a dress and go back to being a Hausfrau.

Musically I think I prefer Stemme, Kaufmann and Abbado at Lucerne, but this Munich version is outstanding because of the production. How would you create the image of an infernal prison where the inmates are dehumanized? Calixto Bieito and designer Rebecca Ringst create a maze-like structure like the circuitry of an infernal machine. A prison for the internet age. We're all trapped in this system. Look at the photos - lights as bright as interrogation chambers, lights that flicker across the structure like mindless drills. As soon as you get your head round the configuratiuon, the maze alters shape and you're thrown off again. Yet the set doesn't intrude. The principals sing in front of it for the most part, starkly defined. Could Beethoven have imagined this? He wasn't into theatrical action so much as symphony with narrative and singing. And it's quite possible that he would have got the concept of suppression and the abuse of power in a wider cosmic sense.

In this staging, the orchestral passages come totally into their own. The prisoners slowly crawl out from inside the maze, having been hitherto invisible. When Leonore and Rocco descend into the darkest deepest dungeon, the overture becomes terrifyingly gri : aerial artists are seen descending through the structure, tied precariously to guy wires. It feels dangerous : but then that's what the journey means.

Later when Leonore and Florestan are reunited, they switch back to street clothes, their dignity restored. What to do with the long orchestral interlude? Florestan and Leonore look upwards and listen, their minds presumably fixed on abstract, noble ideals. And so we listen, too, for this music expresses more than words or scenery. Suspended above the maze are cells - not prison cells but small spaces where musicians are playing. Conceptually brilliant. Through music and spiritual integrity, we might all break out.

This time the prisoners emerge, some with blank placards where presumably their identities should be. Then the masterstroke - Don Fernando. The character is so unreal, it's ludicrous. As if the injustice of centuries can be overturned by simple fiat? We don't know who Don Fernando really is or why he's really popping up, except to end the story. Bieito instead expands the role. This version is a crazed clown, white face and smeared red lipstick, who appears from on high, in a box abouve the stage. A God or a Devil? He does and sings the right things, but we're left wondering, is it all a nefarious ruse? Thought provoking and unsettling. If you want joke Fidelio, there's alway the moronic Jurgen Flimm production (see Literalism Murders Truth). In Bieito's Munich production, Florestan and Leonore triumph because they have vision. Flimm's production is not only the denial of vision, but of basic imagination.

Calixto Bieito Carmen Barcelona

Mention "Calixto Bieito" and anti-modernists charge like enraged bulls, whether or not they know his work or even know opera. Bizet's Carmen shows how rewarding - and operatically valid - Bieito's approach can be, and a lot more "authentic" than most. My review of the ENO Bieito Carmen in London is here.

In Spain, audiences know enough about bullfighting not to be fooled by kitschy imitations on stage. Escamillo appears in full toreador garb at the right time, but the image is used sparingly for maximum impact. Bullfighting is an ancient ritual, pitting man against nature,  challenging death itself. Just like Carmen.

At Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Bieito's Carmen is specially potent. Catalunya straddles the border between Spain and France: this is real Roma, Basque and Catalan territory. Throughout history there have always been underclasses, living on the margins. Bieito dioesn't need to "update" anything. His gypsies and townsfolk are utterly authentic. Once they drove caravans, now they drive battered old cars. The women are dressed as the poor do everywhere. When the smugglers find "flamenco" dresses, the scene becomes a game. Everyone knows it's putting on an act, not reality.

Béatrice Uria-Monzon's Carmen is a powerful figure. She wears a denim skirt, but it's embrodered and lined with satin. Like the poor dress all over the world, her friends wear chain-store tat, but Carmen references grander things. But for her poverty, she could be someone, and aspire to more. Uria-Monzon doesn't camp up the Habanera. It's Carmen's public persona. When Uria-Monzon sings Près des remparts de Séville, her voice becomes lustrous. She's revealing the true Carmen. All those tra-la-las and seduction moves are survival tactics. Only rarely can she sing  je chante pour moi-même.

Like Carmen, Escamillo lives on his wits. Erwin Schrott's face is half hidden by his hat and he uses cunning rock star moves, but the splendour of the voice reveals the depths of Escamillo's soul. Schrott exaggerates the Gallic snorts, which is good: it highlights the wildness of the character, creating Escamillo as if he was a bull. a powerfully animalistic icon, bursting with energy. The singing comes in short bursts, sudden dramatic turns. Just like in a bullring, where both bull and toreador must be in control, waiting for the decisive, sudden lunge.

A huge silhouette of a bull dominates the staging in Act 2. No need for a literal inn, because Spain itself is a smuggler's den. The silhouette is the Osborne Bull, the famous billboard scattered over the landscape so much that it's become a symbol of Spain. Yet it's an ad for a company with English roots selling Spanish products to Spaniards, and Catalans are fiercely independent-minded. A male dancer creates a wonderful tableau in the darkness, stripping off symbolically, dancing with the grace of an animal. He's both bull and toreador, bending his arms inward towards his chest, the way a bull is skewered. Incredibly poignant.

In the first orchestral interlude, a young girl imagines herself as a dancer, and props up her (blonde) Barbie Doll. She's so young, yet already she's buying into the seamy side of life, because that's what girls have to do in these situations. She'll end up corrupted but what choice does she have? Frasquita and Mercédès sing of marriage as an escape, but Carmen knows it's an illusion. Perhaps it might be shocking to some that the child choruses here include young girls well on the way to prostitution. But that's a fact of life in extremely poor societies (and rich ones too). Why should people be horrified by seeing such things on stage when reality outside is even worse?

If anything, Bieito downplays the sexuality, for sex here is a business transaction like any other. He's interested in the wider implications. First the Osborne bull and its connotations of economic colonialization. Then there's a blonde tourist, sunning heself, nonchalantly ignoring the poverty-stricken masses behind her. In Britain, these levels may be missed, because Bieito doesn't force them too explicitly. But in Spain, and in Barcelona, audiences know what they mean. Again, why be shocked when reality is so much more brutal?

Roberto Alagna sings a convincing Don José. He's sympathetic, as the object of Micaëla's love, but macho enough for us to believe that Carmen might fancy him. But he's no match for Schrott's lethally erotic Escamillo. As the case should be - it wouldn't do otherwise. Marina Poplavskaya makes a nicely strong Micaëla, tough enough to brave brigands, but again, not specially feminine. The attraction for Don José is mother and homeland.  The singer doing The Lieutenant deserves mention. He's tall and sexy, another "bull" figure with his physical presence and authoritative singing.
 
Please read Opera Cake on Bieito's Basel Aida - intelligently analyzed. No doubt some audiences won't cope with the idea of "Ethiopian" underclasses destabilizing "proper" society. But again, that's what's happening in the real world.