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Blouinartinfo, December 15, 2015 |
BY Warwick Thompson |
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Berlioz: La damnation de Faust, Paris, Opera Bastille, 8. Dezember 2015 |
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Stephen Hawking in Opera: “La damnation de Faust” at Opéra National de Paris
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Sometimes an opera production is so deliciously bad that it’s good.
“La damnation de Faust” at Opéra National de Paris doesn’t even plumb the
depths of paradox.
Latvian director Alvis Hermanis uses
Berlioz’s 1846 “dramatic legend” to expound the idea that science can be a
force for bad as well as good. If certain members of the audience have just
stepped out from the lead boxes in which they’ve been sealed since birth,
this might be news to them. For the rest of us, it’s not exactly stop-press
information.
But if the concept is banal, its realization is made
worse by the director’s ineptitude and literalism. The action takes place in
the near future, on the day before a human mission to Mars is about to
depart. We know this thanks to reams of text projected onto large metal
screens spelling out the expositionary ideas.
Anyone hoping for
“show, don’t tell” can whistle for it.
Faust (Jonas Kaufmann) is a
scientist. His friend Stephen Hawking (yes, that Stephen Hawking: a silent
role, performed by dancer Dominique Mercy) trundles around the stage in his
wheelchair while preparations are made for the mission. Meanwhile
Méphistophélès (Bryn Terfel), another scientist, experiments on human beings
by locking them in Perspex boxes and zapping them and being generally nasty.
All the while, video images of plants and sea-creatures are projected on
screens above the action. At the end of the piece, Faust’s girlfriend
Marguerite (Sophie Koch) hops on a flight to Mars.
Who could blame
her? The three leads, all excellent singing actors, are given no direction,
no individuality, no characterization. They come on stage, stand still,
sing, and then leave. It’s a similar case with the chorus members, who
mostly remain immobile in regimented ranks, just like the bad old days of
park-and-bark opera. Movement is provided by a troupe of dancers in their
underwear. They judder, twitch, cavort, jiggle, and writhe (choreography
Alla Sigalova). They also spend a lot of time getting zapped by
Méphistophélès. They do pretty much everything, in fact, except dance.
With all the wearisome nonsense on stage, it’s a miracle that the
soloists sound as great as they do. Jonas Kaufmann makes an exceptionally
thrilling Faust, with money-notes of awesome ease and power, and his
climactic aria “Nature immense” is as electrifying piece of singing as
you’re likely to hear anywhere. Terfel is a wonderfully seductive villain,
and Koch sings with exquisite richness and delicacy. Conductor Philippe
Jordan provides a sensuous account of the score, which is both luxurious and
febrile. He occasionally lacks rhythmic drive, and the celebrated “Ride to
the Abyss” feels somewhat underpowered; but he makes up for it with playing
of luxurious warmth.
At the second performance of the staging, the
audience cheered all the musicians involved. Unsurprisingly, they howled and
booed the production.
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