A Night at the Opera
I went to the Met last night to see its acclaimed new production of Carmen. It’s probably the sexiest opera I’ve ever seen, very stylishly designed and directed and lustily performed by all onstage. It was refreshing to hear real (i.e. unamplified) voices once again. And even more refreshing to be in the presence of proactive ushers who stared down wrapper-rattlers and even shushed whispers during the overture. (When was the last time you were able to listen to an overture in complete silence?)
The production should have been riveting. I still remember the Peter Brook Carmen I was fortunate enough to see back in 1983. But it didn’t take long for me to remember that one of the things that made Brook’s Carmen so brilliant is that he cut it to the bone. Only the key relationships, only the key plot points, so the emotions stood out starkly.
Act I of the real Carmen features an entire aria devoted to the fact that the hero’s mother has sent him a letter. Was the music gorgeous? Absolutely! But does, “I’m here to give you a letter from your mother” really merit 10 minutes of stage time? I could also have done without the chorus of urchins singing “We’re watching the changing of the guard!” while the soldiers sang something like “Yep, we’re changing!” There were moments like that in every act. And did I mention there were four acts? (Only one intermission, though the scene changes between the non-intermission acts took for-ev-errrrrrrrr.)
The last time I went to the opera I went to hear some fabulous Russian tenor sing something Russian, and I was struck by the formality of the opera’s construction - set pieces sung by the chorus interspersed with smaller scenes sung by the principals. It got old fast. This staging of Carmen was much more fluid than that - and if the stagehands had worked a little faster, it might have allowed me to hang onto the flow of emotions. But I just kept thinking that opera needs to get the Encores treatment: cut the extraneous stuff and most of the spectacle for the sake of spectacle, and just do a fabulous concert. It’d cost less to produce - and I bet it would draw new audiences.
