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| | Arts Calendar / October 16 / Opera |
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 Opera by Georges Bizet. 210 min. (with two intervals). Libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halvy. Music Director: Wolf Gorelik. Conductor: Evgeny Brazhnik. Sung in French. The opera is written in the genre of opera comique with musical numbers separated by dialogue. It is set in southern Spain and tells the story of the downfall of Don Jos?, a na?ve soldier who is seduced by the wiles of the fiery gypsy Carmen. Jose abandons his childhood sweetheart and deserts from his military duties, yet loses Carmen's love to the glamorous torero Escamillo, after which Jose kills her in a jealous rage. The depictions of proletarian life, immorality, and lawlessness, and the tragic death of the main character on stage, broke new ground in French opera and were highly controversial. "This spectacle, deliberately stripped of any sugariness, almost entirely white sand-colored with just a few specs of grey and black, has its own kind of poetry which now and then unobtrusively shows something in common with Italian neo-realism. Judging by details of everyday life and by character traits it all must have taken place in the mid-20th century somewhere on the French-Spanish border. Michaela comes to Jose by bicycle from her village; the fighting girls from the tobacco factory get separated with a water jet from a hose; the torero (wearing a common contemporary suit) gets caringly protected from the rain by tough guys that are very familiar to the audiences." (Nora Potapova, The St. Petersburg Theatre Magazine)
Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Music Theater  |
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