Posts Tagged ‘regie’
Friday, January 7th, 2011
By James Jorden
New Year’s Eve may have marked a significant turning point for the Gelb administration at the Metropolitan Opera. The replacement of the “beloved” Franco Zeffirelli Traviata extravaganza with a lean, mean non-literal staging has garnered rapturous reviews and strongly positive audience reactions. The single reported boo for director Willy Decker’s production team (someplace over house left in Orchestra) was, from where I was sitting, drowned out by applause and moderate cheering- though, to be perfectly accurate, there weren’t many shouts of “bravo.”
The point, though, is that the sky hasn’t fallen. Big Bad Regie hasn’t chased the audiences away from the Met. Remaining performances of the run, including tonight’s, are heavily sold, and rumor has it that the production will be revived in the next two seasons. So, what went right? Why is Traviata the triumph that Tosca or (thus far) the new Ring is not? (more…)
Tags:franco zeffirelli, peter gelb, regie, symbols, the met, willy decker
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Friday, December 31st, 2010
By James Jorden
The opening of a new production of La Traviata at the Met tonight offers an ideal opportunity to address a fact of modern operatic life, the booing, apparently reflexive, of the director and production team at the first night’s curtain call.
Now, booing and other expressions of disapproval have a long history in the opera house. Likely the public was booing opera singers long before anyone booed professional wrestlers or baseball players. I’ve always thought that the famous climactic scene in Dangerous Liaisons, when Marquise de Merteuil gets read to filth by the audience at the opera house, gains in power when we remember that their hissing actually has a specific meaning in the context of a theater. (more…)
Tags:la traviata, regie, the met, verdi
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Friday, December 17th, 2010
By James Jorden
What makes a dedicated opera queen (well, anyway this dedicated opera queen) sad? Well, it goes like this: the General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera hosts a panel discussion to introduce the company’s upcoming new production of La traviata, the first non-Franco Zeffirelli take on Verdi’s tragedy to be seen there in over two decades. No tears yet? Bear with me. (more…)
Tags:franco zeffirelli, la boheme, marina poplavskaya, martha stewart, new york times, otto schenk, peter gelb, pundits, regie, the met
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Friday, November 19th, 2010
By James Jorden
Revival. Strange word, and creepy, when you think about it. Something used to be alive, then it wasn’t and now (presumably) it is, again. But it’s that last step, the actual reviving that seems so often to elude the revival of an opera production. (more…)
Tags:cecilia bartoli, joseph volpe, lesley koenig, lincoln center, metropolitan opera, mozart, pr, regie, revivals
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Thursday, November 4th, 2010
By James Jorden
The New York City Opera’s production of the Bernstein/Wadsworth A Quiet Place won what are called “mixed” reviews. A few critics hosannaed “Thanks be to Great God Lenny for smooching us once more with his plump, moist genius,” but the majority echoed Cecil B. DeMille’s tactful reaction to Norma Desmond’s bizarre comeback screenplay, “There are some good things in it…” (more…)
Tags:alden, cecil b demille, financial times, glimmerglass, leonard bernstein, new york city opera, new york observer, norma desmond, quiet place, realism, regie, stephen wadsworth
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Friday, October 22nd, 2010
By James Jorden
It’s the laziest of journalistic tropes to lead off with “this guy I know says…” but in this case the guy in question has provided me with what I consider a really handy peg for a first column on opera stage direction. Anyway, this guy—who’s in his 70s now, a retired opera record pirate, but, more to the point, one of the survivors from the 1950s golden age of the Met standing room line—he’s got a “line” expression for just about every operatic experience imaginable. (more…)
Tags:classical music, enrico caruso, eurotrash, franco zeffirelli, leather trench coats, luc bondy, puccini, regie, standing room
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