sovay: (PJ Harvey: crow)
sovay ([personal profile] sovay) wrote2013-10-08 06:17 pm
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Et cela dix fois dans un jour

Patrice Chéreau has died. His opera stagings were legendary. I knew him because he was a marvelous Camille Desmoulins in Andrzej Wajda's Danton (1983)—better-looking than the paintings, but just as snarky, mercurial, scared, and passionate as the contemporary accounts and decades of fandom since—and for that one role I miss him. I should see some of his movies. I hope his operas are on film.
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[identity profile] fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com 2013-10-09 12:16 am (UTC)(link)
Netflix lists at least two: Das Rheingold and something by Janaček. They may have more.
sovay: (I Claudius)

[personal profile] sovay 2013-10-09 03:33 am (UTC)(link)
and something by Janaček.

If that's From the House of the Dead, he directed a production at the Met in 2009 that I desperately wanted to see and couldn't get to. I must look for that. Thank you.

[identity profile] fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com 2013-10-09 10:13 pm (UTC)(link)
This may be that one.

[identity profile] kenjari.livejournal.com 2013-10-09 01:08 am (UTC)(link)
Looks like there are also videos available for the rest of the Ring, Wozzeck, Lulu, Les Contes d'Hoffman, Cosi Fan Tutte, and Tristan und Isolde.
sovay: (I Claudius)

[personal profile] sovay 2013-10-09 03:34 am (UTC)(link)
Looks like there are also videos available for the rest of the Ring, Wozzeck, Lulu, Les Contes d'Hoffman, Cosi Fan Tutte, and Tristan und Isolde.

. . . and I'm very curious about his Berg and Offenbach as well. Thank you!

[identity profile] straussmonster.livejournal.com 2013-10-12 03:43 am (UTC)(link)
The Lulu is famous because it was the first 3 act production; it also basically says "fuck Berg's incredibly precise stage directions which are written into the score with arrows indicating where in the measure actions should take place" which makes some people apoplectic (I'm almost one of them).

The Ring is quite famous; Rheingold and Valkyrie are the best bits, as both the staging and especially the singing go far downhill from there.
sovay: (I Claudius)

[personal profile] sovay 2013-10-12 03:49 am (UTC)(link)
it also basically says "fuck Berg's incredibly precise stage directions which are written into the score with arrows indicating where in the measure actions should take place" which makes some people apoplectic (I'm almost one of them).

Why "almost," then?

The Ring is quite famous; Rheingold and Valkyrie are the best bits, as both the staging and especially the singing go far downhill from there.

Check.

Thank you for weighing in!

[identity profile] straussmonster.livejournal.com 2013-10-12 03:54 am (UTC)(link)
Almost because I think you can probably do interesting things in a production that ignores the stage directions, but on the other hand, this is one where I'm actually happy to talk about authorial intention because hi, his concept of dramaturgy is made manifest in the score by how insanely precise these indications are. (I'm lazy, or I'd go take a picture if I can find where I put the damn thing.) I think Boulez just could not square (he's the conductor, and he defended Chereau's deviations) his love of Berg's music with Berg's adherence to a hyper-Wagnerian style that Boulez considered amateur at best.

very ugly link to Boulez' comments via google books:

http://books.google.com/books?id=NGY4AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA53&lpg=PA53&dq=chereau+boulez+lulu+stage+directions&source=bl&ots=an_eeuCGPq&sig=X0cDolF6nxVkLmyWVtlIw_6P9YI&hl=en&sa=X&ei=uMRYUvvPNIX28gTHtIGQCw&ved=0CCoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=chereau%20boulez%20lulu%20stage%20directions&f=false
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