Carmen

Georges Bizet

Performances

Cast

2024-10-11 | 19:00

Credits

Opera in four acts
Libretto: Henri Meilhac, Ludovic Halévy
World premiere: 3 March 1875, Paris
Premiere of this production: 7 June 2018, Polish National Opera, Teatr Wielki, Warsaw
In the original French with Polish surtitles

Older audiences of the Polish National Opera will undoubtedly remember Lech Majewski's splendid classical production of George Bizet’s most famous opera with monumental sets by Janusz Kapusta and costumes by designed by Hanna Bakuła. Twenty-three years after that premiere, the job of staging Carmen for the Teatr Wielki was taken on by Poland’s popular actor and director, Andrzej Chyra. This time round, the Warsaw audience was treated to a completely different and hardly traditional take on the masterpiece of the world opera repertoire.   

Chyra enlisted the help of Małgorzata Sikorską-Miszczuk, a dramaturge he had worked with on the staging of an outspreading Polish 21st-century opera, Paweł Mykietyn’s The Magic Mountain after Thomas Mann.
To cast new light on the well-known piece, Chyra and Miszczuk introduced to the opera an enigmatic boy figure and the Devil who seems less and less scary to the young character with each act. He appears to symbolise the fate that seemingly renders the characters helpless. In contrast to the bull/demon, the heroine has wings growing from her shoulder blades.

Georges Bizet was commissioned to compose Carmen by the director of Opéra-Comique in Paris, Camille du Locle. The score was written at the turn of 1874 and 1875. The libretto, based on Prosper Mérimée’s novella, is the work of Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy. Ever since its creation, Carmen has been fascinating dramaturges, writers, and film-makers. She is an undisputed icon of femininity. Sensual, tantalising, passionate, and mysterious, she is also valiant, unpredictable, temperamental, wild, and proud. But, above all, she is tragic. Her name is widely known and inevitably associated with something that you cannot ignore. It is present in every industry: the arts, hospitality, entertainment, business, and IT.

The role has been portrayed by some outstanding singers: Angela Gheorghiu, Elina Garanča, Anna Caterina Antonacci, Małgorzata Walewska, and even Maria Callas, who took on mezzo-soprano parts in the 1960s. The film industry could not resist it either. Over a century ago, in 1918, Ernst Lubitch’s adaptation of Carmen starring Pola Negri opened with a pomp. Other actors to have portrayed the tantalising sex symbol on the silver screen were Maruschka Detmers in Jean-Luc Godard’s iconic 1983 film First Name: Carmen with Beethoven’s music and Rita Hayworth in Charles Vidor’s The Loves of Carmen.

There was little indication that the opera would become a hit after its world premiere in 1875. While the first two acts were well received by the audience, the crowd’s enthusiasm was waning with each subsequent act. When the curtain went down on the fourth one, the atmosphere in the auditorium was chilly, a fact that embittered the composer, who had become more invested in the work than in any of his previous pieces. But there was a person who predicted that the ‘scandalous’ and ‘blasphemous’ opera would become a success. His name was Pyotr Tchaikovsky. In his 1880 letter to Nadezhda von Meck, the Russian composer wrote: ‘I am convinced that within some ten years or so Carmen will be the most popular opera in the world!’ He was not wrong.

Chorus and Orchestra of the Polish National Opera
Władysław Skoraczewski Artos Children’s Choir

Synopsis

  • Act I and II

     

    We are in a valley along which pilgrims are travelling. The sun does not

    shine here, and God is far, far away. The travellers are people of all races,

    classes and nationalities, adults and children, living and dead.

    They are on their way to the devilish nymph Goplana to ask her for a

    moment's relief from their purgatorial suffering. The demonic queen of Lake

    Gopło emerges from the water's surface and tells her servants Skierka and

    Chochlik about how she fell in love with a village boy who tumbled into her

    lake the previous winter. She wanted to keep him at her side. She knew the boy

    would die if he stayed underwater. When she saw a hand coming from above to

    rescue him, she let him go. Listening to their mistress's story, Skierka and

    Chochlik realize she is talking about Grabiec, a stable boy who is

    clandestinely meeting with Balladyna, the daughter of an impoverished

    gentlewoman.

    Grabiec appears in his boat. He sings of the appeal of a simple rural

    life and his love for Balladyna. Intoxicated by his presence, Goplana offers

    him anything he might desire if only he will stay with her. Grabiec turns her

    down, not mincing his words. He finds the devilish nymph repulsive. He flees.

    Chochlik promises to get rid of Balladyna and win Grabiec for his mistress.

    Meanwhile, Prince Kirkor rides by the lake on his way back from war with

    his friend and servant Kostryn the knight and other soldiers. He is tormented

    by melancholy and anxiety. He sees a swallow and follows it, singing a song

    about his longing for pure love. The bird leads him to the Widow and her two

    daughters. One of them is Balladyna, a dark-haired beauty and Grabiec's

    beloved. The girl makes a huge impression not only on Kirkor but mainly on

    Kostryn, who immediately recognizes her as a dark kindred spirit. The other one

    is Alina. The prince cannot stop marvelling at the sisters' noble beauty,

    Balladyna's devotion and Alina's artlessness. He is unable to choose between

    them. Chochlik whispers to the Widow to have her daughters take jugs in the

    morning and go raspberry picking. The one who first brings a hundred

    raspberries will be Kirkor's wife. The Widow suggests this strange idea to the

    prince. Alina, watched by Chochlik, prays for success in the following day's

    undertaking.

    Balladyna slips away to meet Grabiec. They both fall asleep in his boat

    in the middle of the lake. Skierka and Chochlik rouse the boy from his sleep

    and lead him to their mistress. Rejected once again, Goplana turns Grabiec into

    a willow.

    Balladyna is awoken by Alina, who is holding a jug filled with

    raspberries. Balladyna is angry with herself, especially since her sister brags

    about her victory. She reaches for a knife and kills Alina. When she returns

    home she lies to her mother that Alina has eloped with a lover from the

    village. A mark the colour of berries and blood appears on Balladyna's

    forehead. Kirkor takes her to his castle.

  • Act III

     

    Balladyna is alone in the castle. Kirkor has gone away, leaving the

    estate and his wife in Kostryn's care. The woman analyses what has happened and

    decides there is no turning back, she has to "follow destiny's path".

    Kostryn enters. Balladyna sounds out his soul and opens up to him,

    allowing him to show his feelings. A procession of guests is approaching the

    castle. The princess asks Kostryn to help her receive them at a banquet. She is

    left alone, but her mother soon appears to tell her a dream in which she had a

    visit from Alina in a bloodstained white dress. Seeing Balladyna's reaction and

    her unwillingness to show her mother the mysterious stain on her forehead, the

    Widow realizes that her daughters were in a sororicidal fight.

    Grabiec appears at the banquet. He is changed, accompanied by a strange

    retinue that also includes Skierka and Chochlik. Balladyna does not recognize

    her former lover in the prince from a distant land. Grabiec sings, revealing

    his identity to the princess and telling her that as a willow he witnessed her

    crime. Terrified, Balladyna orders Kostryn to poison the guest. The knight proposes

    a toast in the honour of Grabiec, who drinks from the poisoned cup and dies.

    Kirkor enters. The situation he sees rouses his anger. Balladyna accuses

    Kostryn of having violated her virtue and poisoned the guest.

    The Widow arrives, exposing her daughter to the prince as a murderess

    and pointing to the band on Balladyna's forehead as proof of the crime.

    Everyone demands that the princess take off the tiara concealing the mark. As

    Balladyna uncovers her forehead, she is hit by a bolt of lightning sent down by

    the angry Goplana. The girl dies.

    Krzysztof Knurek

  • Act III

    The temple

    In the shadow of the Great Buddha, a bronze idol dances as the High Brahmin and the priests prepare for the wedding of Gamzatti and Solor. The betrothed couple enter, and the bayadères perform a ritual candle dance round them, reminiscent of the Sacred Fire burning outside the temple. The Rajah, Gamzatti and Solor dance, but Solor is haunted by the vision of Nikiya, which is visible only to him. During the dance, a basket of flowers identical to the one given to Nikiya mysteriously appears, and Gamzatti, terrified and consumed with guilt, urges her father to complete the wedding ceremony. The High Brahmin performs the ceremony on the steps of the altar, but Solor cannot force himself to say the vows. The infuriated gods destroy the temple and bury everyone under its ruins. The spirits of Nikiya and Solor are reunited in eternal love.

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