Carmen - an inspiration

A few nights back I saw a performance of Carmen by the Danish Opera Academy and it made me think of the woman Carmen. Who is this femme fatale at the centre of Bizet's famous opera and how has she been portrayed ?
This is one of the first illustrations of a Carmen from the performance in 1875.
I've always thought of the opera Carmen as something of an odd mix – it takes place in Seville, Spain and yet they sing in French. The original novella was also written by a Frenchmen so, I guess it makes sense that way around. Any way Carmen is characterized as a free spirit – a gypsy, who belongs to no one.
In the different performances that I have seen, it has varied a great deal how much sympathy she is given.

She has been played as vulgar and cynical in her pursue of Don José, making her uninteresting in my opinion.
At other times she is seen almost as a witch and very mysterious -highlighting the her gypsy background and hinting that she bewitches Don José, who fall madly in love with her. But in my view she is more than just a seductive vixen. She is has a vulnerable side in her fear of death and her attempt to remain independent.
This Carmen has a masculine quality about her with the cigar and hat and her very stern look.
This following clip is from Frencesco Rosi's film version of Carmen with Julia Migenes as Carmen and Placido Domingo as Don José. This is clearly an 1980s Carmen: she looks like Cher. But this is also a good examples of the witch-version of Carmen I think.



>And then there is Carmen Jones, a musical after the opera. Carmen's gypsy roots are not part of the musical as they are in the opera, but the character of Carmen and the plot is basically the same. Carmen Jones in a modern woman, who just like Carmen of 1875 does not want to be owned by anyone.

The power of Martha

I will tell you of a performance of Edward Albee’s ‘Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ I saw last night at Gasværket.
‘Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ is one of my favourite plays and I saw it a few years back for the first time staring the Danish comedian actress Søs Egelind as Martha. She is most famous for her funny performances in comedy shows, but in that production she proved that she really has an incredible talent for serious acting. In my eyes Egelind’s performance was very overlooked in the world of Danish theatre – she really deserved an award for it, but I think many critics still only see her as a comedian. It is safe to say – without exaggerating – that she gave me one of my greatest theatre-experiences ever. And I’ve been a theatre-goer since I basically could walk. In general that production made such an impression on me that I already had my doubts about going to see a new and different one last night. One’s first great experience of a play is rarely exceeded and I guess that makes me a though critic for this production.
But Albee’s play is such a classic and it will and should be staged again and again – and it deserves to constantly be challenged by new actors and directors. Last nights production has already received a lot of critical praise which ultimately helped to persuade me to go.

And I did enjoy it and I enjoyed the fact that it was very different from the first one I saw. But it still didn’t surpass my first experience at all. In this production Martha was played by the great Danish diva Paprika Steen. She defiantly has the temper and desperation which such a part needs and I think she was the absolute best thing about the whole production. Martha’s inner strengths and weaknesses are vital in the play, but what fascinates me the most is the ‘war’ between Martha and George. Unfortunately, I think that the George here played by Lars Brygmann was too weak to match Paprika’s Martha. All his rage and physic game playing seemed too random and lacked a deep ongoing plotting hatred that I think George has towards Martha.
At Gasværket Martha is sexy and George is the old intellectual – but I failed to really believe their mutual attraction. This amazingly complicated relationship seems only to break out into open war because of the two guests – Honey and Nick – but as I understand it, Martha and George have been at war most of their marriage. In the production at Gasværket it seems as if this war starts and ends that night and thus reducing Honey and Nick to odd comic relief gadgets through out the play.

The stage design was amazing, done by Gasværket's manager Jon Stephensen. With a rotating stage construction and a house with moving walls, George and Martha’s home seems like combination of Pandora’s Box and a fish tank.

The talented Marie í Dali

After all of last week's fashion talk I think it's time to return to some geeky topics – after all I am Nerd Girl.

Therefore to night I'll attack something different that's also very dear to me: theatre and stage and costume design. I guess in some sense you could argue a connection to the world of fashion. I love going to almost all sorts of stage performances. Last week I saw ‘Maskarade’ by Danish composer Carl Nielsen at the Royal Opera House.
The story of ‘Maskarade’ stupid – so I’ll only bore you with the basics: a lot of love complications, an evil patriarch and a happy ending at a large masquerade ball. The singing and music was great, the direction was witty and gave a good new life to this old banal piece of drama. What I really want to tell you about is the stage design: It was made by one of Denmarks most interesting stage and costume designers Marie í Dali. She has been working mostly with opera, and I’ve seen only 4 of her productions, yet every one has made such an impression on me that I’ve often ended up remembering more about the set designs than the actual play or opera.

She has worked quite a lot with stage director and the creative director of the Royal Opera Kasper Bech Holten who has also directed ‘Maskarade’. The set design here was modern and funny with such an intelligent use of props (the playboy-bunny towls and all the skincare products) to create a lifestyle image. Í Dali's use of room and perspective are also In the bedroom for example í Dali had tiled the perspective:

I also really enjoyed í Dali’s work in Holten’s direction of The Ring Cycle by Wagner, where she worked together with Steffen Aarfing. I’m not really a Wagner-fan, the music is too heavy for me and I tend to get bored. But from The Copenhagen Ring Cycle I only saw ‘Das Walkyrie’, and I was blown away - it was not boring at all but so heartfelt and moving. The mood in the songs was so beautifully reflected in the different sets:

The valkyries with their black wings and party dresses were so refined and scary at the same time:So far I've only seen Marie Í Dali's work on stage, but I've read that she's also done some Danish films which I look forward to seeing. Actually, in the future I just might start choosing my plays and operas by their stage designer instead of by director or composer.