Dramatically Unsatisfactory

MIKE WHEELER explains his opinion of Peter Brook and Jean-Claude Carrière's take on Bizet's 'Carmen'

La Tragédie de Carmen is theatre director Peter Brook's take on Bizet's opera. Dating from 1981, it drastically prunes the scenario, with a libretto adapted by Jean-Claude Carrière, in order to focus on the four main characters, Carmen herself, Don José, Micaela and Escamillo. There is no chorus, and the opera is re-scored for a fifteen-piece band by French composer Marius Constant, who also composed a number of linking passages. An actor - here Cameron Cook - takes the mimed role of the Active Narrator, a silent master of ceremonies, and three short spoken roles: Zuniga, the lieutenant, innkeeper Lilas Pastia, and Garcia, Carmen's husband, re-introduced from Prosper Merimée's novella, the opera's original source. Most of the well-known numbers are in place, and the sequence of events is roughly as in the standard version.

Cameron Cook as Lillas Pastia in
La Tragédie de Carmen
at the Buxton Festival.
Photo © 2024 Genevieve Girling

For this joint Buxton Festival and Norwich Theatre production - Buxton Opera House, Buxton, UK, 5 July 2024 - Bettina John's stage design is dominated by a quarter-pyramid of steps, reconfigurable to follow the action; at one point, part of it is detached and turned round to become Don José's prison cell. There is also a clothes-rack full of dresses, and a large board, painted with the words 'femme fatale' - flat on the stage to begin with, then hoisted high above it.

From left to right: Cameron Cook as Zuniga, Elgan Llŷr Thomas as Don José, Niamh O'Sullivan as Carmen and Steffan Lloyd Owen as Escamillo in La Tragédie de Carmen at the Buxton Festival. Photo © 2024 Genevieve Girling

In the pre-show talk, conductor Iwan Davies and director Katharina Kastening, described their production as 'an interpretation of Peter Brook's interpretation'. Aiming to deconstruct the idea of the femme fatale, it asks why Carmen behaves the way she does. The answer, they suggested, was that she does so in order to survive in difficult situations. Each of the male characters projects a different female stereotype onto her, but with either the Active Narrator or Don José in charge of her resulting costume changes, she seems to have even less agency than usual.

Niamh O'Sullivan, while steering clear of the sultry gypsy-girl clichés, is a Carmen caught between her own world and the expectations of the men in her life. Vibrant in her three big dance numbers, she catches her apprehensiveness in the (heavily cut) card scene, removing her wig during her final confrontation with Don José as the last act of defiance left to her.

As Don José, Elgan Llŷr Thomas gives a winning account of the flower song, while suggesting a character out of his depth emotionally and, as we see later, capable of lashing out viciously. Steffan Lloyd Owen's Escamillo gives his famous entrance aria all the cocky bravado you would expect, as he and Carmen circle round each other, testing each other's boundaries. The action then cuts straight to his fight with Don José, one of the more startling examples of the scenario being telescoped. More unexpected is Erin Rossington's mezzo-ish Micaëla. She first appears in a bright red dress, wrong-footing us into assuming this must be Carmen, and comes across as less the shy country girl lost in the big city, more like Carmen's mirror-image, both jealous of, and intrigued by, her, as Katharina Kastening commented before the show.

Iwan Davies conducts with flair, and the Northern Chamber Orchestra players project much of the original's spirit and atmosphere. Oddly, the Act IV Prelude, setting the action outside the bullring, is heard in a recorded version, presumably to suggest a wider perspective for the final scene.

The overall impression, though, is dramatically unsatisfactory. Too much of the original has been cut, leaving the action feeling disjointed, especially in the opening scenes. Carmen's first appearance, for example, comes out of nowhere, for no compelling dramatic reason. Ironically, Brook and Carrière's recasting of the original has the effect of diminishing her presence, rather than expanding it. However good the intentions, they don't really come off.

There is one more performance of La Tragédie de Carmen, tomorrow, on 16 July 2024. The Buxton Festival continues until 21 July 2024. There's further information about this and other events at buxtonfestival.co.uk

There are more articles here about Bizet: Carmen, Buxton Opera House, classical music in Derbyshire, operatic music, vocal music, orchestral music, gypsy music, France, UK and nineteenth century classical music.

You can read our latest concert reviews here.

The background image on this page has been derived from a circa 1915 drawing by an unknown author of Carmen singing the Habanera.

<< Home Next review >>

All material © 1998-2025 Classical Music Daily,
various authors and photographers.
All rights of the original copyright holders
are reserved, and are credited where known.
Formerly known as Music & Vision –
The world's first daily classical music magazine
Founding Editor: Basil Ramsey (1929-2018);
Editor: Keith Bramich