Jacqus Offenbach - La vie parisienne / Sébastien Rouland, Laurent Pelly [Opéra de Lyon 2007] [DVD] [2008] [NTSC]

Jacqus Offenbach - La vie parisienne / Sébastien Rouland, Laurent Pelly [Opéra de Lyon 2007] [DVD I have slightly mixed feelings about this production, although most of them are positive. Offenbach's vibrant, scintillating music is excellently played and conducted by a first rate orchestra. All the singers are outstanding in their own right and perform with great verve and gusto. The dancers and the choreography are wonderful and I particularly enjoyed their imaginative use of the entr'actes. The costumes are to die for, very French, very chic.On the other hand, apart from the first scene, I disliked the scenery intensely. I have no objection to the modern day setting, but the young men's high class residences look like nothing on earth and the fashionable Parisian cafe in the final act reminded me of a Wimpy Bar, although possibly that was the intention.I was also considerably turned off by what appears to be an attempted rape of the glove maker by the boot maker. This is unnecessary, unpleasant and thoroughly distasteful! It destroys an otherwise charming scene.But despite these misgivings, I would still highly recommend this DVD solely on the merit of the music and the performers, and for this reason I have given it a 5 star rating.The last scene especially is an absolute joy and positively sparkles with excitement and energy.And last but not least, Marc Callahan is drop dead gorgeous! Comment | PermalinkYour tags: jacques offenbach, laurent pelly (Edit) (Add|Edit) (What's this?)Click to Add: sandrine piausandrine piau, marc minkowskimarc minkowski, felicity lottfelicity lott, mozartmozart, operaopera, classical instrumentalclassical instrumental--------------------------------------------------------------------------------]

I already own DVDs of Laurent Pelly's productions of "Orphée aux Enfers" and "La Belle Hélène" and consider them both to be unqualified successes from both a dramatic and musical point of view. Both productions were "wacky" and innovative, without deviating too much from the spirit of the composer and his librettists. Both operettas deal, of course, Gods and Goddesses on the one hand and Ancient Greek heroes and heroines on the other, while "La Vie Parisienne" was a much more contemporary work, poking fun at the mores of Second Empire Paris. The operetta contains some of Offenbach's most inspired music and has a host of vivid singing and acting parts, opportunities seized gratefully by the talented cast on this production, recorded live in 2007 at the Opéra National de Lyon.The production has been updated to the present day and the sets and costumes are as stunning as they are witty. The choreography is equally brilliant and has some "laugh out loud" moments, while the playing of the Lyon Opéra Orchestra under a conductor new to me, Sébastien Rouland, is exhilarating. The dialogue has been sensitively adapted without doing damage to the spirit of the work and is delivered with aplomb by the hard-working cast. It is in fact much truer to the spirit of the work that the (very enjoyable) rather more traditional production by New D'Oyly Carte Opera Company I saw some years ago, which made it seem like a slightly racier version of G&S."Orphée aux Enfers" featured Nathalie Dessay as Eurydice, while the title role in "La Belle Hélène" was sung by Dame Felicity Lott. There are no "star" names here, although that distinguished and extraordinarily versatile bass-baritone Laurent Naouri (Nathalie Dessay's husband) is brilliantly funny (and quite unrecognisable) as the thrill-seeking Swedish Baron; he had appeared to great effect as Jupiter and Agamemnon in the earlier productions. The other returnee from "Orphée" is the resourceful diminutive comic tenor Jean-Paul Fouchécourt, who is here a hilarious Frick. None of the other singers are familiar to me, although Jean-Sébastien Bou and Marc Callahan make a convincing pair of "men about town", even if they do not sing with special distinction. Jesus Garcia is a virile Brazilian, but he does not dispatch his song with the same tongue-twisting panache as Jean-Christophe Benoit on the Plasson recording. Maria Riccarda Wesseling is a sexy Métella who sings her big number beautifully, while Marie Devellereau runs M.Naouri close as being the star of the show as an effervescent Gabrielle; her acting and dancing are almost as good as her singing, which is quite wonderful.Whether you're already an Offenbach fan or not, there is much to enjoy here...just watch the infectious dancing of the entire cast at the final curtain.