Rigoletto's mask rolls in the gutter, Bastille 10 V 16.

 

video from Culture Box still on here

This image of the clown's mask in the gutter, sniffed by a small Jack Russel, is haunting me since  last Tuesday night at Opera Bastille.( screenshot from the live stream FR2)
Claus Guth did a relooking of this opera with a close up into Rigoletto's character : he is the clown who is the Duke's jester and   his double  mimes all the feelings he goes through during the drama. His appearance is a cross between an old worn out clown and a tramp during the prelude. He is digging into a cardboard box to exhumate props, like an old actor.  They are  relevant parts  of his life: the happy ones with his child: visions of her playing across flowery fields in gorgeous light, almost like some Renoir's painting. His jester costume seems useless now, being next to his daughter's white dress stained with  blood,  like large red flowers. Then he lies flat next to the box. Dying.
Among these visions, when he is mocked by the Duke's mob because he suffers in his father's heart, and even cries, although he never shed a tear in his jester role, earlier, after Monterone's curse on him and his master the Duke, left by himself he resents this curse, another vision : his clown- mask rolls in the gutter and the dog gets an interest in it: meagre consolation from a stray dog.  It is the ultimate symbolic vision of his fall as a clown  to the nudity of the  old man who only cares for his daughter now in the Duke's claws. The old man in rags is hopeless : the music also cries with the violins at the end of the prelude when the stained dress is  taken out of the box.  The whole opera derives from this flash-back and takes place in Rigoletto's memory out of a huge cardboard box which opens up on the wide stage and will close at the end with the horrifying 'maledizione'. This is a new deep outlook which sounds clever but is very efficient and deeply moving with Verdi's orchestral moments, and of course the singing. Even if sometimes this opera is only a showcase for all the marvellous tunes we all know quite well. The visions proposed in the videos are telling a lot but it is not possible in the house to think twice about them. The music, the singers the dramatic tensions and gestures are taking a lot of attention in this production, it is always on the move. Perhaps it is too rich and too much ?
That night there was a mixture of show case arias and true moments of emotion, but not too many compared to the tenor 's and soprano's display of their arias !

 For Rigoletto- Quinn Kelsey, although he was not quite the Italian type,  managed to move me when he dropped his mask at act 3, but was also very good when discussing the arrangement with Sparafucile -  R. Siwek, fantastic bass. Gilda also was more real.  The Duke was very Italian in style and at ease, less convincing for me. Needless to say that the audience loved all the well known tunes and clapped a lot all evening with cheerful enthusiasm. The orchestra was mostly too loud and  so was the singing.  'Caro Nome' was fine but too slow. There was a lot of nice dancing alongside the arias, Gilda and her doubles were very touching, all wearing this nice teenager's white dress, a bit similar to the one Audrey Hepburn wears in Roman Holidays.

Gilda-Olga Peretyatko is quite attractive and  young looking. She was in great  shape and I was glad to discover her. She sang nice trills  but was not light enough for my taste in this role. She was slow and made the conductor follow her and perhaps lost the moving effect in this kind of display. Too much ! so did the Duke- Francesco Demuro: very Italian style of singing with lots of sun in his voice, but also too many (not too nice) vocalisms to my taste. Both got thundering applause at their arias. (but no emotion for me).
I was expecting the quartet, the finest  one in Verdi, because Vesselina Kasarova was in it too: it was disappointing. I could hardly hear her low notes. She appeared  as a Cabaret singer (it is the second time I see her in sexy attire!) not  a gypsy dancer. I managed to listen to her in Maddalena after the quartet, lucky enough to feel her voice live again. It was too short, but still better than nothing! Her top was as always like a burning flame ! During the dance with the Duke (who appears like a rock star and before his "Donna mobile "sniffs some coke by the side of the stage...) Vesselina's acting was very good as always !

She did some crafty "meneuse de revue" steps while the dancers around also had gestures(huge white feather bow-ties  on their behinds) which somehow fit with the rhythm and were hilarious seen from the back... this is  "mélange des genres" ... may be not in the right place...

 It could also have been less loud. It seemed the conductor Nicola Luisotti's changes in tempis  did not serve the melodies, sometimes too fast, and with the arias, tenor and soprano, too slow, lacking the typical rhythm which makes this opera whirl in my memory.

Hopefully with Rigoletto, emotion was at the rendez-vous.
This massive looking singer gave a moving last act and managed to make me at last feel his terrible loss, his false joy when he felt he was revenged, then his curse and  dreadful fate. He is not the kind to let it flow out like Leo Nucci. It is the opposite. But it came out efficient too. He has a strong full sound and made it !
Perhaps the audience was new to this opera because they really clapped a lot and to my ears it was not that amazing. May be I am getting too old...for new visions and new singers...the house was packed and as usual I was at the top second balcony...with great views!

It was a rainy outing in Paris, short but full of nice sceneries, along la Promenade des Arts, Faubourg Saint Antoine, and  the pink chestnut  trees in full bloom.

Rigoletto happens to be one of my first operas:
1949 in Marseille... January 21st 1949, cast: G.Traverso, Michel Dens, Jacqheline Silvy, J.Murcy, F. Morena.
then again : December 4th 1949 : Mado Robin (Gilda), G. Traverso(Duc de Mantoue) Pierre Nougaro (Rigoletto) Jacques Murcy (Sparafucile) Fortuné Morena( Marullo), Isabelle Andrani (Maddalena).
1950: March 19th:
A.Miglietti, G. Traverso, Ugo Ugaro, Jacques Murcy, Fortuné Morena, Isabelle  Andréani...
My child memory kept the words sung in French for the baritone arias I heard so often at home during rehearsals. Here I have not the name of the singer who sang Monterone. "Le vieillard m'a maudit".... well those were the days!
Cast on the 10th  may 2016:

Claus Guth

Il Duca di Mantova

Michael Fabiano

9, 11, 14, 17, 23, 26 avril, 2, 5 mai

Francesco Demuro

20, 28 avril, 7, 10, 14, 16, 21, 24, 27, 30 mai

Rigoletto

Quinn Kelsey

9, 11, 14, 17, 23, 26 avril, 2, 10, 16, 24 mai

Franco Vassallo

20, 28 avril, 14, 21, 27, 30 mai

Ludovic Tézier

5, 7 mai

Gilda

Olga Peretyatko

9, 11, 14, 17, 23, 26 avril, 2, 5, 7, 10, 16, 24 mai

Irina Lungu

20, 28 avril, 14, 21, 27, 30 mai

Sparafucile

Rafal Siwek

9, 11, 14, 17, 23, 26 avril, 2, 5, 10, 16, 24 mai

Andrea Mastroni

20, 28 avril, 7, 14, 21, 27, 30 mai

Maddalena

Vesselina Kasarova

Giovanna

Isabelle Druet

Il Conte di Monterone

Mikhail Kolelishvili

Marullo

Michal Partyka

Matteo Borsa

Christophe Berry

Il Conte di Ceprano

Tiago Matos

La Contessa

Andreea Soare

Paggio della Duchessa

Adriana Gonzalez

Usciere di corte

Florent Mbia

Décors

Christian Schmidt

Costumes

Christian Schmidt

Chorégraphie

Teresa Rotemberg

Lumières

Olaf Winter

Dramaturgie

Konrad Kuhn

Vidéo

Andi A. Muller

Chef des Choeurs

José Luis Basso

Orchestre et Choeurs de l’Opéra national de Paris

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