Massenet - Manon (DVD)

...was painted by Frenchman Jules Massenet (1842 - 1912) and his librettists as little more than an innocent with a fatal character flaw - a weakness for luxury, which seems to be her sole desire in life. And yet, love in the form of the Chevalier Des Grieux is not easily dismissed from the picture.

PLOT

The young student, the Chevalier Des Grieux, is totally smitten by the sixteen-year-old Manon when he first meets her ...
...The music of Frenchman Jules Massenet grows more and more lovely to this listener. His 'Manon' offers more auditory delights than Puccini's heavier 'Manon Lescaut', with music that presents both the frothy and dramatic sides to the tale. Perhaps related to a certain French operatic style in use then, one can also hear strains of Georges Bizet's 'Carmen' at times. Besides the wonderful Gavotte and the poignant final piece of Manon, and the emotionally ... more

Although the original novel by Abbé Prévost apparently had a more scheming, evil Manon and a less wimpy Des Grieux, the eponymous character of the opera, 'Manon' was painted by Frenchman Jules Massenet (1842 - 1912) and his librettists as little more than an innocent with a fatal character flaw - a weakness for luxury, which seems to be her sole desire in life. And yet, love in the form of the Chevalier Des Grieux is not easily dismissed from the picture.

PLOT

The young student, the Chevalier Des Grieux, is totally smitten by the sixteen-year-old Manon when he first meets her at a carriage stop en route to her trip to the convent. Her family have sent her to the care of nuns in a bid to correct her overly materialistic ways. Her cousin, the gambling soldier Lescaut is tasked with escorting her yonder. However, the lightning attraction between Des Grieux and Manon causes the two to impulsively escape to Paris in the coach left at her disposal by a rich old man, Guillot de Morfontaine, who has just met Manon and already set his sights on the ingénue as another mistress.

In Des Grieux's Paris apartment, the couple live a life of pleasure and lovemaking, while the Chevalier writes a letter to his father gushing about his new-found love whom he intends to marry soon. Manon, however, isn't as keen on marriage to him and feels herself unworthy. Then, on orders from the Chevalier's father, Le Comte Des Grieux, Lescaut arrives to take charge of Manon, accompanied by the wealthy tax collector, de Brétigny. De Brétigny takes advantage of the situation and secretly tells Manon that she can enjoy his wealth if she does nothing to stop the abduction of Des Grieux. The Chevalier is soon taken away, with little resistance from Manon.

At the St Sulpice monastery, Chevalier Des Grieux tries to escape Manon's hold on him by preparing to take holy orders, with little success, as thoughts of the lass never stray far from his mind. However, four years after their painful parting, the two are reunited when Manon chances upon the fearsome father of Des Grieux who has hinted at his priest-to-be son while chatting with de Brétigny. Manon decides to seek out the Chevalier at St Sulpice, disbelieving that she has been totally forgotten by her erstwhile lover.

Manon persuades Des Grieux to leave St Sulpice and takes him into her world. Having gone quickly through his money, she then urges him to gamble in order to provide for her earthly pleasures. The beginner Des Grieux wins big, but his opponent Guillot accuses him of cheating, and summons the police, who arrest both Des Grieux and Manon. Des Grieux is bailed out by his father, while Manon is about to be sent away to New France via the port of Le Havre. Des Grieux, with Lescaut's help and some bribery, rescues Manon from the soldiers' grip, and the two sing their heartrending final scene together. In the end, Manon dies in the arms of her lover, delirious with happiness at recovering his love, while Des Grieux weeps inconsolably at her side. The end.

Incidentally, Giacomo Puccini also wrote his own version of the opera, called 'Manon Lescaut' (with the final scene set in Louisiana, USA), although I'm less enamoured of his music than Massenet's.

BEAUTIFULLY REALISED, LIVELY, EARTHY PRODUCTION, STAGING

I really like the clever way in which time and place are evoked here, and I consider David McVicar a saviour of modern opera staging. He distances himself from the insufferably pretentious, outlandish, sometimes pornographic and often nonsensical elements typical of current German 'Regietheater' in opera that does its damnable best to provoke sensation and also feelings of disgust in its viewers, while giving scant or no acknowledgement to the libretto's and composer's intent. (Look up recent Salzburg Festival opera productions to see what I mean.)

Mr McVicar also dispenses with the old, static, stand-and-deliver style of operatic singing that has kept most opera productions in the cobwebby doldrums for decades. (Witness his gorgeous versions of 'Die Zauberflöte', 'Giulio Cesare' and 'Carmen', for instance.) David McVicar brings that same richness of imagination to this 'Manon', which was filmed from live performances at the Gran Teatre del Liceu Barcelona on 24, 27 and 30 June, 2007. Thanks to the guidance provided by McVicar, this production feels like a living, breathing play with meaning (sometimes more meaning than the story merits), that just happens to be mostly sung, and very well, with recognisable, flesh-and-blood characters. Through the employment of well-designed costumes and wigs, and purposeful stage movement, the audience happily gets their full money's worth of entertainment.

A fluid conceptualisation of the dramatic space allows the lighting, props and action to sufficiently suggest a particular locale and ambience. Through evocative use of lights (conceived by Paule Constable, who also collaborated with McVicar on the grandly successful 'Giulio Cesare'), only a small assortment of period furniture and other props are needed to create the various scenes; the audience has no difficulty in filling in the blanks.

The backdrop consists of rising tiers of spectator stands that slope gently down to the right. A doorway opening is cut out on stage right, through which players enter and exit. The main action, of course, takes place downstage. Outside of the busy streets of Paris reproduced here, there are the musty, cold and lonely interiors of the monastery of St-Sulpice that are suggested merely by a stage cast in near-total darkness, save for a cone of soft white light to heighten the dramatic goings-on.

Costumed quite nicely and authentically, the Chorus (of the Gran Teatre del Liceu) remain onstage a lot, and add much to the scenes' atmosphere. At the start, one spies them in the tiered section, standing well apart from one another and holding forth much like an all-seeing Greek chorus, later joining the players below, as the scene requires. Limber creatures from the dance company cavort with exultant freedom across the floorboards, dancing athletically to silly and lascivious choreography (created by Michael Keegan-Dolan) in the opera's many balletic orchestral interludes.

The silk and cotton costumes designed by Tanya McCallin are rendered in attractive hues of olive green, gold, red and burgundy, with a dramatic red silk gown and cape reserved for Manon in Act IV. Rightly so, most are far from pristine, and don't have that fresh-off-the-costume-rack look; they might have been slept in by their wearers for weeks, and I'm reminded very much of the 19th-century Dickensian authenticity in all those 'Masterpiece Theatre' television productions. With wigs and hair treatments of untamed locks and tresses, coupled with a devil-may-care attitude that hews to the life philosophy of eat-drink-and-be-merry, the onstage proceedings here throb with the bawdy vibrancy of life in the seamy side of Paris, not unlike the casual wantonness depicted in the London of Henry Fielding's 'Tom Jones' and English social satirist William Hogarth.

Especially in the Cours-de-la-Reine festival that opens Act III, the streets teem with colourful life, and one meets an assortment of actors and actresses, harlots, merchants, soldiers, croupiers, porters, and travellers both high- and low-born. The milieu is rife with food, gambling, drunkenness, lust and salaciousness that have half- to fully naked men and women carrying on hither and yon, not unlike the libertine atmosphere of Rio's Carnivale reproduced in the theatre. (I may be wrong on this, but US opera houses seem too prudish and conservative to bring such ribald stagings over from across the pond.)

SINGERS

Playing Manon is irrepressible French star soprano Natalie Dessay, and Mexican star tenor Rolando Villazón is her lover, Le Chevalier Des Grieux. Dramatically (or more precisely, melodramatically) speaking, this production lacks for nothing. David McVicar draws intense performances from his two leads, who luckily share an onstage chemistry. There's much physical intimacy in this production, and all are carried out with a convincing aplomb.

An all-around charming chanteuse and thespian, Natalie Dessay makes the singing part sound easy as pie, and she moves across the stage with the ease of a seasoned actress. There's sufficient dramatic depth to her brilliant vocal performance, and the final scene with the dying Manon will surely tug at your heartstrings. Manon's famous gavotte that starts off with ''Obeissons, quand leur voix appelle'' ('Listen to the voice of Youth when it calls'), is a total delight to the ears and spirit.

My sole beef is with that sudden flare in her voice as she ascends into the higher register. Comparisons may be unfair, but one cannot help but miss the grace and elegance - that limpid translucency of tone and the seamless legatos - that Victoria de los Angeles brought to her Manon - still the vocal benchmark for the role, methinks. At least the French Ms Dessay brings a nice clarity to her diction (for the record, Ms de los Angeles sung and spoke excellent French, too).

Superstar tenor though he might be, Rolando Villazón's dynamics tend to swing solely between forte (loud) and fortissimo (very loud). He's also too free (to my annoyance) with that scooping technique at the start of nearly every phrase. There's no arguing with the man's ability to bring lots of passion to his singing, and the part of Des Grieux does call for a young man lost in the wilds of incurable lovesickness. Villazón, however, seems to over-emote at every turn, pushing forth that sound through his voicebox with his entire might and being.

Although director McVicar may have had a hand in it, this rather one-note (pun unintended), gushy, overdone acting of Señor Villazón is present in every role I've seen him in to date, whether comic or dramatic. I'm compelled once more to do the odious thing and contrast Mr Villazón's restlessness and hammy theatrics (vocally speaking) to the relative refinement and greater nuance in Henri Legay's Chevalier Des Grieux as partner to Victoria de los Angeles's Manon. However, my view is clearly in the minority, as Mr Villazón's overwrought style always garners lusty cheers and applause from the crowds. His vocal cords, alas, have suffered as a consequence of this abuse. He has been out of the limelight since last summer, when doctor's orders forced him to cancel all forthcoming engagements in order to give his voice a much-needed rest.

As for Samuel Ramey, his Comte Des Grieux receives the necessary gravitas and dignity from a bass-baritone voice that still booms with power and authority. However, the much-widened vibrato that now prevails proves too distracting to make this too much of a pleasant listen.

Humour pervades the rest of the main cast. Manon's gambler cousin and member of the Royal Guard, Lescaut, is sung well and with persuasiveness by baritone Manuel Lanza. Equally enjoyable are the excellent portrayals of Manon's wealthy keepers, the buffoonish older man Guillot de Morfontaine (Franscisco Vas), and De Brétigny (Didier Henry). The soprano parts of Poussette (Cristina Obrégon), Javotte (Marisa Martins) and Rosette (Anna Tobella) come off with appropriate gaiety and musicality, too.

MUSIC and ORCHESTRA

The music of Frenchman Jules Massenet grows more and more lovely to this listener. His 'Manon' offers more auditory delights than Puccini's heavier 'Manon Lescaut', with music that presents both the frothy and dramatic sides to the tale. Perhaps related to a certain French operatic style in use then, one can also hear strains of Georges Bizet's 'Carmen' at times. Besides the wonderful Gavotte and the poignant final piece of Manon, and the emotionally intense parts written for Des Grieux, there are passages notable for their simple beauty of melody. Of not minor import to this Bach lover is an almost reverent, fugue-like segment played by cellos that opens Act IV.

Victor Pablo Pérez directs the Symphony Orchestra of the Gran Teatre del Liceu with apt doses of lightness, excitement and drama. From sharp staccatos to swooning legatos, everything else in between is similarly pleasing to the ears.

Note that in this opera, dry, spoken dialogue is interspersed amid the singing parts, and everyone gives good to excellent renditions of the language.

EXTRAS

A short documentary film entitled 'Natalie Dessay with Rolando Villazón - Manon in Barcelona' (made by someone named Esti) can be accessed on Disc 1. It's a chaotic mess that begs to be edited, and is less than enlightening. The video cameraperson used too many extreme close-up shots of Ms Dessay, and only about a third or fourth of the footage also includes Mr Villazón, all merely incidental to Ms Dessay's presence.

The superficial chats with Ms Dessay in her dressing room take place in between scenes. The lack of any organised question-and-answer sessions or discussions about anything of import makes you feel like an accidental eavesdropper, lacking any context to the dialogue. While we get some extended shots of David McVicar rehearsing with the two leads, we are also given some overlong, uncut excerpts of certain scenes from the live performances, as viewed from backstage. This barely useful documentary seems to have been cobbled together with little thought.

VIDEO and AUDIO

The digital video picture is sufficiently sharp and clear on a High-Definition TV screen, and colours, lights and shadows are faithfully rendered, looking like an 18th century painting. François Roussillon's film direction uses such apt camerawork that you don't even notice the cuts and edits, so engrossed are you in the action and music.

The audio (on my Region 1 version) is processed in DTS Surround Sound, but while very good, the final product falls short of the truly enveloping, three-dimensional feel provided by a DTS 5.1 or Dolby Digital 5.1 set-up. The orchestra sounds full-bodied and lush, the vocal soloists come across clearly, but the chorus is a tad on the weak side.

SUMMARY

For this viewer/listener, this earthy production as staged by David McVicar is a luscious treat, to be sure, but tends to please the eyes more than the ears. It has much, though, to offer newcomers to the genre of opera, and to all fans of both Natalie Dessay and Rolando Villazón. (For greater enjoyment, those familiar with them, however, are advised to banish thoughts of the enchanting vocal performances on record of Victoria de los Angeles and Henri Legay with Pierre Monteux conducting the Orchestre du Theatre National de L'Ópera-Comique.) Four stars.

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DVD Notes:

Jules Massenet
(1842-1912)
MANON
Opéra-comique in 5 acts and 6 tableaux
Libretto: Henri Mailhac & Philippe Gille,
after Abbé Prévost's 'L'Histoire du Chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut'

DTS Surround Sound
Language: French, English, German, Spanish, Italian, Catalan
Number of discs: 2
Virgin Classics (EMI)
DVD Release Date: 21 January 2008
Run Time: 175 minutes 

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