I'LL POP-OPERA WHEN IT'S POP'PEA

Since when ? Forever I would think, the word Opera and I don’t go well together. There are modern operas I really enjoy or modernizing the classics can be marvelous. But classical or traditional opera leaves me as cold as listening to John Cage.
As a child I spent hours of my free time pretending to dance and sing in musical comedy and consequently knew every show that was on or off Broadway or in London. I was living in Launcestion. Tasmania. Then at the age of 16 in London for the first time, I was  taken to the world premieres of both «My Fair Lady» and «West Side Story». I made up my mind that I would become a musical comedy star. So I broke my voice singing, my back dancing and it never happened. Even so I am still passionate about -most- musical comedies and there is hope for pop opera.

Having reserved for the Chatelet theatre season earlier in the year, I knew what to expect when I sas «Nixon in China» and loved it - but was a little doubtful about what I would see with «Pop’pea.» To be honest at first I thought this had something to do with the sailor man and then reading a little more closely, I saw it was a pop opera based on Monteverdi’s lyrical work of 1642. A date I never forget as that is when Tasmania was discovered by Van Dieman ! The Italian titile was «L’incoronazione di Poppea». That is self explanatory.

«An emperor who would stop at nothing, an ambitious woman hungry for power, both caught up in a torrid affair of passion, a ridiculed empress, a scorned lover, a philosopher hounded into suicide"....

Nero, Poppea, Ottavia, Ottone and Seneca are startling for their modernity. In fact it is the only opera based on truth which is also entirely scored around passion, corruption and violence. It has all the ingredients for a modern day Pop opera. In fact it couldn’t be more modern.

It was a production «commanded» by the Chatelet direction and although the singers and pop worlds were anglo-saxon and northern European, most of the artists were originally opera stars or singers in the pop world.

To the left of me

I was sitting in the front row and like the woman next to me, a little nervous about just how loud and «pop» the music was going to be. The musicians were a couple of feet away from me on the right - and a little bit further away on the left.

Before the curtain went up I looked at a series of maquettes and costumes done for this world premiere. None of them were retained for this production.

Some propositions

One of five maquette

Another maquette

 Screens were rolled on; video cameras moved in an out - displaying gardens, puppets playing music, death, .... and even when Rome is in flames, the flames are all around us. The effects are spectacular, funny and very modern.

Love scene between Neron and Pop'Pea. Rome burns

The suicide scene -Seneca

The costumes are outrageously kitsch and very sexy - leather for the men and lamé tights for Pop’Pea....

Opening scene with Ottone (Benjamin Biolay)

Nero (Carl Barät)

Poppea (Valerie Gabail)

Sung in English (of course), every word could be understood which is more than I can say for «Nixon in China» - even I had to read the subtitles in - French - at moments to understand. But perhaps the texts here were easier to understand. How close it is to the original music score I would know, never having heard the original opera. I do know however, that there have been many versions of Monteverdi's first version which goes to show that it doesn't matter what year we are in - this is today's material !

This I hope is the video - let me know

The man beside me left before the curtain call, muttering rather obscene statements about destroying a classical opera... not for me. I'll go and see that kind of opera - any time !