KVT – Extruded Ruminations on a Carmenized Theme

Carmen is so well known that audiences relish seeing it.

A lot of past productions of the opera would make any committed femist throw up. So its no wonder that some intelligent feminists have made it their business to change the way audiences and history sees this feisty woman. They try to dismiss conceptions of Carmen as the femme fatale, the precocious flirt; of Carmen the wanton woman, opera’s bad girl; the slattern who eyes a man, seduces him and then chucks him away without a second thought.

The latest I saw in this vein was at the Hanoi Opera House last week. Now I didn’t see the first airing of this production in May so I can’t comment as to changes that may have been made to the director’s intent. Sometimes I have rushed along to revivals of ballet productions in Hanoi and found them strangely subdued and devoid of the passion and sexual tension inherent in their first showings – as if a prudish eye had been cast over them and plucked out the bits that had made them alive and sensuous! So I can’t tell if the sexiness I like my Carmens to have has been subdued.

Our Carmen was spirited away from Seville in Spain and plopped into the streets of Hanoi. She was now a worker in a sweat shop factory along with a bevy of her country cousins who had immigrated to the city in search of employment. Historically it’s been hinted that the females in Carmen were really sex industry workers and I guess if you’d referenced certain karaoke, a smattering of nha nghi, some suspect massage parlors,  trafficking of women, and sex slavery this aspect may well  have been used in a local production. But, probably due to local sensibilities, the sex angle was wisely deleted. Thus the cigarette making factory somewhere near Hanoi was energetic but fairly flavorless. But so was the small bia hoi on the banks of the Red River that featured in Act 2…which could have been fabulously suggested as one on those seedy, drug-ridden night spots we’ve all heard whispered about and that urban legends suggest infest the gangsta ridden reaches of Long Bien.

It was an inspired idea on the director’s part to pare back the opera house stage to its barest of essentials….perhaps suggesting that this version of the opera was going to be also thus stripped to its bare bones and reconstituted. When the curtain opened onto the rows of tables in the sweat shop mercilessly illuminated by banks of white fluorescent lights, I was really excited and impressed. In Act 1 the use of the tables as another stage level was great and the way they were almost balletically moved about was wonderful.

I was really struck with awe when, in Act 4, the cast crashed the tables onto their ends, in unison, and formed an arena for the tragedy that was to come…..but I still wonder why these tables weren’t used more often in other cunning ways to form, say, the walls of the guard room, the tables and walls in Lillas Pastias night spot and especially the caves and jagged nooks in the mountain lair (which was crying out for inspired inspiration).

Other nice minimalist scene touches were the use of the striped plastic sheeting…a bit wobbly but very evocative of the ever-present construction that shrouds the city in concrete dust accompanied by the tympanic songs of jack hammers….and the strings of bare bulbs on timber scaffolding.

Using a bare stage presented a few obstacles in relation to the very large chorus and small ballet section. (To any director, the prospect of having to manipulate and paint crowd scenes using so many untrained though terrifically enthusiastic people….up to 100 it is said…would be daunting and I dip my hat in tribute to this director who took on the task and somehow succeeded). I mean, you couldn’t retire the hordes out of sight into the wings as these had flown the coop. Thus the crowd was used in Greek chorus fashion….sometimes dispassionately observing the action, sometimes withdrawing into disinterested sleep and, when necessary, actively involved. Sometimes I found this really effective and at other times it gave it the appeal of an earnest high school production. And when the famous and handsome Thai Boxer (a replacement for the toreador) dominated the stage, the chic lit ecstasies that the female chorus swooned into sort of took away from the feminist reading that the director had established.

Swedish director Helena Rohr has stated in PR that she wished to highlight violence against women, especially domestic violence, in Vietnamese society. To this end she used a prologue to the action to show Carmen as wife/partner and mother in a physically violent relationship.

Thus Carmen was seen as Victim throughout the length of the show and this made her pretty much a one-dimensional character. The fact that Carmen had a tweenage daughter observing all the action from the sidelines throughout the opera and who was thus given a fair bit of bad parental modeling, was also, to my mind, an unfortunate device (though the use of said daughter as a lone voice to replace the usual children’s chorus worked quite poignantly).

For me, the violence angle could have been played up more. The male chorus never really seemed ominous enough and the minor male leads (soldiers and gangsters) came across a bit too wishy washily.

I’d have liked to see more chorus costume changes. The security guard/drab factory worker get-ups became a bit tiresome and by the time we got to the bia hoi I’d have loved to have seen even minor changes. In Act 4 a bit of celebratory sparkle would have been great for the day of the big fight. Nowadays young factory workers may still be celebrated as a uniformed proletariat but when they go out to have a good time they dress up with a little bling in anticipation of sensuous and flirtatious adventures…even if many of the males they mix with may be loosely capped volcanoes of potential violence.

When you direct an opera you are held hostage by the budget, the philosophy of your opera company, the limitations of the venue and the talents of your musicians and singers and in our Carmen’s case, the size and untrained caliber of the chorus.

Luckily for Rohr, the Orchestra of the Vietnam National Opera and Ballet was in pretty good form right from the first sweep of the conductor’s baton that started the stirring overture. Luckily she had conductor and vocal coach Mr. Graham Sutcliffe on hand throughout rehearsals and performance to do an excellent job with his musicians and a largely amateur chorus.

Luckily she had some very competent principal singers who were also able to act. Carmen had a nice mezzo voice and her two female cohorts in crime, Frasquita and Mercedes were attractively appealing but it was the long suffering Micaela who took out my top marks for voice.

Much maligned, puritanical Don Jose had a nice tenor and Escamillo the peacock fighter, a light but fruity baritone and an even fruitier motorbike that roared onto the stage as another of those inspired touches. I really enjoyed the singing of the gangsta/smuggler blokes, Le Remendado and Le Dancaire. (Sorry about the lack of Vietnamese names attached to characters but my program was almost illegible.)

Luckily she had a mob of extras who were visibly enthusiastic and who threw semselves heart and soul into the venture.

This opinion piece won’t hit the right notes for many readers who saw the show but that’s what opinions are all about….diversity. If it had had a bit more swirl and twirl (I mean that bit on chairs by the ballet in Act 4 really could have done with some pizzazz and perhaps pagoda flags a-swooping) I’d have been really happy. But, for all its good intentions and a congratulatory and brave try to redefine Carmen in feminist terms, it was a bit inert and could have done with an infusion of Carmen’s famous sexuality.

Should the opera be given more outings I’d go and see it again. It was, as I said, a brave, experimental vision that attempted to tackle a theme that is universal but that is perhaps and unfortunately more socially acceptable in traditionally partiachal societies. Hanoi was lucky to have it presented to them rather than a tired old interpretation wrapped up in Vietnamese clothing. I’d love to see Rohr tackle more feminist themes. And in a world where the opera stage is dominated by male composers and by operas written pre-feminist stirrings, she certainly could have a field day, particularly with those romantic pieces where the female lead is conveniently killed off at the end.

But it’s probably Carmen that will suggest itself to feminist directors for some time to come because she’s so enigmatic and sensuous. Perhaps one day someone will play about with the ending and she will be the one who survives, goes forth and is liberated.

Germaine Greer laments that western women sought liberation but settled for equality. It would be interesting for Carmen to be directed to be a feminist archetype who shows the male sector where they can ram those notions of equality. A male comentator, Clive Hamilton, Professor of Public Ethics said in a recent article (also refering to western cultures) that the great betrayal of the women’s movement was when it was diverted to male ends so that young women could be freed to duplicate the boorish behavior of young men, from driving like hoons to spewing in the gutter after a big night out…

Enough of my ruminations!

Congratulations all involved…it was a worthwhile venture! It must have been an invigorating experience to have  been guided by talented stage and music directors.

(Note: All photos from DVT)