Orphée et Eurydice

[fidelioscabinet]

What the Netflix blurb has to say:"Robert Wilson directs this 1999 French adaptation of Christoph Willibald Gluck's 1762 opera, starring Magdalena Kozená and Madeline Bender in the title roles and with John Eliot Gardiner conducting. Minimalist in style, this production has become renowned for its combination of a supremely talented cast, spare

Comments

[txanne]

Congratulations! Here is the Internet which you have just won!

[fidelioscabinet]

Merci, Mademoiselle Professeure!

[desperance]

Um, I think this style of show is very different live? The theatre is immersive, in a way that DVDs no can be. I saw a production of Orphée et Eurydice a couple of years back that was equally static & hieratic, and I adored it. They had a male countertenor singing Orphée, which always punches my buttons anyway, but - yup. Soaked me in. Can't imagine the same thing happening through a TV screen.

[fidelioscabinet]

The snark in me is inclined to say it would have to be better live, because Wilson keeps getting work, but I can see how it would indeed make a difference--just having living, breathing performers always adds electricity to things, and it helps not being tied to a camera's specific viewpoint--they always go in on the soloist, so you lose track of what else might be happening, and this is a production where you really need to see the big picture to get a good effect--otherwise you're staring at a blue person singing very beautifully. There's a certain sort of understatedness which just doesn't work too well on a screen of any size, and I think this production has it in spades. There are moments where, on television, it slides past hypnotic and into stupefying