La parola scenica
At yesterday's matinee Hansel and Gretel at the Met (broadcast and simulcast), a disgruntled audience member expresses his distaste for the "forest" setting, just as Lisette Oropesa makes her entrance as the Dew Fairy. Top marks to Ms. Oropesa not only for singing her solo so enchantingly, but for continuing without a flinch despite the clearly audible shout of "Boo! Change the set!" (At least the fellow didn't yell, "Bravo! Bravo Robert O'Hearn!")
POSTED at
12:39 PM
39 Comments:
I hate people like that. I really, really really hate people like that.
This cretin probably reasoned that if it was acceptable to express approval of the scenery, it is just as acceptable to express disapprovel. It is acceptable, but it should be done during the curtain calls if the set designer dares to appear. Then have at him. However, I don't approve of booing a singer.
I took my then-6 year old daughter to this production when it was at SFO as her first opera experience. She behaved better than the guy in the audio clip. The forest scene was the only set we did NOT feel like booing.
Met audiences are just a bunch of lemmings anyhow...Sure, it's a lame "boo", but I'll take that over the planted "bravos" that seem to be plaguing the "new" Met peformances.
What an asshole. Bad enough he disrupts the music but to sabotage a singer who isn't even the target of his displeasure . . . fucking boor.
I once attended a performance of La Forza at the Met where during Ms. Voigt's first aria, an audience member three rows ahead of me vomited profusely and aromatically (or I should say stinkingly). He inadvertently sprayed several people in his vicinity. During the intermission an usher told me that she wished the vomiting patron had shown his displeasure by a simple 'boo'.
Yeah, there's a class act. He should have written a letter, sent an email, or posted a rant on his blog like a good crank.
Ugh.
You would think that if he was knowledgeable enough about the performing arts to think to boo the set, he would know that respect for the performers is important and GENTLEMANLY. What a jerk.
Speaking of misdirected audience rage, the suggestion that the set designer is totally at fault is equally uninformed. in today's production team hierarchy, the director is at least as responsible for such decisions and may, in many cases, have dictated the set to be designed.
I know this, as a veteran set and lighting designer.
Re: The Met's HANSEL: The set in question is not the forest called for in the libretto but a large interior hall with leafy wallpaper and a deer-antler chandelier. It totally drains the mystery out of the scene which should show us the children lost in the woods.
Ms. Oropesa sang beautifully despite the distraction. Hopefully in the next revival she will be singing Gretel.
I thought Ms. Oropesa should have sung Gretel as well.
i haven't seen the hansel and gretel yet, but I have seen oropesa in both iphigenie and nozze. she certainly has the makings of a star with a voice of polish, poise and projection. its too bad there isn't a forest....
I like to give people the benefit of the doubt. Let's not immediately assume he's an asshole, perhaps the poor guy suffers from tourette's.
But speaking of rude interruptions... I don't know that I can beat Sharon's vomiting patron, but during Pirata with Fleming some old guy had a heart attack in the second act. I was one row behind, about six seats over, and it pissed me off to no end because everything from the beginning gasps for air and the growing worried murmurs from his neighbors to the "is there a doctor in the house?" and the dragging him off the auditorium was caught beautifully on my illicit in-house recording over the scooping of Renee and Marcello's belting. The Met ushers called 911 and the guy was still alive when they took him away. But my favorite part of the story was finding out during intermission that all those who got up and took him out of the theater, including the two physicians who heard the call, were not allowed back in the theater until the next act. That kind of put things in perspective and made me feel better about getting so angry that my 'pirate' (no pun intended) had been ruined.
As far as I can tell, nearly all Richard Jones's productions feature kitsch wallpaper. Clearly a fetish of his (along, apparently, with seaside landladies, a great British institution).
His 'Carry On Ravel' interpretation of L'Heure espagnole at Covent Garden featured lots of wallpaper, never mind the otiose Folies Bergere showgirls in the final number. (That gorgeous, sexy music doesn't need tarting up.)
The man's a bit of a one-trick pony if you ask me. He needs to grow up a bit.
I for once do not mind the booing. As an opera singer, we know that this kind of behavior is a job hazard, so I doubt that the singer even noticed.
I saw the production when it traveled to Chicago several years ago and I thought the 2nd act set was uglier than a blasphemy during Easter service.
I applaud him for at least have the guts to show his displeasure for it. Audiences in America are so clueless they would not know art if it hit them on the head with a cast iron pan.
American audiences are so brain-challenged and repressed that the slightest display of public disapproval is met with surprise and shock. No wonder Bush & Cheney get away with so many crimes, they know you sheep won't make a peep.
Ironic that cheering is ok, but boos are not. The problem obviously is not the disruption, it's the nature of the disruption. Very hypocritical too, I must say.
To boo or cheer WHILE a singer is performing is just classless and wrong--no matter if you're in an American audience or one elsewhere.
The fact is that he did BEFORE the singer started. And as i said before, I doubt the singer really noticed.
All this talk of class and classless makes me sick. I thought we wanted to take opera OUTSIDE the class lines.
for once I agree with TKlogan...I feel disgusting and dirty that I do...but I do...Singeril--the disruption was before the singer sang...
I'm all for booing in the proper context but what did this inappropriate (and probably drunken) act accomplish? The set designer wasn't there to hear it. The sets are inanimate objects without ears, so I know they didn't get the point. And assuming the stage director was somehow culpable as well for the offending visuals, well, HE wasn't there, either. And then there is the issue of the music. Respect for music. Remember the music? No one has the right to sabotage my experience of it WHILE THE PERFORMANCE IS HAPPENING--and I don't give a rat's ass what the disruption is about: booing, chronic coughing, talking, snoring, belching, farting, whatever. This shithead was welcome to boo his head off at the conclusion of either or both acts. But not on my dime. He's damn lucky he didn't get his ass kicked.
Enzo: your dime was his dime too, unless you are that generous, there were hundred of paying customers in the house, you were not the only one (assuming you were there).
Did he get anything accomplished? well, I guarantee you that Gelb heard about it, if not hear IT; and that is important enough since Gelb and the house paid for the services of the designer/director team.
Ah, and one more point, he get a lot of people talking about it for days. I would say he get a lot accomplished.
It should probably be pointed out here that the booing happened just as Lisette Oropesa made her entrance as the Dew Fairy. (She walks across the stage silently before starting to sing.) And if the (onstage) microphones picked up the sound of the boo, very likely it carried to the ears of the singer -- though I guess you'd have to ask Ms. Oropesa whether she heard it or not.
You know La Cieca is all for booing under the right circumstances, but the problem with this sort of "boo" is that it's impossible to interpret precisely on the fly. A loud boo just as a singer makes her first entrance of the evening is very easy indeed to misinterpret -- perhaps the mutterings of a disgruntled Louise Wohlafka fan?
I have to agree. Those of you who think that it was OK for this guy to boo JUST as this singer was making her entrance need some lessons in respect. The singers, almost to the person, work really REALLY hard with the experience of the audience in mind. It is truly a matter of respect. Singers LOVE their audiences, and they just expect, at LEAST, respect in return.
Singers ARE NOT the hired help. They are skilled, highly trained artists, who give everything they have to their audiences. Show some respect.
There is no excuse for bad behavior, but enough is enough. To change the subject, did anyone hear tonight Polenzani's Romeo? I found his voice light- Donizetti-esque- and lacking colorization.
Satellite digital streaming, with a good audio system, rather exposes than hides vocal shotcomings. They say that Netrebko's voice is getting larger, and that was obvious in the duet at the end of the second act. Netrebko outsang Polenzani who was hardly audible.
I saw Alagna at the Met and I heard the others. From all the four tenors who sang Romeo, Alagna, vocally and dramatically, was a better Romeo, and better suited to Netrebko's voice.
Now, I have a question: does anybody really know if Netrebko has had, in real life, four diffrent lovers over a period of thirteen weeks?
Now, to all opera lovers: Happy New Year to you Guys and Dolls, straight or gay, we love you all!!!
OK, let's say the singer heard the doo, I am sure the comment about the set made it all clear to her that she was not the object of the guys rage.
I stand by what I say. He had the right to boo whenever he wanted. As a singer, it is my job to not take it personally and continue doing my job. After all remember: "The show must go on"
I agree that audiences should be allowed to show their displeasure but this kind of timing (just before the singer sings) is just cruel and tasteless.
"He had the right to boo whenever he wanted."
Leaving aside latin-lover's ... curious ideas of manners, booing is an outstandingly stupid way to register one's displeasure with this kind of tired production.
The kind of people who think this is an appropriate way of staging Hansel and Gretel _love_ boos as they fancy it gives them credibility. Indifference (or non-malicious ridicule) are far more likely to upset their edgy poseur facades.
A few years ago on the european channel Mezzo, I saw a tv broadcast of what I assume is the original of this production and thought it was tired and barren (I'm not against reinterpretation - I even liked the ENO? version set in post WWII urban England though I'm against having the same singer as the mother and the witch which is not justified in the original at all as far as I can tell).
Pet peeve: I don't like tenor witches, the knusperhexe has some gorgeous music but I've yet to hear a tenor in the role that could do it justice.
I was in the house Saturday, my review will be up soon. The opera was WONDERFUL! I felt sorry for the Dew Fairy who was on stage singing as he yelled.
Check out my review.
http://www.operainamerica.blogspot.com/
I saw the production as well. I did not think that the second act set drained the opera of its mystery. I mean it was not a 'lieteral' production. But for those of us who know this opera for decades and have seen it in its traditional incarnations, this production is a change of pace. I did not agree with all the choices, but quite a few of them were intriguing.
I especially was amazed at the physical truthfulness of Schaefer and Coote. How amazing to create that kind of physical characterization and to maintain it for as long as they did. Bravi (or is it brave?)!
Anyone who boos is an asshole. In Italian houses such as La Scala, the people who boo are frequently paid claque. In the galleria, I observed several men who looked like construction workers who would wait in the lobby and reenter the hall just in time to boo. I never saw a self-respecting audience member at La Scala boo randomly. It is rude. It is like flossing your teeth in the middle of a restaurant. And not booing has nothing to do with the repressions of the American public. That idiot TKLogan has opened its big fat mouth again.
Booing is pig ignorance and that's all there is to it. It's not a question of booing in the right place because there is no right place- it sux period.
It not only insults every singer onstage- it also insults the audience. If one is truly displeased and wants to show it- there is always the option NOT to clap- nothing is worse than silence. That aside- one can always write to the company.
How hot is Lisette Oropesa? So awesome you got this little incipit of her voice! She's a class act. The same, of course, can't be said for the douche in the audience, who is obviously sauced, or just crazy.
Michael Farris:
I even liked the ENO? version
I thought the casting of the same singer, Felicity Palmer, as Mum and Witch worked marvelously , particularly the brilliant Kundry like transformation from put upon drudge to purple clad witch with matching snake skin shoes and handbag.
That was a David Poutney production and his very 50s urban English translation is the same as the one being used at the MET, and very strange it sounded in that context.
I thought that the mother was more frightening than the witch.
I agree that Palmer was excellent in both roles. I'm just unconvinced about that particular bit of double casting, no matter how well performed.
Constantine A. Papas said does anybody really know if Netrebko has had, in real life, four diffrent lovers over a period of thirteen weeks?
"Ten men waiting for me at the door? Send one of them home, I'm tired." (Mae West)
why is there all this concern over whether the booing interrupted a singer, and none at all about the other people who happened to have been working at the same time--in this case, the fabulous Vladimir Jurowski and the 100-or-so musicians of the great Met Orchestra. Of course, we're all OQs, but it might behoove is to acknowledge that our favorite art form incorporates elements other than divas.
"it might behoove is to acknowledge that our favorite art form incorporates elements other than divas"
(hands over ears) LA LA LA! I CAN'T HEAR YOU, I CAN'T HEAR YOU! LA LA LA
More meaningful than a boo would be an email to Gelb that after seeing this appalling mess you are canceling the remainder of your pledge and calling your attorney to have your will rewritten.
Did it,done it... ciao, Gelb.
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