Jules Massenet - Manon / Dessay, Villazon, Ramey, Lanza, Henry, Perez, McVicar (Gran Teatre del Liceu 2007)
by David McVicar, Fran?ois Roussillon
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Manuel Lanza, Natalie Dessay, Rolando Villazon, Samuel Ramey, Victor Pabro P?rezDirector: David McVicar, Fran?ois Roussillon
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: French (Original Language); English (Original Language); German (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language); Italian (Original Language); Catalan (Original Language); French (Subtitled); English (Subtitled); German (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled)
Format: Anamorphic, Color, DTS Surround Sound, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.78:1
Running Time: 175 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2008-01-15
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Virgin Classics (EMI)
Movie Reviews of Jules Massenet - Manon / Dessay, Villazon, Ramey, Lanza, Henry, Perez, McVicar (Gran Teatre del Liceu 2007)
Movie Review: Beautiful but somehow...somehow
Summary: 3 Stars
I will admit, as I write this review, I feel spoiled. Having viewed Villazon/Netrebko in the Salzburg Festival's 'La Traviata' release on DVD, I come to this production still reeling from the other.
First things first, the singing is incredible. Dessay and Villazon both have incredible range, they sing, they are controlled, they project confidence. The staging I felt was in keeping with the tone of the era and Prevost's book. This is France before the Revolution, the lasciviousness of the background characters, the motley crue of the elite with their predisposition for dissolution. This was illustrated well. So in fact, the overall tone (of the singing) and the tone (of the stage) were bang on.
Despite how beautiful everything comes off, especially with the addition of the dancing and the waving of fans to symbolize the steaminess of this decadent world, there is a lack of chemistry between Villazon and Dessay. Dessay started out strong, playing the wide-eyed girl about to enter the convent before being whisked away by de Grieux's character. But when she appears later as a the bourgeois woman of the world, I felt she lacked credibility and stage presence. My interest waned and I found the remaining acts punishing to watch.
Again, I am spoiled but I truly feel an opera's success nowadays can depend on the acting and chemistry of the leads. Joan Sutherland couldn't act, she could sing and she had a certain presence. If her facial expression always remained the same, there was still an emotion in her voice. Villazon sings and acts with heart. Dessay moving from the innocent to the femme fatale simply doesn't work. Her voice is beautiful but I couldn't feel her voice the way I could Villazon. Manon is a powerful character but Dessay simply doesn't offer what her role demands. While Villazon comes through, his role in many ways doesn't benefit from Dessay's lack of credibility. We hear his pangs of love, we feel his heart beating in confusion for Manon but when we see Dessay's Manon, we wonder why he would feel a certain way. I felt sympathy for his character and not hers.
This production on the surface is faithful to Massenet's Manon (the singing, the staging) but when it comes to the heart of the matter, I found it lacked.
More Jules Massenet - Manon / Dessay, Villazon, Ramey, Lanza, Henry, Perez, McVicar (Gran Teatre del Liceu 2007) reviews:
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Summary of Jules Massenet - Manon / Dessay, Villazon, Ramey, Lanza, Henry, Perez, McVicar (Gran Teatre del Liceu 2007)
This imaginative Barcelona production of Massenet's tearjerker about a woman gone wrong in the dissolute world of 18th-century Paris features a brilliant performance of the title role by Natalie Dessay and an abundance of fine vocalism from most of her colleagues. Dessay's expressive face makes Manon's thoughts instantly accessible to the viewer, the way she holds her body, light in Manon's good moods, heavy when the tragedy unfolds. Her singing intensifies the drama as well, her opening aria innocent, her remembrances in Adieu mon petite table touching, the coloratura in her waltz song thrilling, the pathos of her demise fully captured. Rolando Villaz?n is the Chevalier Des Grieux, and he's his usual openly emotional self, the epitome of puppy love at the first encounter with Manon, convincing as her lover, and in the Saint Sulpice scene, he makes a seamless transition from rejecting her to re-igniting his obsessional love. But Villaz?n does have moments where his customary smooth vocalism gives way to inappropriate verismo style and its attendant strains. As Manon's cousin, Lescaut, Manuel Lanza plays up the character's nasty side while displaying a neatly textured baritone while Didier Henry is appropriately creepy in his portrayal of Br?tigny. Smaller roles are well done but the singing of veteran bass Samuel Ramey as Des Grieux's father exhibits considerable vocal wear and tear. Victor Pablo P?rez who chooses apt tempos throughout, expertly directs the Orchestra and Chorus of the Gran Teatre del Liceu.David McVicar's staging plays well in Tanya McCallin's traditional costumes and unconventional sets. Manon enters wearing functional, boyish traveling clothes, later graduating to a gold, green, and cream gown, and finally, a ragged shift for the finale. The aristocrats are in foppish outfits, wigs, and beauty marks, underlining McVicar's apparent subtext of Manon as a condemnation of 18th-century French high society, something that would likely have surprised Massenet. That theme is carried throughout the opera, as the stage is often littered with onlookers, sometimes in the on-stage tiered amphitheatre and even in the intimacy of the room shared by the lovers, where extras not only appear in the wings but also arrange themselves in awkward positions that divert the viewer's attention. To the degree such stagings lessen the sentimentality of the narratives, they're a plus; but McVicar's viewpoint does take something away from the story's intimacy. His production does succeed mightily in suggesting where each scene takes place with minimal props--a table here, some chairs there, and we are in a room, a gambling hall, a dark quayside. Francois Roussillon's TV direction is also smoothly functional, letting us take in the scenes while also getting close to the characters. --Dan Davis
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