Strauss - Elektra
by Brian Large
(Click here)
Canada
DVD Cover Information
Actor: Birgit Nilsson (II), Donald McIntyre, Leonie Rysanek, Mignon Dunn, Robert NagyDirector: Brian Large
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: German (Original Language), Dolby Digital 5.1; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); German (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Chinese (Subtitled)
Format: AC-3, Classical, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, DVD-Video, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 107 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-11-14
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Deutsche Grammophon
Movie Reviews of Strauss - Elektra
Movie Review: I wish it had been better
Summary: 3 Stars
For me, Strauss' tale of ghastly family dysfunction has always been an opera better heard on record than seen in the opera house. Its hysterical atmosphere and bizarre characters, while providing tremendous opportunities for singers to display their power, range and stamina, also seem to encourage overacting and hamhanded emoting. Such is the case here. Mignon Dunn as Clytemnestra is the least offensive and actually delivers some truly beautiful singing. But soprano Rysanek whose histrionic skills--for reasons completely unclear to me--were considered non-pareil delivers another ourtrageous performance with excesses that seem based on the worst excesses of the silent screen era. Donald MacIntyre as Orest sings decently but visually is just ridiculous. Nilsson is past her vocal prime but at least does not embarass herself as do her colleagues. To her credit she underplays much of her role allowing the fevered music to make all of the necessary points. Even so, without the benefit of aesthetic distance, the viewer can see a certain calculatedness to her movements, a quality that belies the out-of-control emotionalism that she is trying to portray. The star of this show is Levine whose conducting is all that that one could wish for. As I suggested earlier, there are certain operas that call for physical acting skills that are just beyond the abilities of the average and even great singer. Watch Renee Fleming's Blanche DuBois in Previn's "Streetcar Named Desire" for a recent example. While vocally they can be quite pleasing and even thrilling, the talent to translate their musical gifts into believable behavioral action is not always theirs to command. Unfortunately, I feel that many of we opera fans have learned to settle for and accept second rate and really rather silly exibitions as examples of great art. No wonder Callas seemed so revolutionary.
Summary of Strauss - Elektra
It's hard to imagine confirmed Straussians not wanting this starry Metropolitan Opera performance of Elektra. Strauss and his librettist, Hugo von Hofmannstahl, transformed Sophocles' take on Homer's tale into a harrowing opera noir. Elektra lives for one reason, to kill her mother, Klyt?mnestra, and her stepfather, Aegisth, the murderers of her father, Agamemnon. In contrast to Elektra's vengeful obsession, her sister Chrysothemis desires to get on with life. When their long-missing brother, Orestes, returns to do the deed, Elektra celebrates with a dance of death and, her sole purpose in life fulfilled, dies. Strauss joined the hermetic plot to music of the utmost opulence, violent and yearning by turns, evoking the cardinal principles of Greek tragedy - pity and terror.This Met performance from February 1980 is notable for the playing of the orchestra, itself a major factor in any performance of Elektra, and for the three female leads. James Levine's conducting is full of passion, lyrical when it needs to be, but crushingly powerful in the big moments. Strauss' orchestration sometimes becomes chamber music-delicate, eloquently done by the orchestra. Birgitt Nilsson and Leonie Rysanek were the leading Elektra and Chrysothemis of the day. Nilsson was in her 62nd year, still singing well, even in such a demanding role that taxes singers half her age. But despite small signs that she's husbanding her vocal resources and hints of wavering pitch that indicate tiring, she gives an overwhelmingly intense performance. The booklet notes say that Rysanek was ill with a 102 degree fever, but there's no indication of it in either her singing or her passionate acting as. Mezzo Mignon Dunn, the Klyt?mnestra, was a Met mainstay for 35 years, and if she lacked the superstar status of Nilsson and Rysanek she more than holds her own here, virtually dominating the stage in her scenes and fully capturing the character's pain and frustration. If the men are not quite up to these three formidable ladies, that's par for the Elektra course.
The single set is of the dimly lit palace courtyard, identifiable as a place where bad things will happen. Herbert Graf's production and Paul Mills' stage direction are conventional, unimpeded by directorial novelty or conceptual misfires. Brian Large's video direction is not as effective or polished as his other Met productions; some moments obscured by darkness, others subverted by too-tight close-ups. The sound is also below the best that could be achieved in 1980, but good enough to do justice to the singing and the orchestra. --Dan Davis
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