Weill: Der Kuhhandel
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Dietmar Kerschbaum, Michael Kraus, Robert Vambery, Rolf Haunstein, Ursula PfitznerBrand: Naxos OF America INC
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Unknown); Dutch (Subtitled); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); German (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0
Format: AC-3, Classical, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.77:1
Running Time: 138 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2008-09-30
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: Phoenix Edition
Movie Reviews of Weill: Der Kuhhandel
Movie Review: Near Perfect
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a first rate production that's well recorded. Great singing, dance, and brilliant choral numbers.
This fairly obscure work, rarely produced until recently, comes from just about the middle of Weill's career. Written in Paris, shortly after the composer fled Nazi Germany, there are major references to the evils of German fascism in particular and governments in general.
The original libretto also satirized unscrupulous US capitalism, in the person of a crooked arms dealer who personifies early globalization, interfering with and destabilizing the lives of simple people. That and the fact that this is neither a museum piece favored by opera houses nor something that could ever pass for "cutting edge", makes it seem unlikely there will ever be a major production in America.
Der Kuhhandel is a beautiful operetta (echos of Offenbach, with a waltz to match Lehar). If Weill's later Broadway output seems at odds with his German work this score provides as good a bridge as you will find--there are some elements of both here.
Sound and video for live performances have come a long way in the past couple of decades. Unfortunately, as with other video recordings of Weill productions, the sound gets a little muddy at some of the most breathtaking and complex orchestral/choral moments (but then that's what studio-recorded CDs are for I suppose).
Now if someone could just produce and film Weill and Paul Green's anti-war musical-tragicomedy Johnny Johnson (another of Weill's very clever and charming and mostly unknown scores.)
Summary of Weill: Der Kuhhandel
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