National
Theater
May
22
 |
| Happiness is a miracle machine and a stifled wife. |
It
was déjà
vu all over again on Tuesday night, when the Moravian-Silesian
Theaterʼs production of Stravinskyʼs The Rakeʼs Progress
brought some familiar faces back to the National Theater.
Joining the cast for bows after the performance were director Jiří
Nekvasil and set designer Daniel Dvořák, a
formidable team at the Prague State Opera and National Theater a
decade ago. The enthusiastic applause suggested they havenʼt lost
their touch.
In
theory, the story of a man who casts aside a gorgeous fiancee and
promising career for a life of debauchery that ends in an insane
asylum is not grist for a lively comedy. But with tongue-in-cheek
humor and increasingly outrageous sets, props and costumes, Nekvasil
and his team created a witty, refreshingly modern version of the
Faust tale. Broad acting, great timing and a brisk rendition of
Stravinskyʼs surprisingly traditional score give it strong appeal
without sacrificing any intelligence or depth.
The
production opens in straightforward fashion – with the title
character, Tom Rakewell (Jorge Garza), and his betrothed, Anne
Trulove (Jana Šrejma Kačirková)
professing their love around a model house and yard mounted on a
swaying platform. The promise of domestic bliss turns out to be just
as shaky when Nick Shadow (Ulf Paulsen), the devil in disguise,
enters from the loge at stage left and persuades Tom to run off with
him to the bright lights of London. The main light turns out be a
flashing electronic message board offering lurid enticements of
money, business and entertainment, echoed in a scarlet-themed brothel
where Tom quickly succumbs to the pleasures of the flesh.
Anne
comes searching for him in virginal white, but by then Tom is clothed
in kingly gold and trailed by a decadent entourage carrying his new
bride – Baba the Turk (Yvona Škvárová),
an improbably large, bearded woman. He
sends Anne away, stops his hairy wifeʼs
nagging by putting a large cardboard box over her head, and turns his
attention to Nickʼs newest gimmick, a preposterous machine that can
supposedly transform rocks into bread. Investing in it drives Tom
into bankruptcy, and the message board mockingly flashes BANKROT as
his estate is auctioned off, then counts down the final seconds as
the devil prepares to drag him into the steaming pit of hell.
Nekvasil
takes full advantage of the operaʼs comic
opportunities. Tom and Babaʼs domestic hell is portrayed like a TV
sitcom, with Škvárová
throwing a temper tantrum and fuming in fractured musical phrases.
The miracle machine looks like a cross between a clothes washer and
an industrial vacuum cleaner, painted in cheap gold. Still, the key
to comedy is timing, and Nekvasil is a master at moving his
characters around with stage with fluidity and precision. A pregnant
pause and salacious “Well?” from Nick after offering another
temptation to Tom was enough to draw giggles from the audience.
Garza
is a solid tenor but with limited emotional range; his character only
took on urgency in the final act. Paulsenʼs smooth bass-baritone and
oily, leering manner were note-perfect for the devil. Šrejma
Kačirková was a beauty with brains,
singing with heartbreaking tenderness as she watched her man slip
away. And Škvárová nearly
stole the show in her brief turn as the demented bearded lady. The
only weak showing was by the chorus, which stumbled through some of
its choreography and served up mostly tepid vocals
Musically,
the most striking thing about Rake
is how conventional it is. With standard arias, recitatives and
choral numbers, it hardly sounds like an opera written in 1951, much
less by Igor Stravinsky. But there are clear and classic Stravinsky
elements, particularly in the woodwinds, which conductor Jakub
Klecker did a fine job of drawing out in a spirited, nuanced
performance in the pit.
Intentionally
or not, this production references some well-known works. The
climactic confrontation with the devil would fit neatly in Don
Giovanni, and the final scene in the
insane asylum called to mind the closing moments of Miloš
Formanʼs Amadeus.
While those are good company to be in, Nekvasilʼs Rake
stands on its own as a fresh and amusing take on an age-old story.
The veterans, it seems, can still deliver.
For
more on The Rakeʼs Progress (in Czech): http://www.ndm.cz/cz/opera/predstaveni/327-zivot-prostopasnika/2012-05-25/2967/
Photo: Martin Popelář
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