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(More customer reviews)Possibly the world's most familiar opera, Bizet's "Carmen" has been sound-recorded countless times and exists in about 6 video versions. My favorite has been the DG set with Agnes Baltsa in the title role because of her humorous portrayal of the gypsy, the use of spoken dialogue and the fine sets used for this Metropolitan Opera production. Now I might have to put, if not above it, at least very near to it the BBC Opus Arte DVD of "Carmen" (OA 0868 D).
On the negative side, both the Don Jose (Marcus Haddock) and the Escamillo (Laurent Naouri) are monochromatic actors, the first eternally angry, the second eternally pompous. I am afraid that Mr. Haddock simply does not look the part of the attractive officer, and his Micaela (Lisa Milne) looks a bit more matronly than "la petite." The sets on the Glyndebourne Festival Opera stage are squalid (the opening chorus may sing "Sur la place" but they are inside their barracks enclosed by metal fences) for the first three acts, forcing all the action downstage and crowding the chorus, to the detriment of any real movement. Act IV gives us only a blank wall outside the bull ring.
When the men sing about how each of the girls has a cigarette between the teeth, the subtitles are silent because few of them are smoking. But that is only one of the two times I spotted a discrepancy between the words and the visual. The audience applauds only three or four of the numbers, possibly asked not to applaud at all for the sake of the video taping; but they are quite enthusiastic at the end of each act.
Now for the good points and there are many. I don't think I ever heard as much of the spoken dialogue in any recording, so we are given much more information than usual about the characters. Indeed, every one of them is given a distinct personality, right down to Lillas Pastia. Carmen's two friends Frasquita (Mary Hegarty) and Mercedes (Christine Rice) could not be more different, one of them showing a bit more affection to Carmen than to the men. The Act III duel between Jose and Escamillo is given in the expanded version so that Jose is about to lose, but the toreador spares him chivalrously only to be bested afterward.
The usually friendly character Morales is played here by Hans Voschezang as a black man with an attitude (rather than simply colorblind casting), which adds a dimension having nothing to do with the opera. Then again, having the children's marching song done as a taunt to the soldiers rather than an imitation does work.
However, the main attraction of this set is the Carmen of Anne Sofie von Otter, a mezzo whose past roles would never have prepared us for what we see when she takes over this one and makes it entirely her own. Opera magazines were all abuzz about her performance and it is good of BBC to make it available to us so quickly. If you remember the Carmen of Julia Migenes-Johnson in the film version and her sizzling sexuality, you can put Otter's a few notches above it. In fact, Otter's Carmen is pretty close to the title character in the French film "La Femme Nikita"! You have to see it to believe it. Yes, there is a little too much groping at male crotches, but that is part of the director's (David McVicar) view of things.
And yet,hers is a beautifully sung Carmen. In the Habanera, she is allowed to light a cigar during the refrain and mumble a bar or two, but she is always in character. This is the only Carmen I have seen who looks frightened at the end of Act III; and her death against the wall of the bull ring is by having her throat cut rather than being stabbed. All of this lingers in the mind long after viewing this DVD.
Philippe Jordan conducts the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Glyndebourne Chorus and cast with dramatic flair (at least when the camera is on him), and keeps things moving nicely.
The opera itself is split onto two DVDs with some bonus material about the plot and characters at the end of disc 1 and about costumes, stage fighting, the music, and the Glyndebourne gardens at the end of disc 2. The one about costumes is especially interesting. The picture is in widescreen and the only subtitles are in English.
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