Cheap Offenbach - La Belle Helene / Harnoncourt - Complete Opera (DVD) (Hartmut Schottler) Price
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The production, alas, is unenlightening and perpetrates an over-the-top style that seems to be synonymous with Offenbach. The backdrop, a pink concave awning, is hideous. The costumes by designer Jean-Charles de Castelibajac are silly: Paris is dressed in lederhosen and looks like a twerp, the high priest Calchac wears a Ku Klux Klan hat, and Helen at one point looks as though she'll take to rappelling. Kasarova suggests the lure of Helen in her voice, but a beauty she's not. So it's left to Harnoncourt, who joins the company at the curtain call with a twinkle in his eye and a nifty side step, and his superb orchestra to remind us what might have been. --Adrian Edwards
| CATEGORY: | DVD |
| DIRECTOR: | Hartmut Schottler |
| THEATRICAL RELEASE DATE: | 01 January, 1999 |
| MANUFACTURER: | Image Entertainment |
| MPAA RATING: | NR (Not Rated) |
| FEATURES: | Color, Dolby |
| TYPE: | Performing Arts - Opera |
| MEDIA: | DVD |
| # OF MEDIA: | 1 |
| UPC: | 014381927627 |
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Customer Reviews of Offenbach - La Belle Helene / Harnoncourt - Complete Opera
Zurich Opera House is so mediocre...to do with the audience? This production is tres epatant for all the bankers and industrialists and moribund widows of Zurich on a Saturday night but is overblown, silly and distracts from the music. E Schmarre as the Swiss would say. Like all the productions - yes I mean ALL - at the world's most expensive but most bland Opera House the combination of must-be-Swiss chorus, players and above all audience reduces even the music to occasional jolliness but no thrills and even less magic. The best thing to do with this is to turn it on for the music and don't look. Also don't listen too hard to the Francais Federal. Ugly! For real opera go to the cheapest seats in Vienna, New York, London, Berlin or Milan. Never be tempted into the horrid Zurich opera house. Not even to the front row.
Delicious Work Masterfully Performed
It is so rare to see an Offenbach operetta performed today that, if nothing else, this is worth the price for the sake of curiosity. It happens to be a delightful work (much of it used in Rosenthal's ballet arrangement "Gaité Parisienne"). The text is insouciant and witty, and the music sparkles. The beautiful Zurich Opera cast from strength: Vasselina Kassarova as Hélène is a delight. She also happens to be one of the pre-eminent artists of our time, a mezzo of radiant voice, temperament, splendid technique, with rare coloratura skills. Mr. van der Walt whose name looks Dutch sounds like a French tenor of old, a light but carrying sound, full of color, with heady top notes and truly elegant musical artistry. The supporting cast is all superb, with exact singing and plenty of joie. Nikolaus Harnoncourt, so long associated with Zurich in Monteverdi and Mozart does wonders for Offenbach. It is my understanding that 19th century instruments were used. The clarity, color, inflections he gets from his orchestra are astonishing. His inner drive, rubato, his sheer joy of music making comes through in every bar of the score. It is indeed a pleasure to see this conductor whom I first encountered in ascerbic albeit moving, austere performances of Bach Cantatas and Passions, making such successful excursions into the romantic theatre repertoire. I hope he has more up his sleeve. Get this DVD..... you'll go back to it. By the way, the production is nothing special but the acting is invariably good, with excellent rapport within the ensemble. It looks well directed.
La Belle Opera
Harnoncourt really captures the spirit of this light opera, and the entire cast seem to enjoy themselves, which makes it a thoroughly enjoyable experience. This is Offenbach the way it should be done.