Ma non!
Rodney Milnes,
If suspension of disbelief is any part of theatrical performance, then Colin Graham's production of Massenet's Manon at the Coliseum must be counted some sort of perverse success, since I simply could not believe what was happening before my very eyes. MrGraham usually starts his operas off with a bang, witness the pole-axing openings of War and Peace and The Tales of HoffmannFor Manon the curtain rises during the prelude to reveal an elaborate eighteenth-century proscenium with two-tier stage
boxes. an
Through monogrammed gauze gauze we see the good lady teetering through waves of dry ice in a wispy-ghosty costume reaching at, or perhaPs seeking to hitch her wagon to, a glittering ballroom star. In come the blacks, the stage staff contribute some interesting bangs and crashes, and then the opera itself proceeds.
The false pros. and boxes are permanent, yet what happens in and around them is hardlY thought-through. Members of the chorus sitting in the boxes are in 18th century rig, and are baldlY replaced by dummies when the chorus is off. Only few passages in Massenet's score (1884) are 18th century pastiche, so precisely what is the relevance of an 18th century framework, especiallY when what happens on the stage-within-a-stage is by no stretch of the imagination presented in eighteenth or indeed nineteenth-century style? Mr Graham has hinted that when the production is toured to sma.11 provincial theatres, the boxes Will be dropped. We hear much of the difficulties of adapting Coliseum productions for the provinces, but that they should be tailored before they even reach the Coliseum itself is pandering to regionalisation to a ludicrous extent.
More seriously the stage framework almost suggests .an excuse for not bothering with proper sets or a stylistically con.sistent production: within this context anything — like painted. drapes, twinkling stars flown in 00 strings, peculiar lighting — goes; Little room is left for meaningfw stage action. The concept emphasises the latent artificialitY of the piece, evades the challenge of presenting it to a 20th century audience, gives no hint of the squalor beneath the surface glittef (an excellent article on which ha° tbaegene iinnclut the g rd,p rboywatrm
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proclaims, whether truthfully °rf no, the production team's lack ° belief in the opera. Sadly, this lack of belief has been passed on to the press vw. when faced with a misguide, production (cf. Yolande), deem tiie work itself to be at fault. Manon may not be an undying masterpiece (the bland treatment of Lescaut alone precludes this) but it is more than musical comedy and the narrative technique is fascinatingly fluid (it is given in a comendably full version). It is tempting to compare it unfavourably With the earlier Carmen, but this' is fair to neither work: Massenet's boudoir eroticism (there are worse locations) has a hypnotic power of its own and the musical idiom is as Powerful as it is original. Neither cast nor orchestra captured this idiom at a First bash, understandably, though I admired the way Mackerras kept the music on the move and resisted the temptation to linger over the more glutinous Passages.
Elizabeth Harwood is, I suspect, seldom at her best on first nights, and I am sure she will be a memorable interpreter of the title role. Her diction is'good given that she is not one to let mere words interfere with pretty sounds in the Upper range. With the intensive musical and stage coaching he enjoys for his Wagner, Alberto Remedios could be a fine Des Grieux; so far he produces little more than a sketch for the role. Geoffrey Chard's Lescaut was winsome in a John Hansom sort of way, but that fine character bass Harold Blackburn was mysteriously miscast and miscostumed as the Count. John Fryatt's standard tongue-in-cheek, straight-out-front, audience-ogling performance as Guillot is best forgotten. An unfortunate mishap on the first night summed up the Proceedings all too succinctly. Poor Manon ended her Gavotte With a triumphant flourish and dropped her fan; similarly the Production, a would-be grand gesture, empty save for flatulence, _fell flat on its face. Poor Massenet.
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