Multi-locale Traviata being shown all at once in US Broadcast

Associated Press

Mary Campbell

26 August 2000

[Excerpt]

The American audience has it easy.

Viewers here can see in one sitting La Traviata for which Europeans, watching it broadcast live last June, had to tune in no fewer than four times:  aired from Paris, the opera was performed in four different locations.

Conveniently unspooling on videotape, this production will be shown as part of PBS’ Great Performances series.

Verdi’s opera is about Violetta Valery, a Parisian courtesan who falls in love with young Alfredo Germont, then leaves him when his father requests it so that Alfredo’s sister’s marriage won’t be undone by scandal.  Violetta and Alfredo are reunited on her deathbed. 

Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava and Argentine tenor José Cura, neither of whom had sung the parts before the June performances, were praised for voice, acting, and good looks. 

Conductor Zubin Mehta and the RAI Symphony were in the Salle Wagram, a concert hall often used for recording because of its acoustics.  Mehta and the musicians had earphones to hear the singing, while the singers, at their various locations, could see Mehta conducting on monitors.  

Gvazava went to Munich where Mehta heads the Bavarian State Opera, off and on for a year and a half to work with him and attend Traviata performances he conducted.  Cura did the same for the first half of this year.

Act I

Amami Alfredo nell'opera hi-tech

Panorama

Stefania Berbenni

19 May 2000

Two microphones for each performer, hidden cameras and steady-cams, four sets scattered around Paris while the orchestra plays at the Salle Wagram.

With a cast of stars, Oscar winners and artists in search of glory, here is a preview of the multimedia Traviata.'  But will it be opera or superfiction?

The earring falls, slips under the table, there is ambiguity in that sudden detachment from the lobe: force of gravity or force of seduction? Violetta bends down to pick it up, Alfredo does the same, they find themselves under the lace tablecloth, hidden, protected by lace where it seems easier to say without pretense what the true nature of love is, "cross and delight". Kiss. End of the scene. The music is silent, the cameras are turned off, the choir that has just sung the Libiamo with full glasses scatters in the golden halls of the Italian embassy in Paris. Alfredo (Josè Cura) and Violetta (Eteri Gvazava) come out from under the table, go to the monitors in the next room to see each other again, study each other, listen to each other again (the scene had been recorded): both try to understand if the professional gamble to which they have been called has meaning, feasibility, artistic dignity. Because they are not rehearsing the "classic" Traviata, they are developing the first soap with music, the first live film with a brilliant soundtrack (composed by Giuseppe Verdi), the opera which is also an archetype of absolute love, opposed. A dangerous mix of cinema, television, opera. A hi-tech, multimedia, two thousand proof Traviata. An operatic superfiction that on June 3 and 4 will enter millions of homes on five continents, live on TV, invading the global television village: 125 connected countries, 25 billion expected viewers, four appointments distributed over the weekend, each half an hour each.

This jumble of genres has a title, Traviata à Paris; it also has a creator, Andrea Andermann who with his company (RadaFilm) has been working on the project for eight years. Andermann has an exceptional production partner in Rai (it provides him with full technical-managerial support) so much so that the broadcasting rights (that is, the transfer to world’s TVs) are divided between the two parties. "It is live cinema, but it is also Verdi's Traviata. It is the chronicle of a shocking, scandalous love. It is the TV that gives an account of what is happening on the love front," explains Andermann, who in 1992 directed a similar project, Puccini's Tosca.

These days in Paris they rehearse ten to twelve hours a day: the movements of the cameras, the audio system, the gestures of the performers, the music. Because on June 3 and 4 nothing can go wrong, the live broadcast won't allow it. Vittorio Storaro, director of photography, winner of three Oscars, studies shots, hides cameras. Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, master of direction (he also worked on Tosca eight years ago), insists on details, expressive nuances. He has a guideline:  the music: "I never forget that I'm staging an opera for TV: the characters are musical creations, the notes tell us what they feel, what feelings they are possessed by. Images can be precious accomplices to dig into the narrative."

Zubin Metha and the Rai Orchestra will play at the Salle Wagram, while the choir and performers will be on one of the four breathtaking sets scattered around Paris: the music will come out of speakers hidden among the furniture and plants of the garden, the protagonists will have double microphone hidden by their hair or clothing. The French capital, aware of the impact of the images on tourism, has made exceptional scenarios available, such as the Petit Palais or the Hameau de la Reine in Versailles. Period pottery and precious objects such as the pen with which Violetta writes the farewell letter to Alfredo in Act II (art director is Aldo Terlizzi) have been rented from Parisian antique dealers; hundreds of dresses were made with precious fabrics for the two parties called for by the libretto; and then, horses, carriages, mirrored windows: a riot of pomp and sophistication. The action has been moved forward by fifty years: we are in 1900 instead of 1850 as indicated by Francesco Maria Piave’s libretto, derived, as is known, from La dame aux camèlias by Alexandre Dumas fils.

Will the purists be outraged at the artistic license taken for use by the world-wide audience? Certainly, the lovers of Verdi's score will not easily digest the natural concessions to the cinematographic-television medium which, inevitably, often wins over music (Panorama attended three days of rehearsals). And perhaps not a few fans of the notes will turn up their noses on the cast: except for Josè Cura, an accredited tenor, the other two main roles are entrusted to Eteri Gvazava, a young Russian soprano in her first Verdi role, and Rolando Panerai, an "historic" Giorgio Germont for over fifty years on the stage who replaced Ruggero Raimondi at the last minute. The soprano admits: "I have been studying the score for more than three months. Violetta requires a dramatic voice while mine is lyrical. I have to be careful not to force it and at the same time to give a more intense interpretation". With devotion to Patroni Griffi and professional determination, the TV-Violetta from Siberia repeats scenes, studies the score, indulges in some daring shots in the second act when the two lovers relax in the country house. Will she convince, this petite Eteri Gvazava? Hers is not only a performance as a soprano, but also as an actress: just think of the last act, with the camera a few centimeters from her face, for half an hour. The Violetta del 2000 will die at midnight on June 4th, to the sound of the bells of Notre-Dame and must be able to make half the world cry.

Watching the rehearsals, one cannot help but think of Verdi, that nineteenth-century man who for more than fifty years investigated the feeling of love, as a detective might, finding proof of its contradictory and violent nature ("Croce e delizia .. . ") in Rigoletto (filial love), in Otello (passionate) and of course in Traviata (to name some of the most famous titles). Certainly, Verdi could never have imagined that his music would one day travel over the air across the globe, becoming "live cinema." A planetary event, while the opera's debut was a Venetian fiasco: the premiere of Traviata at the Fenice in 1853 was a resounding failure, raining whistles. What would he say today seeing dozens of cameramen chasing Violetta and Alfredo? How much would he suffer thinking Addio del passato, Violetta's yearning farewell to life, will be listened to by many while munching on cookies and chips on the sofa at home, in slippers? Anyone who wants to can attend the "performance" and hypothesize possible answers. The ticket for the "multimedia theater" is free.

A 'Traviata' Roams Paris, Partaking of Its Rhythms

New York Times

Alan Riding

June 6, 2000

In a fantasy world of opera where plots frequently strain credulity, ''La Traviata'' is unusually realistic. Based on a true story, it was Verdi's only contemporary opera, one inspired by events and attitudes of his time. In fact, even today, it requires no great leap of imagination for audiences to accept that the tragic love of Violetta Valery and Alfredo Germont is unfolding in and around mid-19th-century Paris, and not on stage.

So why not present it, live and in color, in Paris?

This weekend an Italian production team did just that, with an ultrarealistic version of ''La Traviata'' set in four different Parisian locations and broadcast live or slightly delayed in 125 countries (it will be rebroadcast by PBS in the United States in late summer, provisionally on Aug. 27). The lush production went off with barely a glitch, with Violetta's poignant demise timed to coincide with the bells of Notre Dame Cathedral chiming at midnight Sunday.

The hidden star of the $25 million production was of course technology, but it served to enhance the show. The Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava, singing her first ''Traviata,'' was a beautiful and moving Violetta, while the Argentine tenor Jose Cura was a convincing Alfredo and the Italian baritone Rolando Panerai a forceful Giorgio Germont. The National Symphony Orchestra of the RAI, the Italian television network, was conducted by Zubin Mehta.

Eight years ago the same production team, led by Andrea Andermann, presented a similar version of ''Tosca,'' broadcast at the time and from the places established by Puccini, with Catherine Malfitano and Placido Domingo in the lead roles. With ''La Traviata'' the locations are less specific than those of ''Tosca'' in Rome, yet as the Paris opera, it seemed like an obvious candidate for a new audiovisual adventure.

To place the production even more firmly in Paris, Mr. Andermann and his director, Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, set it in the Paris of the Universal Exhibition of 1900 and included live views of Paris, including the Eiffel Tower, shot from a boat traveling down the Seine. And for the locations of the four main scenes, they again picked places that reinforced the link to Paris, albeit allowing time for performers to change costumes and move between the scenes.

For Act I, Violetta's party, where she first meets Alfredo, was held on Saturday evening in the Hotel Boisgelin, the 18th-century Left Bank mansion that is now the residence of the Italian ambassador to Paris. For Act II, the hamlet built for Marie-Antoinette in the park at Versailles became the country retreat of Violetta and Alfredo on Sunday noon. The finale of Act II, Flora's party, where the lovers break up, took place on Sunday evening in the Petit Palais in Paris, itself built for the Universal Exhibition. And for Act III, which began at 11.30 p.m. on Sunday, the ailing Violetta's apartment was on the Ile St.-Louis, with a view of Notre Dame.

The technical challenge was to link these different locations to the Salle Wagram, where Mr. Mehta was leading the RAI orchestra. Each performer, including a large chorus in two scenes, was equipped with two tiny radio microphones and could follow the conductor's beat on television monitors hidden around each location. In place of a score Mr. Mehta had a television monitor showing the performance as well as an earpiece carrying their voices.

The recording itself posed other challenges. With television broadcasts of theater opera productions, the cameras stay offstage; with other film versions of opera, like Franco Zefferelli's own ''Traviata,'' the music was prerecorded and the scenes shot in takes like a movie. Here the cameras had to move constantly among the singers without ever being seen by another camera.

Perhaps the great technical breakthrough this weekend, then, was the daring use of four Steadycams, large cameras strapped to the body of the operator that provided both visual fluidity and stunning close-ups. In Act II they followed Violetta and Giorgio through fields, while in Act III Garett Brown, the Englishman who invented the Steadycam for Stanley Kubrick's film ''The Shining,'' caught the drama of Violetta's reunion with Alfredo and subsequent death in one uninterrupted 28-minute take.

''In 'Tosca,' we were just amateurs,'' said Vittorio Storaro, the Oscar-winning cinematographer. ''Now the camera is even freer because the Steadycam can be used emotionally. The Steadycam is now part of the style.'' Mr. Andermann put it even more succinctly: ''It's like a work for solo, orchestra and Steadycam.''

After years of preparation and weeks of rehearsal, however, a final headache was posed by the forecast of stormy weather. And indeed, heavy rain both preceded and followed three of the scenes. But the only significant glitch was a brief blackout during Act I when Ms. Gvazava entered the Left Bank mansion's garden and a camera faltered.

''It lasted three seconds, but it felt like three days,'' Mr. Andermann said. ''We had five seconds to decide whether to run the backup tape. But then it came back on again. Still, it was a bit like when Placido Domingo fell in the first act of 'Tosca.' It proved it was going out live.''

For the video version, which will be seen in the United States, the blackout will be replaced for a few seconds by the backup version recorded during the final dress rehearsal. What the American audience will see, though, is Mr. Andermann's proudest ''discovery,'' the tall Siberian-born soprano whom he picked from among hundreds auditioned to be his Violetta.

''Eteri was supposed to be the surprise, and she is the surprise,'' he said. ''I kept her out of contact with the world for six months, three months learning Italian in Rome, three months during rehearsals. I found her in a small opera company in Germany. She knew nothing about film or television. No one had heard of her. Now I think she will have a marvelous career. She's a natural tragedienne, all that deepness of Russian soul, but she also showed she is a natural comedienne.''

Island of Bliss

Classical Music Guide

Alan Rich

2001

 Only a couple of choked phrases from under Zubin Mehta¹s baton, and you know that in PBS' new video of La Traviata, which turns up Sunday night on KCET, the eloquent Verdian breath is going to be in short supply. This is another of those gadgety productions, like the Roman travelogue in the PBS Tosca of a couple of years ago or the Aïda filmed at the Pyramids. This one takes place all over Paris: four scenes, four venues.

I can't wait for a Fidelio on Alcatraz. Heroine and father-in-law do their big scene while chasing each other through the woods around Versailles; the party scenes are so populated with ephebes that you expect Oscar and Bosie to show up in matching bath towels.

Argentinian tenor José Cura is the splendid Alfredo, a role ideal for the smooth, elegant middle of his voice. Russia¹s Eteri Gvazava, the Violetta, comes in under the pitch now and then, but I like the somewhat dark quality in her voice that works particularly well in her scenes with the elder Germont. He, alas, is the veteran Italian baritone Rolando Panerai, now 76, given to eyeball rolling to cover the notes he no longer commands. His Act-Two cabaletta has been excised, the better part of wisdom in this case. One of the two verses of Alfredo's often-cut "Oh mio rimorso" has been left in, filmed with the camera about two inches from his nose. Has it never occurred to camera folk that the human mouth while singing is seldom if ever a thing of beauty?

Act II

Note:  This is a machine-based translation.  We offer it only a a general guide but it should not be considered definitive.

A “Traviata” that will Become a Milestone

Le Parisien

Agnès Dalbard

12 June 2000

[Excerpt]

EVE RUGGIERI devotes his entire magazine “Musiques au coeur” (on France Musiques) to La Traviata, Verdi's most popular and most frequently performed opera. Tonight we will see Giuseppe Patroni Griffi's film, which was shot live in Paris on June 3. This version, conducted by Zubin Metha, revealed the Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava in the role of Violetta and confirmed the first place status of Argentinean tenor José Cura.

Hymn to passion

Act III

Paris Authentic Setting for Filming of TV Opera

Cleveland Plain Dealer

Donald Rosenberg

27 August 2000

[Excerpt]

It used to be known simply, and gloriously, as La Traviata.  Now, under the name La Traviata from Paris, it is a live performance of Verdi’s great opera, with the French capital as yet another character.  Sort of.  Was Paris ever out of the picture in the first place?

Great Performances seems to think so.  Tonight’s telecast of La Traviata in Paris employs sites in and around the city to capture the opera’s atmospheres. The settings are wondrous, which isn’t news where the City of Light is concerned.  The big question is whether they add much to an opera that essentially revolves around the courtesan Violetta (Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava);  her lover, Alfredo (Argentine tenor José Cura); and his father, Germont (Italian baritone Rolando Panerai).

La Traviata was telecast and filmed live, with [Zubin] Mehta leading Italy’s RAI Symphony Orchestra in a studio and the singers doing their duty on location.  The technical achievement is impressive:  most of the time, the singers are superbly synchronized with the orchestra.  The result is a production with a high degree of realism.

The issue isn’t always relevant.  La Traviata possesses moments of extravagant display but it is intimate drama that makes the work the endlessly touching creation Verdi intended it to be.  Wisely, the Great Performances presentation lingers only sparingly on palaces, bridges and rustic settings, refuting a press-booklet essay claiming that the production “is above all a glorification of Paris, the myth of Paris, which remains constant however many years go by.”  After a whle, the environs blend into the theatrical concept, allowing the opera’s crucial elements (the score, the three principals) to prevail.

The performance is most engrossing in the way director of photography Vittorio Storano brings the narrative into vibrant focus.  Hand-held cameras follow the action with utmost fluidity and imagination.  Traviata is largely an opera of closeups, usually with one or two charactrers musing or interacting.  No gimmickry is involved here in conveying the emotional plights that motivate the opera.

Great Performances auditioned hundreds of sopranos for the role of Violetta, among the most difficult in the repertoire.  Gvazava, an unknown singer until now, emerges with distinction, proving both affecting and alluring as the consumptive courtesan who seeks redemption.  The first act is a severe test of the coloratura soprano’s art, and Gvazava doesn’t entirely manage the florid writing with accuracy.  A slight flutter also mars her artistry, though her soft, lyrical singing poignantly embraces the character’s compassion and vulnerability.

Cura, one of the hottest new tenors on the international scene, is an elegant, dashing Alfredo, fully in command of Verdi style and the role’s dramatic needs.  His father is sung by veteran baritone Panerai, once a first-rate Verdian, but now woefully past his prime.  Mehta’s conducting sometimes emphasizes heaviness over subtlety, but the orchestra and chorus sound trim.

Traviata on location is no Triumph

Boston Herald

T.J. Medrek

1 September 2000

[Excerpt]

The opera gods will surely be smiling tomorrow.

That’s when there will be the local premiere of a unique production of Verdi’s La Traviata taped on location in Paris in spring.  It’s hot of the presses.  And if it’s far from the Traviata of your dreams, it’s certainly not for lack of trying.

During the weekend of June 3 and 4, the cast—led by previously unknown Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava and tenor-of-the-moment José Cura—and crew performed the opera at real locations corresponding to the opera’s Parisian setting.

The logistics of this project can only be imagined, and it’s a real credit to all involved that Verdi didn’t get lost in the shuffle.

But when viewed in one sitting, weeks after the excitement of the live event, the flaws of this Traviata are more prominent than the virtues.

Worst is the disembodied quality of the audio.  Carefully mixed and tightly processed to avoid nonmusical noise (for the CD release, no doubt), the soundtrack avoids the realism that the prosecution aims for in the visuals.

You see, for example, what looks like an actual, if slightly sterile, party in a real dining room in Act I.  But, except for an occasional clinking of wine glasses, you never hear a chair scrape the floor when moved or the sound of silverware tapping against a plate—things you might hear at any staged performance.

And there’s nothing close to the sonic perspective we expect from even the lowest budget film.  While it’s lovely to see the opera’s heroine, Violetta (Gvazeva), from a distance as she walks across a filed in Act II, it’s just plain weird that she sounds exactly like she does when she’s going full throttle in close-up.

Similarly, the singers treat the locations like sets.  You never for a inute imagine that they live in these places.  They’re trained to work on a stage, and that’s what they do here.  You can almost hear them thinking to themselves, “Don’t lean on that wall!  It’ll fall over!”

The problem is that opera is not realistic.  Sure, the emotions of the tubercular, high-priced prostitute Violetta—convince by society (as embodied by her lover’s father, Giorgio Germont) to abandon her lover, Alfredo, for the sake of propriety—are as real as they come.  But presenting the action as reality just makes it look and sound even more fake.

That said, the performance isn’t bad.  Gvazeva reportedly was one of the 700 singers to audition for Violetta, and she was a good choice.  This is her first performance of the role, and thrown-away phrases and stock gestures prove she doesn’t have it all worked out either vocally or dramatically.  But freshness does count for something, and her occasional naiveté works to her advantage in endearing her to the audience.  Her voice is darkly pleasing and she’s beautiful to watch.

Cura’s Alfredo will delight his many fans and further frustrate those who, like me, don’t quite get him.  His blunt, throaty delivery negates a lot of the manliness of his basic sound.  And while the Argentinian tenor’s swarthy looks make a dashing first impression, close-ups reveal one or maybe two expressions.  In other words, he’s an OK singer and not much of an actor.

Alas, Rolando Panerai, as Alfredo’s dad, was ill-advised to participate in this project.  At 75, he has decades of warm, wonderful singing behind him, and he brings the authority of age and experience to a production populated by relative youngsters.  But Panerai’s once unmistakably ripe baritone has worn painfully thin, and there are too many times on camera, when he just looks lost.

Mehta’s conducting is efficient, if not especially loving.  But efficiency must have counted for a lot under these conditions.  The singers in the several smaller roles are adequate.

On Air

Financial Times

9 June 2000

[Excerpt]

The filming of opera for TV reached a peak last weekend which it is difficult to envisage being surpassed in the foreseeable future. In a medium which can, on occasions, appear to score off opera through the imposition of obtrusive camera work and inappropriate technical wizardry, the production of Verdi’s La traviata must be accounted a musical and dramatic triumph as well as one of the most astonishing technological achievements of recent years.  The sheer scope of the project in terms of rehearsal logistics and production requirements almost beggars description.

Act I was filmed on Saturday evening, the rest of the opera during the course of Sunday, and the transportation of singers, camera crews and equipment between the various locations must have posed nightmarish problems.  What might have seemed, under the circumstances, the almost insurmountable problem of achieving a convincing musical ensemble was miraculously solved.

The production looked magnificent, flowing splendidly within the real-life locations, and film director Giuseppe Griffie’s work was outstanding.  The odd musical mishaps would have been forgiven, but the fact is that the ensemble between singers and orchestra was as good as it ever is in the theatre, and the production was enormously touching.

At first, the casting seemed questionable:  the Siberian soprano Eteri Gvazava looked unsuitably healthy for someone in the last stages of TB, while José Cura did not suggest the younger lover.  Still, over the next 24 hours one learned to sympathize, and the final scene grasped us by the throat.  An unforgettable event.

Site-specific Traviata:  a cool concept falters

Philadelphia Inquirer

David Patrick Stearns

24 August 2000

[Excerpt]

 Sometimes the more real an opera looks, the more fake it seems

High technology has allowed Verdi’s low-tech classic La Traviata to reach a new height in site-specific performance:  the story of the fictitious consumptive courtesan Violetta Valery unfolds in various locations around Paris where she might have lived, loved and died.  But it unfolds at considerable cost.  On a literal level, it was $35 million.  On an artistic level, the price was much higher.

Earlier this summer, this rendering was broadcast live in Europe, each individual act being beamed out at the time of day in which it was set.

The Act I party scene where Violetta meets the love of her life, Alfredo, was on a Saturday night.  Next day at noon, the two were seen cohabitating in the countryside outside of Paris.  The third installment (with their raging fight at a party) arrived in the evening.  And as nearby Notre Dame Cathedral chimed midnight, Violetta expired in her nearby Ile St Louis apartment.

Cool!  (At least in concept.)

Technically, this was achieved with sophisticated communications between the RAI symphony Orchestra, which was performing at Paris’ Salle Wagram, and the on-location singers, who had microphones hidden in their hair.  That’s enough to make opera fans cancel all engagements and watch each installment with the anything-can-happen verisimilitude of live TV.

And yet, arriving here in its less-than-life state, it’s just another opera film and not a particularly good one.

Musically, it’s often fine, even remarkable.  Considering the geographical separation between singers and orchestra, it’s surprising to hear a credible Traviata.  The two main singers, Eteri Gvazava as Violetta and José Cura as Alfredo, are new to their roles, and it sometimes shows.  Still, you rarely hear such a cleanly vocalized Violetta, a role written for four voice types.

Cura is a sexy, charismatic Alfredo both in voice and presence.

Conductor Zubin Mehta is inspired and inspiring.  When their affair begins to unravel, Cura and Gvazava use frightened-child voices that are hugely affecting.  But even Mehta can’t remedy the labored growling, yelling and barking that Rolando Panerai often passes off as singing in his portrayal of Germont.

Visually, the telecast is problematic on many levels.  It’s shot in an oddly unforgiving lighting that gives everything the antiseptic literalness of educational TV.  Giuseppe Patroni Griffi’s direction often rings false.  Maybe in real life, a Violetta and an Alfredo might playfully crawl nder a table at a party.  But while singing, it looks illogical and stupid.

This and many other touches suggest the telecast is trying to convince you this is a real-life parallel universe where people happen to sing rather than speak.  That is dishonest.  And in coping with Verdi’s sense of “opera time,” which is a slower than normal TV time and even slower than real time, Griffi’s camera zooms in and out for tight close-ups in a show of virtuosity that alienates you from the story.

Faces of the singers are seen with the camera peeking around pillars, posts and tree branches, which is visually redundant and often robs you of that which you want to see.  The use of Steadycams, which gives such a labyrinthine sense of intrigue to theh Z-Files, has a very different effect here:  the camera seems to be tagging along with the opera rather than filming it.

As the opera goes on, irrelevant detail takes center stage.  In the Act III party scene, we’re treated to extended close-ups of a flamenco dancer who is there for atmosphere only.  How terribly Riverdance!  When Violetta and Alfredo are finally reunited in her dying moments, it the most interesting thing about the scene her nightgown and his overcoat?  That’s about all you see.

There is one great touch:  At the end of Act I, Violetta sees Alfredo’s face in the mirror and goes to kiss it, only to have it disappear.

It all goes to show that even a broken clock is right twice a day.

Fine Traviata filmed on site in Paris

SF Gate

Allan Ulrich

25 August 2000

[Excerpt]

It could be argued, and most persuasively, that La Traviata is not, like Charpentier’s Louise, about Paris.  It is the tale of the downfall of the kind-hearted courtesan Violetta Valery, a character based on the real-life charmer Marie Duplessis.  It could be argued, also, that although the libretto states that the action transpires in a short time period, the instruction doesn’t make a lot of dramatic sense; Violetta’s death from consumption only hours after partying stretches credibility a bit.

It could be argued, additionally, that although Violetta is at the top of her particular profession, rent on the Hotel Boisgelin (now the Italian embassy) might be a bit pricey, and that friend Flora Bervoix probably wouldn’t be throwing a louche party in the courtyard of Le Petit Palais. A country retreat on the grounds of Versailles doesn’t come cheap, either.  And for a demimondaine down on her luck, Violetta inhabits rather impressive digs on the Ile St. Louis.

Nevertheless, the performance and production of La Traviata from Paris are strong enough to circumvent these qualms of logic.  The coast is young, gifted and extremely telegenic.  The location shooting (by the great cinematographer Vittorio Storaro) massages the eye.  The score is performed without any major cuts.  The direction by Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, famed for his film work ( Il Mare) and theater projects, is assured and sensitive.

Purists may complain Verdi set La Traviata at the time of composition (the only one of his major operas to be accorded contemporary treatment).  Moving the action to 1900 allows mouth-watering glimpses of the Eiffel Tower and gives the action an almost Proustian flavor; perhaps fallen women didn’t have quite so far to fall in the heady bello époque.

Patroni Griffi has assured that the intimate relationships prevail over atmosphere.  Gestures seem calibrated for the small screen; the Steadicam pursue Violetta and her lover Alfredo as if they were trying to invade their souls.  The occasional arty set-up, like shooting singers behind pillars or through bushes, is a small price to pay.  And the Alfred Hitchcock tribute, tracking a glass of medicine to its recipient, will delight aficionados of Suspicion.

What doesn’t convince so much is the sound of these voices in space.  Everything seems to lack the perspective you would find in an opera house performance.  And you keep feeling that the orchestra and conductor Zubin Mehta are just off-camera playing on the deck, as the boat glides down the Seine during the Act 3 prelude (in reality, the  musicians, stationed in a studio, communicated with the singers via video monitors).

The Violetta, Russian soprano Eteri Gvazava, is a discovery.  Reportedly chosen from hundreds of auditioning singers, she is glamorous and she delivers a lyrical protagonist, who negotiates the bravura passages without allowing them to dominate.  The pathos and desperation in her portrayal make one wonder if she would score in a mammoth opera house.

Tenor José Cura evidently thinks he’s singing in one.  No doubt about the Argentine singer’s passion (look, he’s shedding real tears!), but his voice is far too hefty at this point for Alfredo; all that scooping up to the note is not what the composer ordered.  Veteran baritone Rolando Panerai substitutes intelligence and artful phrasing for the juice his baritone no longer possesses.

But, this, after all, was live opera, shot in one take.  You see that rarely on TV these days and the thrill of the moment is not to be denied.

Curtain Call and Backstage

An Essential Traviata

L’Arena

Cesare Galla

1 August 2003

[Excerpt]

The semi-stage version curated by Paolo Panizza follows the logic of psychological drama with smooth naturalness and precise effectiveness

Everything is concentrated in the middle of the stage; we are not distracted by the vastness of the spaces or look for the postcard decoration. Freed from the nightmare of having to relate to the Arena as a whole, and having to "make a show" at all costs, director Paolo Panizza follows the logic of psychological melodrama with fluent naturalness, aided by the shrewd theatrical arrangement of the main protagonists. The costumes give the period picture, gaudy, elegant and traditional; the corps de ballet performs the choreographies of Maria Grazia Garofoli with precision but without grand-opéra aspirations; lights define the situations. In this way, even in the Arena, Traviata it finds its dimension.

The singing company certainly had important names for the main roles, but the outcome of their performance was not homogeneous. Angela Gheorghiu, with a slightly thin voice, prudently kept away from the high note expected by Verdi. Her interpretation is theatrically meditated, introverted, never blatant or over the top. 

For his part, José Cura was clearly suffering from the fatigue of a season that had subjected him to a terrifying and consequential tour de force—just two days earlier the tenor had performed in Carmen after engaging in almost all the performances of Turandot. His Alfredo was blurred, devoid of expressive softness, too pushed with an oscillating and forced emission, in search of- subtleties almost never adequately calibrated.  The choir was busy but less precise than on other occasions of the season.

Still, in the end, a festive conclusion [of the season].

Arena di Verona: La Traviata

OperaClick

Danilo Boaretto

31 July 2003

[Excerpt]

 It's true, Traviata is an intimate work, naturally versed in the classic red velvets of traditional theaters; however the "semi-staged" edition represented last night in the pharaonic arena spaces has definitely dispelled the cliché that considers it a work that by definition was not fit for the Arena.

La Traviata is a melodrama with such strong psychological content that when you have valid interpreters, capable of delving deeply into the Verdi score, almost everything else becomes superfluous.

[…]

From the cast list appeared a name which, due to the role assigned, was immediately perplexing: José Cura as Alfredo Germont.  The role had not suited him even in the now famous television Traviata three years earlier, years during which the Argentine tenor has devoted himself exclusively to the lyric-spinto / dramatic repertoire.  How was it that he thought he could return to Alfredo's shoes?