'Manon Lescaut' is not one of Puccini's finest operas, have much more of a personal preference towards 'Tosca', 'La Boheme', 'Madama Butterfly' and 'Turandot'. Its story, while entertaining and moving, is implausible in places and due to so much of the original story being skipped also jumpy and not as coherent as Massenet's take on the opera.
Puccini's music however is simply gorgeous, the Intermezzo, deportation scene, Des Grieux's "Donna non vidi mai" and Manon's "Sola Perduta Abbandonata" being the highlights. Having loved his Met productions of 'Carmen', 'Werther' and especially 'Le Nozze di Figaro', Richard Eyre's take on 'Manon Lescaut' was really disappointing, not only my least favourite production of the opera (which enjoys a quite solid DVD competition, the 1980 Met and 1983 Royal Opera productions faring best) but one of my least favourites too of the fascinating Metropolitan Opera HD Live series.
It's not all bad this said. The best assets are the orchestral playing and Fabio Luisi's conducting which are both superb. The orchestra's playing throughout is impeccable, lush in tone and multifaceted, while Luisi wrings out every nuance of the beautiful music, like every good conductor should he lets the music breathe (important for a score that has a lot of intimate moments) yet ensures that the drama never loses lustre. The chorus are well-balanced and sound splendid, and while individuality in chorus work is always welcome their stage direction is overdone and their acting comes over as gimmicky unfortunately.
On a technical front the production is fine, the video directing having expansive use of the stage while focusing sympathetically on the intimate moments and the sound mostly having resonance, apart from some balance issues in the Act 2 duet (with Opolais and Alagna's voices not quite carrying over the orchestra). Deborah Voigt's hosting is admirably poised. Performances are good but not outstanding. Kristine Opolais has a gleamingly dark beauty to her voice, which is used and phrased with great intelligence, and is heart-wrenching in the last two acts especially "Sola Perduta Abbandonata". Unfortunately she is over-directed in Act 2, which makes Manon very difficult to root for.
Roberto Alagna, replacing an indisposed Jonas Kaufmann, does a gallant job as Des Grieux. He does sound strained at times to begin with and doesn't project quite as much in "Donna non vidi mai" as much as he could have done, but his portrayal is a passionate one, he sings with handsome tone and good musicality and his diction is excellent. The two are very moving in Act 4, sadly they looked ill-at-ease in Act 2 in contrast. Brindley Sherratt stands out as a wonderfully nasty and characterfully sung Geronte, and Massimo Cavalletti sings warmly if a little stiff as Lescaut, while Zach Borichevsky makes much of little as student Edmondo.
Visually, this 'Manon Lescaut' is rather garish and ugly. Even for a supposedly deliberately ambiguous (morally) setting, it was very difficult ciphering when and where the production was meant to be set in without prior knowledge, and there is little in the staging that represents the period the production is set in. The towering sets dwarf the singers and are quite tacky. The staging is the production's biggest downfall, there is a complete lack of emotional impact outside of Act 4, parts veer on the silly and bizarre, parts are irrelevant to the libretto and anachronistic to the setting of the production and in context to the story (which is set in a very specific time period), parts like the stage business during the deportation scene are gimmicky and pointless and nothing is done to make the story or setting clear to the audience, Eyre managing to make it even less coherent.
All in all, despite superb orchestral playing and conducting this was a disappointing performance. 5/10 Bethany Cox
Puccini's music however is simply gorgeous, the Intermezzo, deportation scene, Des Grieux's "Donna non vidi mai" and Manon's "Sola Perduta Abbandonata" being the highlights. Having loved his Met productions of 'Carmen', 'Werther' and especially 'Le Nozze di Figaro', Richard Eyre's take on 'Manon Lescaut' was really disappointing, not only my least favourite production of the opera (which enjoys a quite solid DVD competition, the 1980 Met and 1983 Royal Opera productions faring best) but one of my least favourites too of the fascinating Metropolitan Opera HD Live series.
It's not all bad this said. The best assets are the orchestral playing and Fabio Luisi's conducting which are both superb. The orchestra's playing throughout is impeccable, lush in tone and multifaceted, while Luisi wrings out every nuance of the beautiful music, like every good conductor should he lets the music breathe (important for a score that has a lot of intimate moments) yet ensures that the drama never loses lustre. The chorus are well-balanced and sound splendid, and while individuality in chorus work is always welcome their stage direction is overdone and their acting comes over as gimmicky unfortunately.
On a technical front the production is fine, the video directing having expansive use of the stage while focusing sympathetically on the intimate moments and the sound mostly having resonance, apart from some balance issues in the Act 2 duet (with Opolais and Alagna's voices not quite carrying over the orchestra). Deborah Voigt's hosting is admirably poised. Performances are good but not outstanding. Kristine Opolais has a gleamingly dark beauty to her voice, which is used and phrased with great intelligence, and is heart-wrenching in the last two acts especially "Sola Perduta Abbandonata". Unfortunately she is over-directed in Act 2, which makes Manon very difficult to root for.
Roberto Alagna, replacing an indisposed Jonas Kaufmann, does a gallant job as Des Grieux. He does sound strained at times to begin with and doesn't project quite as much in "Donna non vidi mai" as much as he could have done, but his portrayal is a passionate one, he sings with handsome tone and good musicality and his diction is excellent. The two are very moving in Act 4, sadly they looked ill-at-ease in Act 2 in contrast. Brindley Sherratt stands out as a wonderfully nasty and characterfully sung Geronte, and Massimo Cavalletti sings warmly if a little stiff as Lescaut, while Zach Borichevsky makes much of little as student Edmondo.
Visually, this 'Manon Lescaut' is rather garish and ugly. Even for a supposedly deliberately ambiguous (morally) setting, it was very difficult ciphering when and where the production was meant to be set in without prior knowledge, and there is little in the staging that represents the period the production is set in. The towering sets dwarf the singers and are quite tacky. The staging is the production's biggest downfall, there is a complete lack of emotional impact outside of Act 4, parts veer on the silly and bizarre, parts are irrelevant to the libretto and anachronistic to the setting of the production and in context to the story (which is set in a very specific time period), parts like the stage business during the deportation scene are gimmicky and pointless and nothing is done to make the story or setting clear to the audience, Eyre managing to make it even less coherent.
All in all, despite superb orchestral playing and conducting this was a disappointing performance. 5/10 Bethany Cox
