Osipova in Carmen

[SheilaC]

On Saturday I attended the second performance of a new version of Carmen, choreographed by Didy Veldman. It was produced by key players in the previous Osipova vehicle (The Mother) Alexandra Markvo and her organisation Bird and Carrot Productions, and the composer, Dave Price, also worked on both dance pieces. It premiered at a theatre in the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, also like The Mother.

 

The concept is ambitious albeit cliched, a play within a play, or more accurately a ballet within a danced play. It covers two acts. There are five performers, Osipova, Isaac Hernandez, Jason Kittelberger, Hannah Ekholm and Eryck Brahmania. They are in the process of filming Carmen but their relationships mirror those in the ballet. At times it is confusing as to whether a particular section is the filming or the ballet, although when Brahmania or Hernandez are holding cameras it is, of course, obvious that it is the filming.

 

A major theme is jealousy, with Michaela, the character performed by Ekholm in the play element, consumed with jealousy of the increasingly sexual relationship of Carmen and Jose, as well as Jose's jealousy of Escamillo, in the ballet. In a play section Ekholm (Michaela) and Carmen have a long duet where their relationship fluctuates, as Carmen tries to placate her colleague, until the jealousy explodes. The ballet ends, as usual, with a violent pas de deux between Jose and Carmen. It was these duets which were the most powerful parts of the piece.

 

Overall I felt that the whole came to less than the sum of the parts. The quality of the choreography varied and it was too long, some editing, particularly of the 'play' parts, would strengthen its impact. On the plus side, I particularly liked the way Carmen's interiority is explored in a way that isn't equalled in the ballet versions of Carmen that I know best (those of Roland Petit and Alberto Alonso). This gives Osipova the opportunity to delve into the anxieties and the emotions that propel Carmen's behaviour ; and it is a powerful vehicle for highlighting Osipova's strengths in acting and dancing. The opportunities for the other dancers were more limited. Hernandez  danced well but the choreography for him was not very varied, concentrating mostly on his jumps. Kittleberger only came fully into his element in the final section. Ekholm's contribution became less prominent in the second half.

 

The music worked well. Mostly original there were also some segments from Bizet's score. The designs were attractive especially the vivid red costumes for Carmen. There was video although the images were at times obscure over different surfaces rather than a full screen. And the printed programme was excellent value at £5, informative and very well illustrated, a marked contrast to the £15 programme for Polunin Ink at the Royal Albert Hall.

 

The audience were very enthusiastic at the end, even though I heard people say they hadn't always followed what was going on. As a vehicle for Natalia Osipova it works well., it's an ideal role for her..... no doubt in time there will be a video on SkyArts to accompany all the other Osipova programmes.

[Jan McNulty]

Thanks for the report Sheila.  I did think it an intriguing concept and one of the draws for me would have been the opportunity to see Eryck Brahmania dancing again.

 

I think I remember seeing somewhere that the production is due to be put on at the South Bank sometime in 2022 but I can't find any details.

[jmhopton]

There was a mention in yesterday's Times article in the Links. However, all it says is it will be at the Southbank Centre sometime in 2022. Not very helpful. 

[alison]

So, it's not a rehash of Veldman's production for Northern Ballet, then?  A shame - I'd like to see that again.

 

Thanks for the report, Sheila.

[ajf]

I also saw the performance on Saturday evening and agree with much of what Sheila said above. It was an enjoyable evening but given how well known the plot of Carmen is, the storyline chosen was more than a little obscure in some parts and yet telegraphed far too obviously in others. The play within a play idea, or at least dancers playing actors acting/dancing in a film, was perhaps too much for the movement to communicate. The main failing for me was the failure of the narrative in the first half to set up a strong enough set of relationships between Carmen, Don Jose and Escamillo. Therefore when the powerful final pas de deux came along to end the show, although the dancing was excellent, the strength of emotion between the duo seemed to come from nowhere. More time was spent on the relationship between Michaela and Carmen which allowed a substantial amount of dance by and between the two women.

 

The star of the show was clearly Osipova, the quality of her movement and dramatic ability shone and it was a delight to experience this in an auditorium smaller than most of those in which I have seen her perform. I was 5 rows from the front and appreciated every nuance that she brought to the stage, particularly the shifts she demonstrated between the private and public persona of her character.

 

Isaac Hernandez as Escamillo showed that he could dance but, given that his character had most of the storyline in the first half, he failed to convince me with his acting. He looked a ballet dancer out of water. This was not helped by having to dance around for part of the time with both holding a camera and with a clapper board slung round his neck (an example of the occasional over telegraphing by the production that reminded me of the postman's sack that Ed Watson had to deal with slung across him while trying to pirouette in the Royal Ballet's Raven Girl also wearing a postman's hat, grasping an envelope and having just jetisoned a postman's bicycle.) Sadly the clapper board made a number of reappearances throughout the evening worn both by Escamillo and by the Cameraman. I may be doing Hernandez an injustice as his character, of lead man and film director, did not seem as strongly written as others.

 

Jason Kittelberger had much more dramatic presence, particularly in the second half where he has more to do, and I felt he was very well cast.

 

Of the other two dancers, Hannah Ekholm made little impression as Michaela next to Osipova; while in contrast, I felt that Eryck Brahmania was outstanding in his trio of roles as Fan, Cleaner and Cameraman, and was just as important a part of the evening as the other two men. For example, he was able to strike exactly the right note in his role as a fan with his wide-eyed eagerness, exaggerated but not overacted.

 

I enjoyed the movement quality and there were two particularly good sections for all 5 dancers together. I am not familiar with Didy Veldman's work but I would go and see more of it. The piece was just 1 hour 45 minutes long with a 20 minute interval though I felt that it could have been run straight through, possibly with even more impact. I am however, influenced both by my admiration for Ashton and his ability to shoehorn Chekov and Shakespeare plays (A Month in the Country and The Dream) into miraculously complete storytelling ballets of less than 60 minutes, and by my love for the Mats Ek Carmen set to Shchredrin's reduced Bizet score, Carmen Suite, together a marvellous 50 minutes.

 

I appreciated the music when it more closely echoed the Bizet tunes, but that is maybe the traditionalist in me and I do have a very soft spot for the Bizet music. Most of the solos, pas de deux and group dances seemed to be to a specific BIzet extract while the remainder of the movement was to the newly composed music, which my companion enjoyed much more than I did.

 

The set was well thought out and had long gauze panels hung at the rear of the stage which allowed characters to sometimes be seen at rest while the front stage was occupied by others. In front of the panels there were two butcher hooks that held Carmen's costume changes - a large red cape, a natty Spanish hat and a marvellously ornate ruffled short cape - as well as something that looked like flowered garlands, the point of which I am unclear. There was a long mirror on one side at the rear of the stage, at one moment smeared with mud, or somesuch, by Carmen to telegraph her dissatisfaction, though with what I am still unsure - her image, an actress having to pretend to be something, a woman having to pretend to be someone? (The removal of the mud from the mirror by two stage crew took most of the interval.) The other main prop was a sofa which was initially to the side but on one occasion moved to centre stage to sit all 5 dancers in a group number. The costumes were pared down modern dress with a hint of Spain and in general I thought worked well.

 

The evening was well attended given that social distancing was practiced in the seating arrangements (masks were worn by all, as per the rules set by Nicola Sturgeon  here in Scotland). As Scottish Ballet have just announced the early closing of their Nutcracker show due to the even stricter Covid rules that are about to come into force, this production team must be thanking their lucky stars that the timing worked out for them. It must have been an expensive undertaking to put on such a high quality show for two nights only. I would say that it was a less memorable evening than the previous piece by the team, The Mother choreographed by Arthur Pita, but as that bleak story has a mother gouging out her own eyes in an unsuccessful attempt to get her baby back from Death, it is hard for even the high drama of Carmen to compete.

 

[Shade]

Thanks for these reviews - sounds interesting 

[Sebastian]

On 21/12/2021 at 20:12, SheilaC said:

The concept is ambitious albeit cliched, a play within a play, or more accurately a ballet within a danced play.

For example this device is used in Carlos Saura’s broadly wonderful film Carmen from 1983. Well worth looking at, especially for the magnificent flamenco dancing. 

[Jan McNulty]

4 hours ago, Sebastian said:

For example this device is used in Carlos Saura’s broadly wonderful film Carmen from 1983. Well worth looking at, especially for the magnificent flamenco dancing. 

 

I love that film!!  (As well as Blood Wedding and A Love Bewitched).

[TSR101]

I thought I'd flag that tickets for this at the Southbank Centre are on say (29/30th May I think). 

[PatC]

It’s on at Queen Elizabeth hall May 27th & 28th. Cheap tickets seem to have gone already.

[art_enthusiast]

Looks like the good seats have gone as well

[capybara]

I found last night’s performance (QE Hall) disappointing, to put it mildly. The wonderful dancers were not well-served by repetitive choreography, unclear story-telling and poor technical support. (The recorded music firstly went out of sync with the action, then broke down for a few minutes in Act 1 leaving Isaac Hernandez standing there stranded.)

For much of the time, it felt to me as if the audience was wanting to cheer Osipova in particular but found too little cause to do so.

A great pity, especially as the UK is unlikely to see much of Hernandez in future.

[art_enthusiast]

4 hours ago, capybara said:

I found last night’s performance (QE Hall) disappointing, to put it mildly. The wonderful dancers were not well-served by repetitive choreography, unclear story-telling and poor technical support. (The recorded music firstly went out of sync with the action, then broke down for a few minutes in Act 1 leaving Isaac Hernandez standing there stranded.)

For much of the time, it felt to me as if the audience was wanting to cheer Osipova in particular but found too little cause to do so.

A great pity, especially as the UK is unlikely to see much of Hernandez in future.

I was quite puzzled by that pause in Act 1! He handled it well though.

I found Act 2 much more enticing than the first. The pas de deux/pas de trois between Hernandez/Osipova and Kittelberger/Osipova were extremely exhilarating to watch. I also found the interactions between Kittelberger/Hernandez and Osipova/Eckholm very interesting. However I do agree that the storytelling was a bit unclear, and the production overall did not appear as smooth as it could be. Found the cameraman role portrayed by Eryck Brahmania intriguing, but slightly redundant after a while.

 

It was great to see Osipova's affinity for contemporary dance, as I have only seen her live in classical ballets before.

[FionaM]

I went to the second night at QEH and found it an interesting and entertaining version with something modern to tell us about the well-known Carmen story.  As explained above it’s a story within a story … specifically a film being made of the Carmen story.  So Natalia is both a movie actress and also Carmen. 
 

Loved the inventive contemporary choreography by Didy Veldman, so many interesting moves and of course Natalia was mesmerising.  She was really enjoying herself and both her characters.  Interesting use of the themes from Bizet’s music too.  Good use of video visuals too displayed in an interesting multilayered way.  

 

There were strong performances from all the other dancers, most especially from Jason Kittelberger who I’ve not seen in a narrative dance piece before.  Interestingly in the dancersdiary video, Didy explains that Jason approached her about a project for Natalia, but that it didn’t necessarily need to include himself.  I’m glad she did.   
 

Isaac Hernandez wasn’t much of anything initially as the film director … possibly on purpose … but what a transformation to Escamillo!  Really strong … his shoulders and arms rippling, and his stage presence visibly expanded.  Eryck Brahmania (RBS trained) was expressive as the adoring fan of Natalia the actress.  And Hannah Ekholm had super smooth movements in all her duets with Jason and also with Natalia. 
 

Clever use of the sofa throughout, especially the reference to ‘Friends’.  There was one very brief lighting glitch, but no problems with the music at this second show. There’s a twist to the story at the end 🤫 

In summary, it’s a good show …. I would recommend seeing it if it tours near you.  It plays to Natalia strengths.  👏👏👏

It will also appeal to a much wider dance audience than say ‘The Mother’ which was quite shocking.  If you were looking for something to challenge or wow you, as that did, this is not it.  
 

[Shade]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Fiona. I was there yesterday too and very close to the stage which made it even more exciting. I thought it was clever and liked the production very much. No sound glitches that I noticed. All the dancers were terrific, fully committed. All received well deserved applause.
 

I was with a companion who knew the story but nothing specific about the cast (not a ballet regular) and she was blown away by the show and came away full of enthusiasm.

[Nogoat]

I'm so glad we'd booked both performances of this version of Carmen rather than just the one, as I needed both performances to really appreciate it. 

 

At one extreme, for a sufficiently shallow ballet/performance I'm 'happy' with one viewing (eg The Unknown Soldier); at the other, a sufficiently confusing or impenetrable ballet/performance (eg Tree of Codes) will also only be seen once. The happy medium for both producers and audience alike is where we are satisfied by our initial experience but know we can glean more by going again. A performance is, after all, an act of communication between the stage and the audience - there are stories to be told, reacted to in the moment, mulled over at leisure, and built on with repeated viewings.

 

After the first viewing, Carmen didn't sit in the 'happy medium' of my arbitrary scale. An apparently simple story told by a small cast had been deliberately complicated by being framed and conveyed in at least two different but, frustratingly, not always easy to differentiate ways:- as the filming of the Carmen story and as a parallel interplay between the actors' real lives. The device of mirroring story-telling this way has precedent in the film world - eg The French Lieutenant's Woman - though it's the first time I've seen it used in dance.

 

The deliberate blurring of the boundaries between the two strands - life and art - had been flagged up in the (gorgeous, though variably expensive [£10 on Friday, £15 on Saturday]) programme, but trying to keep track of the switches on stage (with minimal use of props), yet alone the changing relationships between both the actors and their characters, proved rather frustrating. 

 

In fact, another layer of complexity was thrown into the mix on opening night. A slow-motion celebration/birthday party for the director/Escamillo character (Hernandez) was interrupted by him clapping his hands and shooing the cast off-stage. Was he interrupting a 'take' of a scene? But a take of what, as I thought this bit was their 'real' life?

He stood there facing the audience, the (recorded) music stopped and started and stopped, voices were heard off-stage. The audience responded and clapped their enthusiastic support for Hernandez. Eventually the whole scene was played out again.

I left the theatre confused - it certainly had the appearance of a glitch, but it also fitted and extended the central concept of blurring boundaries; maybe we were being shown not only the Carmen performance (ie Hernandez as Escamillo) and the 'real life' of the cast and crew of that performance (ie Hernandez as the director), but also the actual cast being coached/rehearsed (ie Hernandez as Hernandez) on the night. Were we part of the performance as well?

 

All I can say is that the clouds parted and all became clear in the second performance. I was able to follow just about every strand of the complex and changing relationships playing out on stage between the two 'layers' of reality presented to us (the 'third layer' didn't reappear - it was just a glitch on opening night - though I was strangely disappointed when it didn't happen, as I think that 'accident' on the first night added a very interesting, if at the time confusing, dimension to the central, recursive conceit of the staging - stories within stories within stories). 

 

I really hope that Carmen pops up on Sky Arts at some point, as The Mother did back in those halcyon pre-covid days. If it does, and if anyone were to ask me if it's worth watching, I would say 'No - don't watch it, watch it twice; once to get your head around the plot and the second time to really enjoy what it has to offer.'

The closest comparison I can think of is with the film The Usual Suspects; a multi-layered, labyrinthine, roller-coaster of a film with an incredible plot twist at the end. I just about followed it on first viewing, but the real rewards came from repeat viewings. In fact, that analogy is a bit closer than I first thought as there is also a really good twist at the end of Carmen. I won't say what it is, but I was struck how death, in life and art, in reality and fiction, is mirrored/inverted - very clever indeed!

 

And what of the music? Having seen Frank Moon and Dave Price perform the music to The Mother live, I was slightly disappointed that Moon was not listed in the programme and that the music was pre-recorded. I had also assumed that Price was more a session player than a composer, so I was pleasantly surprised to find the music was similar in style to those earlier works. As with the plot, I was taken more by the music second time round than first; familiarity breeds content?! I thought the music for Jose's jealousy/breakdown/paranoia scene worked particularly well - I could just imagine that pounding, pressurised, heartbeat rhythm pushing him relentlessly towards the abyss and the tragedy that followed.

 

And what of Osipova in this production of Carmen? Is this a vanity project and, if so, whose vanity is it satisfying?

Her trajectory since leaving the Bolshoi has allowed her to expand her dance horizons - in the more classical repertoire through MacMillan and Ashton at the ROH, and in the contemporary sphere through, amongst other things, new works in collaboration with Vasiliev, Polunin and now Kittelberger.

While we may be moved to tears by her in Giselle, Manon, etc she has said she 'is not a robot' and needs to develop not just repeat; and I really think for her it is 'needs to' rather than 'wants to', it's that fundamental to her - after all, we don't 'want' to breathe, 'want' to eat, 'want' to drink, we 'need' to.

This need to explore, to push at the boundaries is an integral part of who she is as a dance-actress, as a 'creative'. And, hey, dancers gonna dance, creatives gonna create, and spectators gonna spectate. As a 'spectator' I just love seeing her as a 'dancer', almost regardless of whatever vehicle the 'creative' has assembled (packed theatres suggest there are many thousands like me). So, I think it's necessity rather than vanity.

That's not to say my awe of her is completely uncritical. The nadir of those vehicles was probably Narcissus and Echo with Polunin (though she still managed to grace the stage, er, gracefully). On the other hand, I'm happy to argue the toss about the merits of pieces like Passo (with Vasiliev) which many panned but I thought quite complex beneath the surface.

However, the best pieces, for me, have come from her collaboration with Pita. The Mother is the perfect vehicle for her as it plays to her uncanny ability to unite body and soul - it melds the visceral with the emotional, the physical privations of the mother with the unrelenting love for her child. Facada has a similarly deep vein running through it of the emotional made messily physical. 

 

It is, of course, essential that new works are commissioned and performed, and creating work around established stars is one way to help deliver these new works economically. I guess there's a bit of a symbiotic relationship between the dancer and choreographer; Osipova needs to push the boundaries and choreographers need established stars to make their works viable.

It's questionable how many of these pieces will stay the course, especially when those have been created for a particular person. Mind you, it's questionable how many of the large productions from the last decade will stay the course (yes, The Dante Project, I'm looking at you!).

It's easy to get lulled into a false sense of security. When looking around at the classical repertoire, we only see the fraction that managed to stay the course. The only difference between the old and the new (and the source of much argument around the time that new seasons are announced) is that with new work we get to see the evolution of dance in action - with all the messy, but necessary, wastage that entails. And, as with all things, only time will tell if this Carmen survives to dance another day.

 

 

 

[Sebastian]

11 hours ago, Nogoat said:

An apparently simple story told by a small cast had been deliberately complicated by being framed and conveyed in at least two different but, frustratingly, not always easy to differentiate ways:- as the filming of the Carmen story and as a parallel interplay between the actors' real lives. The device of mirroring story-telling this way has precedent in the film world - eg The French Lieutenant's Woman - though it's the first time I've seen it used in dance.

Thank you for for a most thought-provoking post Nogoat, a lot to chew on.
 

As an addendum to your comment re the story-telling device, this has in fact been used in dance at least once before, as it happens in an adaptation of Carmen. Carlos Saura’s marvellous (indeed award-winning) flamenco film of Carmen, very well worth seeing, uses a similar dual narrative. Here are some details:

 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085297/

 

Edited May 31, 2022 by Sebastian

[capybara]

Super review Nogoat. Thank you. I think I might have got more out of this ballet had I read what you have said before I watched it myself.

[Nogoat]

 

While following 'official advice' to prepare for the upcoming Like Water for Chocolate by watching the (3 hours of!!! 😲) Insight Evenings on YouTube, we came across an interesting and, at 8 mins, refreshingly short Making of Carmen video - at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE8eJUPsTzQ

 

I just wish I'd seen it before attending the two performances at the weekend!

 

I'd wondered at those performances how much of what I'd labelled as a 'self-doubt' sequence (where Osipova-the-actress, after being 'mobbed' by the adoring fan, uses greasepaint to 'cancel' her image in the mirror) reflected aspects of her own personality, especially given the dramatic way her Swan Lake performance on March 3rd unfolded (my account of it here). If deliberate, it would make it an incredibly open, honest and personal part of this version of Carmen - especially as the work predates that particular Swan Lake performance.

 

There may be equally insightful interviews in the UK press (but as most are behind paywalls I wouldn't know), but there's an open (in more ways than one) article from about three weeks after that Swan Lake - at https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/5270658 - that reveals the very human side of this superhuman performer.

It's in Russian, but if Chrome doesn't translate it immediately, then right-clicking and choosing 'Translate to English' provides readable copy.

Even though the translation appears stilted in places, reading her account of the night and recalling my own memories made me feel even more for her, and for the art that enthralls the both of us.

 

[annamk]

Nogoat, thank you for posting the video and for your fascinating review. I also wish I'd seen the video before the performance, everything would have been much clearer. 

 

I enjoyed the evening; it was an interesting concept, attractively staged and well danced. I liked seeing Osipova with non Royal Ballet dancers, particularly Kittelberger and Hernandez. The latter's emotional intensity was something of a revelation in this and he danced beautifully, as he always does. It seemed to me that Osipova is now more comfortable in the grounded contemporary dance style. I preferred Act 2 and particularly enjoyed the pdd between Osipova and Kittelberger.