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Chris from Lafayette

I finally got around to watching the blu-ray recording of this 2012 Bavarian State Opera production of Dvorak's great opera, Rusalka. The impetus for my purchase was that it starred Latvian soprano, Kristine Opolais (formerly the wife of BSO conductor Andris Nelsons - looks like they divorced in 2018), a compelling singer not only for her accomplished vocal qualities, but also for her photogenic physical appearance and her acting ability as well.

In the event however, it doesn't really make any difference, because, here, we have yet again a production which does not respect in the least the explicit wishes and stage directions of Dvorak and his librettist, Jaroslav Kvapil, whose original tragic fairy-tale story about a water sprite's love for a human prince is ignored. In this production, the good hearted world in which Rusalka, her father, and her sister water sprites exist is replaced by the all too common perversions of today's headlines - something which I'm sure that Dvorak could not even conceive of. Instead of the water sprites' frolicking in the river at the beginning of the opera, we're subjected to a foul, vile environment, in which Rusalka's father (a sympathetic character in the original) is some kind of child-molester pervert who imprisons Rusalka and her sister water sprites in the flooded basement of his house to use as molestation fodder for his for his own sexual depravities. In one scene, he strokes his own penis in anticipation of future perversions. In a later scene, the prince simulates standing sex with the foreign princess as Rusalka is forced to look on.

The question for me is how such deviants as the director in this production have managed to attain positions in so many major opera houses in Western Europe and the US. And moreover, how is it that so many listeners and viewers in the West seem to be OK with the degeneracy evidenced in these Euro-trash stagings. You can see from some of the comments on Amazon that some folks had long been bored with the "traditional" staging called for in the score by Dvorak and Kvapil. What delicious ennui these listeners suffered! And how eager they were for a production which would shake them out of their own lethargy. And how wonderful to display our Western "values" of tolerance for "anything goes" by promoting these kinds of debauched stage spectacles.

In a way though, this production simply continues the kind of stagings I've written about before, such as the final scene of Aida, where, as Aida and Radames are put to death, Amneris searches the internet for porn. Or the Dutch production of Rimsky-Korsakov's "Invisible City of Kitezh" where a Jim Jones massacre is recreated on stage. And, BTW, if somebody wants to show this kind of sexual decadence on stage, I say, fine! Go ahead! Just don't impose this degeneracy on the innocent story line of Dvorak's original opera. Well of course the depraved directors don't want to do that - they want to use the deserved fame and high quality of Dvorak's artistic creation merely as a vehicle to get themselves some cheap notice as "mavericks" or whatever.

To tell the truth, I was so disgusted by this Rusalka staging that I had to quit before making it all the way through. Of course, it's not a total loss, because one can simply shut off the picture and listen to the (MCh) soundtrack. But one thing I can tell you with absolute certainty: if Dvorak had seen the production on this blu-ray disc, he would have thrown up. Truly disgusting.

Classical Court

A new low, even for Eurotrash productions

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