Auteur : Johan Uytterschaut
Let me be brief: what Kevin Puts wrote for The Hours doesn’t convince me. I have been making the same remarks before: quite a few new opera composers go their way with one of the finest orchestras in the world, and they make it understood that there lies their expertise. But when it comes down to matching the regularities of music theatre with this orchestral writing, they have to own up. In the best case, they familiarised themselves with the Stimmfach of the singers they are writing for. The dramatic added value, however, is more than often grossly neglected. In the specific case of The Hours, the protagonists, when interviewed, have a very clear opinion: it is paramount that their character’s emotional subtext is balanced musically. We can only agree with that. If only we could get to hear it… It is all too easy to use the parallel between the three women in this story as a pretext to treat their singing stiles simply as branches of the same tree. Never the less, this is exactly what Puts does: there is no significant difference between the types of phrases sung by Virginia Woolf, Laura Brown and Clarissa Vaughan.
As a matter of fact, the whole score suffers from that same problem. We are being treated to a few recurrent themes that aren’t however applied in a pertinent way. On the other hand we have an on and off of loose ideas, sometimes attractive in themselves, but otherwise meaningless for lack of elaboration.
Is the Metropolitan’s production (signed Phelim McDermott) able to offer a remedy? Alas. More about the singers later on. The innate dramatic qualities that also support Steven Daldry’s fine motion picture (fine, apart from the completely irrelevant score by Philip Glass) contain ample material to put to work someone like Benjamin Britten, whose operas are mostly treated with an apt economy of means. Nothing of the sort in this instance. I don’t have a problem with the combining of contrasting platforms. But what on earth are those ballet dancers doing there? Except being a waste of space? This is another typical example of dramatic anaemia being camouflaged by irrelevant ballast. There is, all told, one scene wherein the dancers have some use: the ageing of Laura Brown. I think that could have been solved otherwise.
What keeps this production afloat is the cast’s quality. I shall limit myself to the three central female characters. Renée Fleming had some part in the birth of this opera, an the part of Clarissa Vaughan is written for her. It is her reappearance at the Met after a few years, and I cannot but admire how she succeeds in making a consummate professional vocal appearance, certainly when taking her age in account. I have always looked at her as “the queen of her generation”, and I still have no reason to change my mind. Kelli O’Hara has been exploring the world of musical comedy for some time, fitting admirably in it with her silvery voice; casting her as the slightly mundane Laura Brown was a excellent choice. She makes her part into a house of trust. For the part of the tragically melancholy Virginia Woolf, Joyce DiDonato’s mezzo is fully apt. She stands her ground admirably in the middle and lower range of her voice. But I cannot, for the world of me, understand why, these last years, she keeps making the same technical mistake when passing to the upper range (for the connoisseur: wrong use of the upper lip), resulting in an annoying wobble. Avoidable, therefore quite unfortunate.
This being said, the three ladies gave a valued acting performance, which can also be stated for the rest of the cast; a single odd caricature notwithstanding.
Conclusion: Kevin Puts’ The Hours is a missed opportunity. A more thoroughly elaborated score with more economy of means could have yielded a most interesting result.
The sheer size of The MET as an auditorium, and the size of the stage area are extremely problematic in terms of staging. It is in no way an intimate house. To reach the audience in the Family Circle (5th Balcony) and to fill the stage, directors often have to fill the stage with a clutter of people and things. When I saw Muhly's 'Two Boys' there some years back, my impression was that the story got totally lost in an overly busy stage. Ditto Muhly's 'Marnie'. I'm amazed that The MET even does smaller 18th Century works, where the vastness of the house definitely works against size and content.
Was just watching the video of 'Cosi Fan Tutte' as staged by Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker at the Paris Opera (Palais Garnier which has an even vaster stage!) where excellent dancers seem to be present for no other reason than to fill space.