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With audio description

Carmen

Georges Bizet (1838 – 1875)

06
Friday
September
19:30 - 22:30
C prices: € 108.00 / 90.00 / 64.00 / 40.00 / 26.00
Information about the work

Opéra comique in four acts by Georges Bizet
Libretto by Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy,
based on a novella by Prosper Mérimée
First performed on 3rd March 1875, in Paris
Premiered at the Deutsche Oper Berlin on 20th January 2018

3 hrs / 1 interval

In French with German and English surtitles

Pre-performance lecture (in German): 45 minutes prior to each performance

recommended from 14 years
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Cast
Our thanks to our partners

Kindly supported by Förderkreis der Deutschen Oper Berlin e. V. The children's chorus is sponsored by Dobolino e.V.

06
Friday
September
19:30 - 22:30
C prices: € 108.00 / 90.00 / 64.00 / 40.00 / 26.00
Cast
the content

About the work
Georges Bizet’s titular heroine is as captivating a character as any in the history of opera. The different interpretations of Carmen are legion: we have the seductress, the personification of forbidden yearning, the standard bearer for the “eternally female” in the brutal battle of the sexes, the anarchist unfettered by bourgeois angst and compulsions, the archaic clairvoyante seeing her own death in the cards - yet free, as she does not dread her destiny. Few opera heroines are so open to interpretation and hence so able to serve as a mirror held up to society.

With CARMEN Bizet was throwing down the gauntlet to Romantic opera. His naturalistic presentation of a proletarian milieu with its poverty and crime was a direct challenge to the conventions of opera. It is a setting in which Don José’s dreams are doomed to be dashed. His fixation on Carmen sucks him into a pit of wretchedness and felony and he persistently rejects his chance to lead a steady, secure life with Micaëla the peasant girl.

This clash of principles – feminine versus masculine; bourgeoisie versus anarchy – is illustrated by the bullfighting scene, which is much more than a colourful bit of folklore used as a backdrop to the storyline; it is a gory ritual involving the survival of the fittest, where no quarter is given.


About the production
In his version Norwegian director Ole Anders Tandberg has embraced the unique blend of great opera, working-class tragedy and overstoked operetta. He packs his triumphant ramped-up production with emotional realism, bloody corrida symbolism and grotesque, Tarantino-esque scenes of absurd cruelty. And the iconic character of the work is playfully reflected in the opulent Andalusian garb of Carmen and Escamillo.

Tandberg is interested in the eponymous heroine’s openness and the mystery surrounding her. He sees in her not just the seer, the anarchist or the focus of male gaze but also a person playing these different roles for fear of emotional injury, a woman who is led by Don José’s true love to glimpse, at least for isolated moments, behind the façade of her own Carmen poses.

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12
DEC

Adventskalender im Foyer: Das 12. Fensterchen

Today in the foyer: ‘The Snow Queen’ as a live audio play
A reading with Burkhard Ulrich and Fanny Frohnmeyer, with Lukas Zeuner on the drums
5:00 p.m. / Parkettfoyer
Duration: approx. 25 minutes / Free admission


‘Behold! Now we begin. When we reach the end of the story, we will know more than we do now, because it was an evil goblin! It was one of the very worst, it was the devil! One day he was in a good mood because he had made a mirror that had the property of making everything good and beautiful reflected in it shrink to almost nothing, but what was no good and looked bad was emphasised and became even worse. The most magnificent landscapes looked like overcooked spinach in it, and the best people became disgusting or stood on their heads without a torso,’ so begins the fairy tale “The Snow Queen” by Hans Christian Andersen.

By an unfortunate accident, a splinter of this evil magic mirror jumps into Kay's heart , whereupon he suddenly finds life in his small town quite awful and lets himself be taken by the nasty Snow Queen to the far north. But Kay's friend Gerda sets out to save her best friend. With the help of a crow and a reindeer, she eventually finds her way to the cold north of Lapland and, with the true power of friendship and laughter, she is able to free Kay from the clutches of the Snow Queen.

Today, in the foyer, the tenor Burkhard Ulrich and the director of our Junge Deutsche Oper Fanny Frohnmeyer read this touching and wonderful fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen for all fairy tale fans, old and young! And our percussionist Lukas Zeuner provides the sound for the story with marimbas, a xylophone and all kinds of rhythm and sound instruments. And all this live and very close to the audience, next to the large fir tree in the parquet foyer.