Opernhaus Zurich, 2016
Alain Altinoglu, Dmitri Tchernaikov, Corinne Winters, Kyle Ketelsen, Jacques Imbrailo, Brindley Sherratt, Damien Göritz, Yvonne Naef, Charles Dekeyser, Reinhard Mayr
BelAir - Blu-ray
There's no excuse really for not doing something creative and original with a work as unique and enigmatic as Pelléas et Mélisande. The story is deceptively simple on the surface, but it does have complex undercurrents that don't necessarily translate easily to anything obviously contemporary, so it demands an imaginative response. You would certainly expect a director like Dmitri Tcherniakov to find a new and modern way of looking at the work and for this 2016 Zurich production he employs a similar approach in look and feel that he has employed in other recent productions - in Carmen at Aix-en-Provence, in Les Troyens at the Paris Opera - which is to say an openly psychoanalytical approach.
When I say 'openly' that means that the director doesn't just place emphasis on the overt symbolism that is there throughout Pelléas et Mélisande, but he actually has a therapist up there on the stage, and - as with Don José in Carmen, and Dido in Les Troyens - he uses that figure as a way of drawing a character out of a deep trauma through psychoanalysis. Mélisande is and has always been a fascinating character to explore, very much a damaged figure, and Tcherniakov wouldn't be the first to see Mélisande as an abused female controlled by men (see Katie Mitchell's 2016 Aix-en-Provence production), but there's always the danger of a director (or the therapist) rationalising and explaining too much of the enigmatic mystery of the opera.
So in Dmitri Tcherniakov's production, Mélisande is not found in a forest, but led into a brightly-lit modern office or stylish living room in a state of deep shock. Her therapist, Golaud tries to get her to relive or reveal the deep-rooted cause of her distress, telling her to imagine sitting by a pool of water. A man approaches. How do you feel? ("Ne me touchez-pas!"). Why are you crying? Has someone harmed you? It's a perfect fit that captures the circularity of Mélisande's condition. We don't know what trauma this young woman has experienced, but the suggestion is that it's probably something similar to what she is about to go through again in Allemonde.
Suggestion is the key word here. It doesn't need to be explicitly stated because it's already hinted at in Debussy's score, not least in its ability to almost control, halt, shift and suspend notions of time. The Mélisande we discover at the end of the work is in a similar condition to the one we see at the start. It's almost as if she has been wiped clean by Golaud, by his authoritative 'therapist-like' manner, but the trauma remains buried deep and resurfaces as she experiences what we imagine must be similar conditions of mistreatment, abuse, mistrust, possessiveness and control. Tcherniakov's way into Pelléas et Mélisande respects the enigma of the work, finding - in combination with the music under Alain Altinoglu's direction - that unique and slightly sinister character of the piece.
As a concept it's an interesting proposition, but it still remains a challenge to develop it. Initially, when the therapist marries his patient and brings her home, it looks like Golaud's family are slightly alarmed at the idea, but soon they also start to put other dubious methods of practice into the treatment of Mélisande. Even Pelléas seems to treat her more as an object of curiosity or a case study furthering Golaud's experiments by practicing hypnosis on the young woman, placing her mentally rather than physically in those dark places that Maeterlinck describes in the original work. We already assume these are metaphorical in the work anyway, so whether that is following the idea through or overly spelling it out is debatable.
While it is fascinating to approach the work this way, personally I tend towards the latter view. It's not so much a case of Tchernaikov over-explaining the work as detracting from its mystery. Tcherniakov's approach towards demystification can produce interesting results in works like Dialogues des Carmélites or Macbeth, but it does tend to take away a little from works that have what some would see as more of a spiritual dimension (Parsifal, Tristan und Isolde). While there's no doubt that at heart Pelléas et Mélisande is a domestic drama as much as Macbeth is, those works also have an extraordinary way of describing or suggesting deeper undercurrents and complex emotions, and that is something that you can't afford to lose in this work.
Some mystery and ambiguity remains inevitably, as Tcherniakov can't quite fit the remainder of the work to his psychoanalytical approach, but it does tend toward the view of Mélisande being in an abusive relationship but under a kind of enchantment that prevents her from leaving. Golaud certainly lives up to this reading to a large extent, although Tcherniakov underplays some of the situations, making it more of a game play, which makes it all a little more sinister. Pelléas isn't quite the young innocent here, but controlling also, putting images in Mélisande's head. Mélisande is reduced to a shattered woman, walking around in a horrified troubled daze for most of the opera, which takes away somewhat from a more nuanced and dynamic view of her character.
Fortunately the singing performances are all exceptional, working with this conception of the work but also finding ways to express that more nuanced aspect that is suggested in Debussy's score. I'd go even as far as to say that all the principals are perfect matches for Debussy's score, having a wonderful lyrical enchantment with a darkly sinister or troubled edge. That's always the case with Jacques Imbrailo as Pelléas, but Corinne Winters is also impressive despite having her range of dramatic expression restricted and Kyle Ketelsen is an intriguing Golaud. All of them do find interesting ways of expression that is brought out by Tcherniakov's direction.
If there's some degree of magical enchantment taken out of the work and its dark Allemonde locations, Tcherniakov nonetheless comes up with a very stylish decor for the set that has its own sense of attractive entrapment. It all looks pretty good too in HD in the BelAir Blu-ray release with High Resolution soundtracks in LPCM 2.0 and DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1. There are no extras other than a booklet notes interview with Dmitri Tcherniakov, a synopsis and a full trackisting. The Blu-ray disc is all-region and has subtitles in English, French, German, Spanish, Korean and Japanese.
Links: Opernhaus Zurich
