“Proust ou les intermittences du coeur”
Paris Opera Ballet
Palais Garnier
Paris, France
May 30, 2009
by Leigh Witchel
copyright © 2009 by Leigh Witchel
Even without any madeleines in sight to dip into it, Roland Petit’s ballet adaptation of Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time” wasn’t my cup of tea. But even at his most indulgent, Petit kept things moving. The audience always came first.
I have not read the series of novels by Proust, though I assume that Proust was able to color his thoughts with more subtlety in words than anyone could manage in choreography. I write here about Proust as Petit sees him. Petit avoids boiling down the plot, opting instead for a series of character sketches. We see the young Proust and Albertine, Swann and Odette, Morel with Charlus and St. Loup as well as a few dances Petit creates out of whole cloth.
The ballet, made in 1974 for Petit’s company in Marseille and acquired by Paris two years ago, is in two acts. The first is Proust’s images of Paradise, the second his images of Hell. The curtain rose on a salon with a singer performing Reynaldo Hahn’s “L’Heure Exquise.” (The musical performances at the Opera are always worthy of the ticket price.) An interlude with two young dancers in white symbolized innocence, but of the most demanding and tricky kind. As well as Proust, the young man’s costume and the complex choreography recalled Lifar’s “Suite en Blanc.” The couple, Ludmilla Pagliero and Josua Hoffalt, had a shaky time of it.
Swann (Bruno Bouché) and Odette (Christelle Granier) danced a passionate duet augmented by three men. There was a clear dynamic in their dance; it was obvious he worshipped her, and also that he was wildly jealous. The most telling moment was at the end when Swann set Odette spinning like a porcelain ballerina on a jewel box. He could worship her like a perfect doll, but he couldn’t love her.
The scene shifted to the seaside where Eleanora Abbagnato as Albertine led a frolicking group of girls in white. Abbagnato is a raving beauty and looked much more spirited than I have seen her previously. The young Proust, Benjamin Pech, came on the scene. They met again later when Pech returned for a soliloquy worshipping Albertine as she lay asleep on a bolt of white silk. She roused briefly and their dance contained all his thwarted desire. She tried to walk away from their desperate relationship; he held her ankles and inched along on his back.
The passion is even more twisted in Act II, Proust’s Hell. Morel is transposed from being a violinist (though that’s referenced in mime) to a virtuoso dancer. Stéphane Bullion gave a robust performance as an audience of men in white tie and tails applauded and his admirer Charlus (Aurélien Houette) mimed his admiration.
The next two scenes set to Saint-Saëns showed in detail the downfall of Charlus: first, his taunting and humiliation by Morel in a whorehouse and then Charlus’ inciting of a group of laborers to assault him. Similarly to Neumeier’s ballet adaptation of “Death in Venice,” a complicated and poetic sexual obsession got stripped of its words to express its complexity and became reduced to the downfall of a Doomed Queen. In consolation for losing words, we did get to see Morel take off his silk robe with his back to us. There’s full dorsal nudity, though his genitals remained artfully concealed.
Petit went farther in the next scene, a counterpart to the idealized duet in Act I. One topless woman (Peggy Dursort) and three men in dance belts performed an arty sex number in silhouette worthy of the Crazy Horse Saloon. I say that with some admiration. Even at his most prurient, Petit still has craft and minimal angst given the angst-ridden subject. This was here for our viewing and they wisely used a girl who’d look good topless. Kindly, she was allowed to take her bows at the final curtain in a flesh-toned sports bra.
Morel returned in the next scene for a love/combat duet in flesh toned tights with St. Loup, the handsome Florian Manganet. The ballet returned to a salon for the finale, with Béatrice Martel’s Duchesse as an icy and controlling mistress of ceremonies. Even though the ballet’s now 35 years old, zombies never go out of style, and so the ending in which all the denizens of the salon become kohl-eyed zombies is back in fashion (Evidently Eifman stole this for his Onegin.) Though Petit’s professionalism can’t save him, throwing caution to the wind and having a brain-eating orgy in the salon might have. (Proust! Zombies! BRAAAAAIIIINSSS!)
Petit’s demanding and exposing choreography has an academic rigor to it that’s very French. He packed a lot of Proust and theater in just over two hours, and the production, redesigned for Paris by Bernard Michel is a glorious eyeful. An added bonus of Luisa Spinatelli’s beautiful cream and white Edwardian costumes is seeing how good-looking the company is. The orchestra, directed by Koen Kessels, was exceptional even with the vocalise one could hear sitting close by. Turning Proust into a showy ballet isn’t the most faithful homage to the novels, but it isn’t the dullest by a long shot.
copyright © 2009 by Leigh Witchel
