{"id":100124,"date":"2018-04-27T12:45:09","date_gmt":"2018-04-27T18:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/on-saturday-morning-the-met-will-spin-a-satirical-tale\/"},"modified":"2018-04-27T12:45:09","modified_gmt":"2018-04-27T18:45:09","slug":"on-saturday-morning-the-met-will-spin-a-satirical-tale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/on-saturday-morning-the-met-will-spin-a-satirical-tale\/","title":{"rendered":"On Saturday morning, the Met will spin a satirical tale"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The MET: Live in HD will be streaming \u201cCendrillon,\u201d which will be shown Saturday at Fort Lewis College.<\/span>Courtesy of The Metropolitan Opera<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

At two hours and 47 minutes running time, the French Cinderella will not be late to the ball.<\/p>\n

By any measure, the Metropolitan Opera\u2019s smart, tart production of \u201cCendrillon\u201d is short. You can see it livestreamed at 11 a.m. this Saturday at Fort Lewis College.<\/p>\n

The MET Live in HD will transmit its final performance of the season to the dark and comfy Vallecito Room. This particularly innovative production of Jules Massenet\u2019s 1899 \u201cCendrillon\u201d premiered in 2006 in our own backyard, the Santa Fe Opera. Since then, French director Laurent Pelly\u2019s fresh take on an old tale has been mounted all over the world. The companies that originally collaborated to make it all happen include London\u2019s Royal Opera House, Barcelona\u2019s Gran Teatre del Liceu, Brussels\u2019 Theatre Royal de La Monnaie and Opera de Lille.<\/p>\n

Massenet\u2019s interpretation is the familiar story of a poor working girl who meets her prince charming. But the century-old opera has a new look and a clock that keeps ticking. Thanks to smarty-pants director Pelly, the hearth-to-palace fiction broadly winks at a fantasy that has mesmerized Western women for centuries.<\/p>\n

What makes it so different?<\/p>\n

Having seen the Santa Fe production starring the same star that continues to endear audiences to Cinderella, I can say confidently, it\u2019s Pelly\u2019s satirical world view.<\/p>\n

At every turn, the director sends up fairy tale stereotypes. Everything is exaggerated.<\/p>\n

First, he imagines a literal storybook. Set Designer Barbara de Limburg delivers oversize pages as a backdrop filled with French text. Pages turn, doors open. Some props wear labels. Cendrillon\u2019s carriage is not a Disney pumpkin. Here, it\u2019s elegant, white and carries huge letters that spell the French word for carriage, carrosse. The horses (upright dancers who sport horse heads) wear white suits covered in more text. You know you\u2019ve arrived at the palace because the gate spells: The doors of the PALACE.<\/p>\n

Costumes are also satire. The evil stepsisters and stepmother wear gauche red dresses with huge, poufy bustles and narrow, constricting skirts. Choreographer Laura Scozzi enhances the fun by underscoring how idiotic clothing defines movement. Clattering, stilted movements of all the princess-wannabes tell another story and bring back the days of high heels and tight skirts. In Pelly\u2019s world, nothing escapes the satirist\u2019s eye.<\/p>\n

The title role now belongs to Joyce DiDonato. She can sing with a purr or rocket her arias to the starry sky. It\u2019s all ease and beauty. The role of Prince Charming will be sung by mezzo-soprano Alice Coote, who starts out as a sulky teenager and ends in a tuxedo to claim a princess. Kathleen Kim is the supersonic Fairy Godmother, a shade away from Mozart\u2019s Queen of the Night. Another MET-Santa Fe favorite, Stephanie Blythe, will sing the role of the stepmother, Madame de la Haltiere, and get to display her comic chops in the process. The dry-witted father, Pandolfe, will be sung by Laurent Naouri. Poor guy, someone ought to write an opera about him. And Conductor Bertrand de Billy will shepherd the whole fantasy forward as he has all over the world.<\/p>\n

The Met\u2019s \u201cCendrillon\u201d is contemporary comic opera at its best. If you missed the Santa Fe production, here\u2019s a chance to see its dazzling offspring.<\/p>\n

Judith Reynolds is an arts journalist and member of the American Theatre Critics Association. <\/em><\/p>\n

\n

If you go<\/h4>\n

WHAT:
\n The MET: Live in HD presents Massenet\u2019s \u201cCendrillon,\u201d directed by Laurent Pelly, conducted by Bertrand de Billy.
\n WHEN:<\/strong>
\n 10:55 a.m. Saturday.
\n WHERE:<\/strong>
\n Vallecito Room, Fort Lewis College Student Union.
\n TICKETS:<\/strong>
\n $23 general, $21 seniors, students and Met members, available online at
\n www.durangoconcerts.com<\/a>
\n , by phone at 247-7657, at the Welcome Center at Eighth Street and Main Avenue, or at the door. Note: Surcharges may apply.
\n MORE INFORMATION:<\/strong>
\n Running time: 2 hours, 47 minutes, four acts, one intermission. Sung in French with English subtitles.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Massenet\u2019s \u2018Cendrillon\u2019 is all French all the time<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":100125,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5843],"tags":[5252],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-100124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-living","tag-classical-music"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100124\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100124"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=100124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}